The Role of Culture in Chinese English Language Curriculum

With the widespread use of English as an international language,the importance of learning English is highly valued and it has become a compulsory course in China.As a lingua franca,English serves as the medium of communication between people who share nether a common native tongue nor a common culture.Learning English facilitates making cross-cultural communication and providing learners the opportunity to understand the outside world.In order to allow English learners to produce the best learning outcomes,the modification of current English language curriculum becomes necessary because there are indeed some problems resulting from its use.As for China,the curriculum is only concerned with the understanding of 'Anglo' cultures and the teaching material and pedagogy are basically imported from western countries.Knowledge about national culture can rarely be found in the textbook.As a result,problems such as students' low motivation in learning English,the threat to learners' national identity and unsatisfactory cross-cultural communication effects emerge.Therefore,in order to solve those problems,we need to examine the role of national culture in the language curriculum because language is an inextricable part of culture and they are closely interrelated.