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com

Procedia Social and Behavioral Sciences 15 (2011) 294–301

WCES-2011

Cultural load in English language textbooks: an analysis of

interchange series
Gholam Reza Zareia *, Mahmood Khalessib
a
English Language Center, Isfahan University of Technology, Isfahan 84156-83111, Iran.
b
Isfahan Department of Education, Isfahan, Iran.

Abstract

This research set out to investigate cultural density in the internationally-distributed textbooks (IDTs) of the English Language,
i.e., Interchange Series (Int. hereinafter). To this end, a model of cultural patterns was formulated to analyze the contents of Int.
The analysis showed that value as one component comprised ‘entertainment, liberal, consumerism, and inculcation of Western
values’. Norm as another component encompassed ‘girlfriend-boyfriend relationship, opposite sex contact or dating, pet-keeping,
and club-dancing’. The next category, i.e., institution involved ‘entertainment, commercial, sports, educational, and
conventional institutions’. The ten sub-components of cultural artifact included ‘occupation, clothes, name, music, sport, art,
celebrity, food, instrument, and education. Overall, the results indicate that textbooks are artifacts which are strongly grounded in
cultural assumptions and biases.
© 2011 Published by Elsevier Ltd. Open access under CC BY-NC-ND license.

Keywords: English language; Culture; Textbooks; Interchange series;

1. Introduction

The dialectical relation between culture and language in general and a foreign language, say, English, in
particular has spawned much discussion among those concerned. For some (e.g., McDervitt, 2004; Pulverness,
2003), language is intertwined with culture and any attempt toward linguistic exchanges requires some kind of
cultural literacy. The idea of culture incorporation into the foreign language contexts is thus granted a position
through a so-called paradigm shift from linguistic competence to communicative competence. The communicative
era of language teaching puts premium on the language learners’ acquiring new cultural frames of reference. These
frames are thought to reflect the target language culture and native speakers as the key elements to the success of
learners. In their extreme stances, communicative competence proponents deem foreign language learning no less
than enculturation, stating that learning another language equals changing in mind and body so as to understand and
be understood (Bex, 1994).
Yet other experts approach the issue of culture in language learning contexts with reservation. Aleptkin (2002)
and Smith (1976) both approve of an intercultural competence which transcends the bounds and limits of native

* Gholam Reza Zarei. Tel.: +98 311 3912843; fax: +98 311 3912836.
E-mail address: [email protected].

1877–0428 © 2011 Published by Elsevier Ltd. Open access under CC BY-NC-ND license.
doi:10.1016/j.sbspro.2011.03.089
 Gholam Reza Zarei and Mahmood Khalessi / Procedia Social and Behavioral Sciences 15 (2011) 294–301 295

speaker model. This is partly because English language has gained a world-wide lingua franca status, whose non-
native speakers already outnumber native speakers. Thus, the global use of the English language necessitates global
cultural awareness rather than mere conformity to the target language culture. In other words, it may be claimed that
the world wide communication through English is instrumentally motivated and involves predominantly non native
speakers’ interactions, thus vitiating the need for a unilateral native model.
Following this line of thought, McKay (2004) and Kachru (1986) suggest that English as an International
Language needs to describe one’s own culture and concerns to others rather than being linked to the culture of those
who speak it. However, the question now raised is whether or not it will be possible to learn English divorced from
culture. Fairclaough (1989) believes that language is not an independent construct but a social institution that creates
and is created by certain forces and structures forming our functions in the society. Thus, learning a foreign
language is a particular way of assimilating into a complex system of categorized experiences, thoughts, behaviors,
modes of interaction of certain people. At this point and with such an inalienable position assumed for culture and
language relation, learning English finds its own strong critics who view it as a means of linguistic imperialism
(Philipson, 1992) or even as an attempt to commit genocide (Skutnab-Kangas, 1999). White (1997) interprets the
role of English in today’s world as the one in which individuals are helpless victims of linguistic and cultural
hegemony. Also, Pennycook (1995) and Swales (1998) talk about linguistic skewedness, ideologies and values
associated with the English language.
Motivated by the concerns that are expressed respecting the cultural consequences of the spread of the English
language, and also by the fact that the issue of language is not natural, neutral and value free, this study was
conducted to cast light over the way culture is manipulated in the Interchange Series. More specifically, the study
attempted to provide a categorized characterization of culture and then apply it to the texts in search for the
associated cultural facets.

