The linguistic and cultural experiences of Portuguese Erasmus+ students during their stay in Ostrava: Challenges and opportunities

Abstract

The study investigates the linguistic and cultural experiences of Erasmus+ students from Portugal at the University of Ostrava in the Czech Republic. Special attention is paid to the chal- lenges encountered by the students in both communication and coping with cultural differences, as well as to their language needs, ways of communicating, attitudes towards the Czech culture, and the role of English in communication. The research tool was a questionnaire covering a number of questions related to the purpose of the study. As the results show, while the intercultural experience was generally enriching and the participants appreciated some interesting aspects of the Czech culture, they were particularly disappointed by the limited number of Czechs able to speak English and some of the academic teachers’ low levels of language proficiency in English. In fact, this is not limited to the lack of language skills, as communication problems can also lead to the perception of the interlocutor as unpleasant and unhelpful.