TEMA 4: VALORACIN DEL CONOCIMIENTO DE LAS LENGUAS EXTRANJERAS COMO INSTRUMENTO DE COMUNICACIN ENTRE LAS PERSONAS Y LOS PUEBLOS.

INTERES POR LA DIVERSIDAD LINGSTICA A TRAVS DEL CONOCIMIENTO DE UNA NUEVA LENGUA Y SU CULTURA VALUING THE KNOWLEDGE OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES AS AN COMMUNICATION INSTRUMENT BETWEEN PEOPLE. INTEREST FOR THE LINGUISTIC DIVERSITY THROUGH A NEW LANGUAGE AND ITS CULTURE.

TOPIC OUTLINE
I.
II.

INTRODUCTION: WHY DO WE LEARN LANGUAGES? LANGUAGE AS A MEANS OF COMMUNICATION BETWEEN PEOPLE AND PEOPLES.
The language barrier Multilingualism Vs. Plurilingualism.

III.

INTEREST FOR THE LINGUISTIC DIVERSITY THROUGH THE KNOWLEDGE OF A NEW LANGUAGE AND ITS CULTURE.
The Iceberg Metaphor. Teaching Socio-linguistic contents in the language classroom. The Intercultural approach.

IV.

THE IMPORTANCE OF ENGLISH IN TODAYS SOCIETY.

Reasons why English is flourishing as the world-language Objective standards to establish the reach of a language

BIBLIOGRAPHY Quirk, R. et al. A comprehensive Grammar of the English Language Longman 1985 Language Policy Division, Council of Europe. 2002 Common European Framework for Languages: Learning, Teaching, Assessment. Strasbourg: Cambridge University Press (for the English Edition). Madrid: Anaya (for the Spanish Edition) Crystal, David. 1987 The Cambridge Encyclopaedia of Language. C.U.P. Cambridge. Rose, Chris Intercultural Learning (included in the BBC website www.teachingenglish.org.uk) Claire Kramsch 1993 Context and Culture in Language Teaching OUP, Oxford.

TEMA 4: VALORACIN DEL CONOCIMIENTO DE LAS LENGUAS EXTRANJERAS COMO INSTRUMENTO DE COMUNICACIN ENTRE LAS PERSONAS Y LOS PUEBLOS. INTERES POR LA DIVERSIDAD LINGSTICA A TRAVS DEL CONOCIMIENTO DE UNA NUEVA LENGUA Y SU CULTURA VALUING THE KNOWLEDGE OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES AS AN COMMUNICATION INSTRUMENT BETWEEN PEOPLE. INTEREST FOR THE LINGUISTIC DIVERSITY THROUGH A NEW LANGUAGE AND ITS CULTURE.

TOPIC DEVELOPMENT
I. INTRODUCTION: WHY DO WE LEARN LANGUAGES? Human relations are directly linked to communication, and communication is directly related to languages. Through this syllogism we can state that the more we use the language(s) the more we can relate to different people. However, there are a number of reasons to use, adopt, study or learn a new language such as: To adapt ourselves when living in a country with a different language. To establish financial or trade relationships with foreign enterprises. To get a job/grant in which the knowledge of one or several foreign languages are required. To pass some examinations necessary to get a degree in the different stages of the educative system. To get a more direct access to a foreign culture through literature, cinema, visits, etc in the original language. This last is the most interesting for us as teachers, since we should encourage our students to be interested in the culture of the society of the target language and the learning of the language, not only to pass examinations and tests, but also to know, understand and value that there are many different cultures, many different living systems and that all of them deserve the same respect as our own one. Apart from this, the learning of a language contributes widely to the intellectual development of the individual. In this respect research shows us that students who have learned several languages: develop greater cultural sensitivity toward others. have more developed listening and retention skills. are more creative and display more highly developed thinking skills. will be better prepared to contribute and compete in a global economy. -- 1,261 companies surveyed recently reported 60,687 positions that required fluency in a second language. But, are normal people aware of this importance? Do they really consider the advantages of learning a completely new language? Unfortunately the answer to both questions is NO. Despite the global movement and the enormous increase on communication technologies taking place these days, many people are reluctant to learn a new language, considering it as a barrier for communication. II. LANGUAGE AS A MEANS OF COMMUNICATION BETWEEN PEOPLE.

