Critique on “Developing Intercultural Competence in the
Language Classroom”
By Prof. Jonathan Acuña Solano
Sunday, May 24, 2015
Twitter: @jonacuso
Post
172
“The
person who learns language without learning culture risks becoming a fluent
fool” (Bennett, Bennett, & Allen, 2003). And if this sentence is extended
to the learning of literature, we can fully encase the dimension of culture
learning for a better understanding of those others who speak the language that
is being acquired. For this, “intercultural competence refers to the general
ability to transcend ethnocentrism, appreciate other cultures, and generate
appropriate behavior in one or more different cultures” (Bennett, Bennett,
& Allen, 2003) and in its literature, which is part of their cultural
heritage.
What
Bennett, Bennett, & Allen (2003) propose is that culture must be “at the
core of the language curriculum.” Based on their model, called the Development Model of Intercultural
Sensitivity, culture understanding rests on six discernible stages “that
can be explained by principles of constructivism.”
These stages were labeled by Bennett, Bennett, & Allen (2003) as denial, defense, minimization, acceptance,
adaptation, and integration. And
curriculum design should aim at working on culture teaching and comprehension
throughout these six developmental stages differently but coherently since
these can be linked to language development phases.
For
Bennett, Bennett, & Allen (2003) there is a culture learning journey for
learners, who are guided by their instructor, from a Stage I linked to the early-novice language learner all the
way to Stage III connected to the late-advanced
language student. As the authors admit, these stages in language development
are not necessarily a reflection of culture understanding since an early-advanced language learner can be
in a defense level. In addition to this observation, educators are confronted
with the fact that culture-awareness activities must be designed and developed
in accordance to cultural sensitivity. It is a shame that these authors did not
go beyond in their explanation on how literature can be used in a culture
curriculum design that can help students develop culture sensitivity.
If
“it is the apprehension of this subjective culture –temporarily ‘looking at the
world through different eyes’- that underlies the development of intercultural
competence” (Bennett, Bennett, & Allen, 2003), literature can be greatly
exploited in the classroom and vastly appreciated and enjoyed by learners in
very specific levels of their culture and language training. Literature can be
a way to move students from ethnocentric stages towards more ethnorelative
ones, which could help students take great pleasure in novels, poetry, drama,
and short stories written in the target language.
Bennett, J., Bennett, M., & Allen, W. (2003). Developing intercultural competence in the language classroom. In D. L.
Lange
& R. M. Paige (Eds.), Culture as the core: Perspectives on culture in
second language learning. Greenwich, CT: Information Age Publishing.
Sunday, May 24, 2015