2. Methodology

The main focus of this study was to reveal through a certain discursive analysis some social and cultural practices
of English language in the internationally-distributed ELT textbooks. To this end, a model of culture analysis was
developed and then applied to the intended books.

2.1. Model of analysis

Drawing on various socio-linguistically and discursively oriented assumptions (e.g., Fairclough, 1989; Halliday;
1985; van Dijk, 1998), an attempt was made to construct an operational definition of culture, a model which could
best be used to determine the culture quality and quantity of the books. Drawing on Williams' (1983) definition of
culture, an attempt was made to make the definition measurable. The ideas of culture embedded there were
reformulated as those encompassing a number of values that are consolidated as certain norms to be run by
institutions and also manifested as artifacts.
Therefore, the key components of culture derived from the coherently reformulated definition were as follows: 1.
values: 2. norms: 3. institutions: and 4. artifacts. To make the components tangible and operational, values were
assumed to comprise ideas about what in life seems important. This aspect was analyzed through the topics and
subject matters enunciated in each unit of the selected books, representing a specific idea about life. Norms were
considered to involve expectations of how people will behave in various situations. The norms which a society
enforces formally have the status of law and others which are implemented informally are just regulative.
Institutions are the structures of a society (e.g. organizations) through which values and norms are transmitted.
Artifacts refer to the things or aspects of material culture, derived from a culture's values and norms. One important
point to remember is that these patterns categorized under different names are not supposed to be mutually
exclusive. But, sometimes one pattern, for example an idea, may partially account for or be incorporated in another
category, for example a norm, thus being counted in that category as well.
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By critically looking into the Interchange Series, the content of the books was precisely investigated to trace any
probable sub-components of cultural value, norm, institution, and artifact. The subcomponents were then classified
through their major running themes and their frequency rates were determined to show the load of each identified
subcomponent.
To validate the findings and demonstrate the proportions of the cultural load, the frequency and percentage of
both western versus neutral cultural components were compared and contrasted. It must be noted that four analysts
judged the western like or neutral status of the identified categories. Their disagreements were resolved and settled
to 100 percent agreement. This study focuses on the western categories of the cultural components identified and
makes the comparison with total components counted.

2.2. Materials
The Internationally-distributed ELT text books selected for the analysis are listed below.
1. New Interchange Series; Books 1, 2, and 3 by Jack C. Richards (2005) published by Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press. The criteria for the selection of internationally-distributed ELT text books are:
1. These textbooks all represent lower to upper-intermediate four communicative skills. Thus, this series of books
tends not to be simplifying the texts linguistically.
2. They show a strong presence on the market. They are in their third editions. They are also written by a well-
known applied linguist, Jack C. Richards.
3. They have been published by an internationally popular and leading publisher, Cambridge University Press.

3. Results

The analysis of contents of the three volume series of Interchange revealed that the four identified general
constituents of culture subsume a number of different evidential elements (Table 1). As can be seen, ‘value’,
apparently the most basic of all four categories, sets the ground for other ensuing factors to emerge. This is
categorized under four classes which are realized through ‘norm’ with five categories, ‘institution’ with six and
‘artifact’ as the last with the longest list (10) of subcategories.

Table 1: The sub-components of Western cultural patterns

Main Components Value Norm Institution Artifact

1. Entertainment 1. Girlfriend-boyfriend 1. Entertainment 1. Occupation

Sub-Components 2. Liberal relationship 2. Commercial 2. Clothes
3. Consumerism 2. Opposite-sex contact or 3. Sport 3. Name
4. Inculcation of Western dating 4. Food 4. Music
Values 3. Pet-keeping 5. Educational 5. Sport
4. Club dancing 6. Conventional 6. Art
5. Others 7. Celebrity
8. Food
9. Instrument
10. Educational

As shown in table 2, the first category under ‘value’ is identified as ‘entertainment’. It includes human activities
based on pleasure, enjoyment, leisure time activity, listening to the music, going out with the opposite sex friends
(as an example, Sun Hee, a Korean female, invites David Garza, a Mexican male, to cafeteria, …I'm on my way to
cafeteria now. Are you free? David answers: Sure. Let's go. Int. 1, p. 5, sect. 1). This category occurs 12 times and
makes up 51.5 percent of the total value subcategories. The second subcategory is ‘liberal values’, which stands
second in occurrence rate, with 38.2 percent of the total. This subcategory refers to the freedom in opposite sex
 Gholam Reza Zarei and Mahmood Khalessi / Procedia Social and Behavioral Sciences 15 (2011) 294–301 297

contact (for instance, Emily, an American female, asks her boyfriend, Randy, an American male, I heard you have a
new girlfriend, Randy. and he replies, Yes. Her name's Ashley and she is gorgeous!, Int. 1, p. 59, sect. 2), no
limitation to entertainment in club dancing, traveling with opposite sex friends even to other cities, clothes (for
instance, …In the hip-hop style, boys and girls often dress the same way. Int. 1, p. 63, sect. 11), and gaining
autonomy from family, though being too young (for instance, Lamar Andrews, an American boy describes himself
as follows: I'm 16 now, and I don't get an allowance from my parents anymore, Int. 1, p. 13, sect, 12). These are all
cases of liberal values or unlimited liberty focusing on a specific life style peculiar to western culture, of course
from Iranian perspective. The third subcategory ‘consumerism’, which also ranks third in the frequency rate (8.8%),
includes cases of promoting spending and apparent lavish life through new methods of electronic shopping, (for
instance, The World's online Marketplace-eBay! Do you like shopping online?, Int. 1, p. 21, sect. 12) and new types
of food (for instance, …do me a favour and pick up a pizza on his way home?, Int. 3, p. 19, sect. 9) as just two
examples. The last subcategory is ‘inculcation of miscellaneous western values’, specified here as the mere focus
on, for example, western cultural interpretation of gestures and colors as two cases in point, disregarding all other
possibilities (for interpreting body gesture, Ron talks about Raj, an Indian student: …He moves his head from side to
side when you talk to him. … when they agree with you, Int. 2, p. 93, sect. 3; for color interpretation: "Green color"
is interpreted as indicating "jealousy", Int. 1, p. 16, sect. 1 while it is interpreted as "holy" in other cultures, e.g. in
Iran). However, this subcategory has the lowest percentage (1.5%). Also, from among the three volumes of books,
Int. 3 shows the lowest use of value.

Table 2. Frequency & percentage of sub-components of cultural value in IDT books

Sub-components of Int. 1 Int. 2 Int. 3 Total Rank

Value F P F P F P F P
1. Entertainment 12 34.2 12 35.1 11 31.4 35* 51.5 1
2. Liberal 10 38.4 8 30.8 8 30.8 26 38.2 2
3. Consumerism 2 33.3 2 33.3 2 33.3 6 8.8 3
4. Inculcation of Western 0 0 1 100 0 0 1** 1.5 4
values
Total 24* 35.3 23 33.8 21** 30.9 68 100

In all tables: *=The highest F, and **=The lowest F,

Table 3 displays the ‘norm’ based facets of culture identified. As stated above, ‘norm’ indicates how people
should behave in a society. This category shows an increase both in terms of number of subcategories used and also
the total frequency rate, compared with the above stated cultural component of ‘value’ (5 subcategories and total 92
frequency rate). Girlfriend-boyfriend relationship has the highest frequency of use with 37 occurrences (40.2%)
among the five sub-components of cultural norm while ‘others’ as another sub-component of norm has the lowest
frequency of use with 6 occurrences (6.5%). The repeated use of opposite sex norm in the books is probably the
most unwelcomed bias, especially for the societies where this is considered a taboo and forbidden based on moral
judgment. Among IDT books, Interchange 2 has the highest frequency of use of sub-components of cultural norm
with 38 occurrences (41.3%), whereas Interchange 3 has the lowest frequency of use of sub-components of cultural
norm with 21 occurrences (22.8%).
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Table 3. Frequency & percentage of sub-components of cultural norm in IDT books

Sub-components of Int. 1 Int. 2 Int. 3 Total Rank

Norm F P F P F P F P
1. Girlfriend-boyfriend 15 40.5 13 35.1 9 24.3 37* 40.2 1
relationship
2. Opposite-sex contact or 5 25 10 50 5 25 20 21.8 3
dating
3. Pet-keeping 4 18.2 12 54.6 6 27.2 22 23.9 2
4. Club dancing 4 57.1 2 28.6 1 14.3 7 7.6 4
5. Others 5 83.3 1 16.7 0 0 6** 6.5 5
Total 33 35.9 38* 41.3 21** 22.8 92 100

Below as can be seen in table 4, ‘institution’ as the third subcomponent of culture refers to the society based
structures whereby ‘values’ and ‘norms’ are to be delivered. This subcomponent involves six subcategories ranging
from ‘entertainment, commercial, sport, food, educational, to conventional structures. The total use of Western
institution is 73 occurrences. Entertainment Institution has the highest frequency of use with 41 occurrences (56.1%)
among the six sub-components of institution while sport and educational institutions have the lowest frequency of
use with 3 occurrences (4.1%). Among IDT books, Interchange 1 has the highest frequency of use of Western sub-
components of institution with the frequency of 30 (41.1%), whereas Interchange 2 has the lowest frequency of use
of Western sub-components of institution among IDT books (f=20; 27.4%). The important point in this part is that
while ‘education’ and ‘sport’ could be received more acceptably on the part of global learners of the language, one
wonders why these two categories enjoy a negatively oriented picture, having the lowest frequency. This sort of
disposition in the use of cultural patterns undoubtedly arouses some feelings of scepticism and pessimism.
Table 4. Frequency & percentage of sub-components of cultural institution in IDT books

Sub-components of Int. 1 Int. 2 Int. 3 Total Rank

Institution F P F P F P F P
1. Entertainment 19 46.3 15 36.6 7 17.1 41* 56.1 1
2. Commercial 2 14.3 3 21.4 9 64.3 14 19.2 2
3. Sport 3 100 0 0 0 0 3** 4.1 5
4. Food 5 100 0 0 0 0 5 6.9 4
5. Educational 1 33.3 0 0 2 66.7 3** 4.1 5
6. Conventional 0 0 2 28.6 5 41.4 7 9.6 3
Total 30* 41.1 20** 27.4 23 31.5 73 100

Table five presents the last subcomponent of culture, namely ‘artifact’, which is characterized as representing the
cultural objects and materials of any kind used within the particular community or society. The total use of western
artifact is 143. ‘Art’ has the highest frequency of use (f=28; 19.6%) among the ten subcategories of artifact
identified while ‘instrument’ and ‘educational’ artifacts have the lowest frequency of use (f=3; 2.1%). The second
and the third highest frequency rates refer to ‘food’ and ‘music’ artifacts (f= 26 and f=23, respectively). Among IDT
books, Interchange 1 has the highest frequency of use of western subcategories of artifact (f=74; 51.7%), whereas
Interchange 3 has the lowest frequency (f=15; 10.5%). As was the case with ‘institution’ in table 3, ‘education’ in
this cultural subcomponent receives the least attention.
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Table 5. Frequency & percentage of sub-components of cultural artifact in IDT books

Sub-components of Int. 1 Int. 2 Int. 3 Total Rank

Artifact F P F P F P F P
1. Occupation 6 50 2 16.7 4 33.3 12 8.4 6
2. Clothes 8 88.9 1 11.1 0 0 9 6.3 7
3. Name 8 100 0 0 0 0 8 5.6 8
4. Music 19 82.6 0 0 4 17.3 23 16.1 3
5. Sport 13 72.2 4 22.2 1 5.6 18 12.6 4
6. Art 3 10.7 25 89.3 0 0 28* 19.6 1
7. Celebrity 2 15.4 10 76.9 1 7.7 13 9.1 5
8. Food 15 57.7 9 34.6 2 7.7 26 18.1 2
9. Instrument 0 0 3 100 0 0 3** 2.1 9
10. Education 0 0 0 0 3 100 3** 2.1 9
Total 74* 51.7 54 37.8 15** 10.5 143 100
*The highest F, **The lowest F,

Table 6 shows the frequency and percentage of four main western components of culture in the IDT books. The
overall use of main cultural components is 376. Western artifacts are used with the highest frequency (f=143;
38.1%) among the four main components of culture while the western values are used with the frequency of 68
(18.1%). Western norm has the frequency of 92 (24.4%). Western institution has the frequency of 73 (19.4%).
Among IDT books, Interchange 1 has the highest frequency of use of four main Western components of culture
(f=161; 42.8%), whereas Interchange 3 has the lowest frequency of use (f=80; 21.3%). It is interesting to note that
the frequency rate of cultural components declines from the first to the third volume of the books. The general
pattern emerging points to the heavy reliance of the books on the material objects, namely ‘artifacts’ (f=143), which
is highest in comparison with all other cultural subcomponents. This is probably of little wonder if we are right in
claiming that modern society of the west is built around a capitalist philosophy, whereby objective materialistic
change, ownership, and consumption are insatiably desired.
The detailed analysis of all four components and subcomponents (unit by unit analysis) has been presented in
Zarei and Khalessi (2010).

Table 6. Overall frequency and percentage of four main western components of culture

Cultural Components Int. 1 Int. 2 Int. 3 Total Rank

F F F F %
Value 24 23 21 68** 18.1 4
Norm 33 38 21 92 24.4 2
Institution 30 20 23 73 19.4 3
Artifact 74 54 15 143* 38.1 1
Total 161* 135 80** 376 100

4. Conclusion

The analysis of the Interchange series in terms of the cultural load reveals that these instructional materials are
laden with cultural values unique to the Western world. As stated above, some controversial issues such as the
opposite sex relationships have been given special saliency, which are believed to be culturally disruptive and
unconstructive in other societies, especially in Iran. In contrast, there are two important facets, namely, ‘education’
300 Gholam Reza Zarei and Mahmood Khalessi / Procedia Social and Behavioral Sciences 15 (2011) 294–301

and ‘sport’ which have been marginally dealt with. While these two could have been used to mitigate the culturally
undesired issues in these books, unfortunately they have been very narrowly touched and left unexpanded. On the
whole, the general cultural pattern in these books catching one’s eyes features a number of various points incapable
of accommodating the learners’ local cultures. Worse than that, some of the issues raised and exposed there can
even be construed as being negatively affecting the individuals’ social and psychological integrity.
Another general regularity discovered in the three books is that as we proceed along from the first book to the
third, the frequency rate of the cultural subcomponents dwindles down (except for ‘Institution’ having the frequency
of 23 in Int. 2 compared with frequency of 20 in Int. 3). This declining trend in the use of cultural issues requires
some explanations. The first explanation can refer to the fact that advanced cultural conditions, expected to be
manifested in the advanced books, move towards universal homogeneity while the basic ones in the basic books
display radical shifts and deviations. This may in fact imply that people’s conceptualization of the world around is
initiated by the most immediate individualized conditions and later gets globally inclined through time and
maturation. Contrary to this explanation, one may argue that the shrinking proportion of cultural issues in the
advanced volumes arises from the authors’ inattention to such issues at those levels where they have access to some
more miscellaneous ideas for presentation and development. Yet, one far-fetched explanation can go around the idea
that rather advanced levels of cultural issues go very far in their cultural idiosyncrasies, thus being unsuitable for
public presentations.
We need to bear in mind that an adversary relationship between the value system embedded in the books and that
of the language learners can lead to incomprehensibility, misunderstanding or even antipathy on the part of the
learners, thus impeding the ease of learning that language. The learners' prevailing failure can be attributed to the
cultural biases in the books. Vygotsky (1962) says that 'true human communication presupposes a generalizing idea
because thought reflects conceptualized actuality' (pp.6-7). This socio-cultural framework can account for the
learners' feeling of alienation towards the books and also impracticality of the materials, as can be easily evidenced
in the case of most culturally charged examples we have extracted from the Interchange books.
All we can say in relation to our findings is that textbooks are cultural artifacts developed by authors with their
own cultural assumptions and biases. The topical and linguistic contents of the books are necessarily engulfed in the
cultural structures. The cultural density in such books is suggestive of the tacit goal that foreign language learners
need to get acculturated to the target language culture if learning is to be achieved. This is the point which has made
quite a few researchers warn against the spread and expansion of English language whereby the associated cultural
domination is believed to pose threat to the world multiculturalism and integrity (Philipson, 1992) by increasing the
liberal values of western culture (Yarmohammadi, 2004). Some scholars have tried to perceive English as an
International language (e.g., Smith, 1983; Talebinejad & Aliakbari, 2001), and thus purge it of the cultural biases,
but the depth and breadth of the lopsided cultural issues running rampant across the textbooks cannot be obviously
ignored. This has brought about sometimes vehement reactions against the English language as being perilous to the
viability of other languages (Kim, 2002), as a means of suppression and oppression (Pennycook, 1994), as a carrier
of arrogance (Searle, 1983, quoted in Pennycook, 1994), as colonization of mind (Chatterjee, 1993) and finally as
social and linguistic discrimination (Tsuda, 1994).
While there are always opposing voices as to the inclusion or exclusion of the culture in the instructional
materials, a half way suggestion seems to be the deemphasizing of the western tendencies in favor of some more
global issues, thus providing the opportunity for the self promotion of the culturally different individuals.

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