THE LANGUAGE BARRIER The discovery that language can be a barrier to communication is clearly made by anyone who travels to a foreign country. The lack of a common language is generally seen as halting or, at least, impeding progress. There are several ways of getting around the foreign-language barrier; however, none has yet been entirely successful. The most important ones have been: 1. Translation and Interpretation services (they are useful but expensive. There are some technical terms and cultural concepts very difficult to translate) 2. Invention of an auxiliary language (Esperanto was one of them, however it wasnt successful since everybody has to learn it and there isnt any society or government supporting it) 3. Development of an existing language (that is the case of English nowadays or Latin in the old years. The so-called Lingua Franca is somehow imposed by the economical and military development of a country)

4. Motivate and facilitate the learning of foreign languages. This will be our main concern. In this respect, the Council of Europe has recently made efforts to promote a common linguistic policy through Europe by giving a major priority of the learning of languages in the educative systems. Up to now, the knowledge of a foreign language or culture has been supposed necessary only to travel to a foreign country but considering recent changes in the migration movements, different languages and cultures are coming home. The natural tendency has been to reject the newcomers and to consider them as invasive, but a change of mind claims to be necessary. MULTILINGUALISM AND PLURILINGUALISM What is plurilingualism? In recent years, the concept of plurilingualism has grown in importance in the Council of Europes approach to language learning. Plurilingualism differs from multilingualism, which is the knowledge of a number of languages, or the co-existence of different languages in a given society. Multilingualism may be attained by simply diversifying the languages on offer in a particular school or educational system, or by encouraging pupils to learn more than one foreign language, or reducing the dominant position of English in international communication. Beyond this, the plurilingual approach emphasises the fact that as an individual persons experience of language in its cultural contexts expands, from the language of the home to that of society at large and then to the languages of other peoples (whether learnt at school or college, or by direct experience), he or she does not keep these languages and cultures in strictly separated mental compartments, but rather builds up a communicative competence to which all knowledge and experience of language contributes and in which languages interrelate and interact. In different situations, a person can call flexibly upon different parts of this competence to achieve effective communication with a particular interlocutor. For instance, partners may switch from one language or dialect to another, exploiting the ability of each to express themselves in one language and to understand the other; or a person may call upon the knowledge of a number of languages to make sense of a text, written or even spoken, in a previously unknown language, recognising words from a common international store in a new guise. Those with some knowledge, even slight, may use it to help those with none to communicate by mediating between individuals with no common language. In the absence of a mediator, such individuals may nevertheless achieve some degree of communication by bringing the whole of their linguistic equipment into play, experimenting with alternative forms of expression in different languages or dialects, exploiting paralinguistics (mime, gesture, facial expression, etc.) and radically simplifying their use of language. From this perspective, the aim of language education is profoundly modified. It is no longer seen as simply to achieve mastery of one or two, or even three languages, each taken in isolation, with the ideal native speaker as the ultimate model. Instead, the aim is to develop a linguistic repertory, in which all linguistic abilities have a place. This implies, of course, that the languages offered in educational institutions should be diversified and students given the opportunity to develop a plurilingual competence. Furthermore, once it is recognised that language learning is a lifelong task, the development of a young persons motivation, skill and confidence in facing new language experience out of school comes to be of central importance. The responsibilities of educational authorities, qualifying examining bodies and teachers cannot simply be confined to the attainment of a given level of proficiency in a particular language at a particular moment in time, important though that undoubtedly is. The full implications of such a paradigm shift have yet to be worked out and translated into action. The recent developments in the Council of Europes language programme have been designed to produce tools for use by all members of the language teaching profession in the promotion of plurilingualism. As teachers of foreign language it is our duty to promote a plurilingual and pluricultural approach by developing and really considering the socio-linguistic objectives and contents in our curricula. INTEREST FOR THE LINGUISTIC DIVERSITY THROUGH THE KNOWLEDGE OF A NEW LANGUAGE AND ITS CULTURE. WHAT IS CULTURE? THE ICEBERG METAPHOR The Iceberg metaphor for culture shows a cruise ship sailing close to the iceberg for a look at this foreign territory. Part of the iceberg is immediately visible; part of it emerges and submerges with the tides, and its foundations go deep beneath the surface. Above water line: Aspects of culture that are explicit, visible, taught. This includes written explanations, as well as those thousands of skills and information conveyed through formal lessons, such as manners or computing long division or baking bread. Also above water are the tangible aspects: from the "cultural markers" tourists seek III.

out such as French bread or Guatemalan weaving, to the conformity in how people dress, the way they pronounce the letter "R", how they season their food, the way they expect and office to be furnished. At the water line: The transition zone is where the cultural observer has to be more alert: "now you see it now you don't", the area where implicit understandings become talked about, explained--mystical experiences are codified into a creed; the area where official explanations and teachings become irrational, contradictory, inexplicable--where theology becomes faith. Below the water line: "Hidden" culture: the habits, assumptions, understandings, values, judgments ... that we know but do not or cannot articulate. Usually these aspects are not taught directly. Think about mealtime, for example, and the order you eat foods at dinner: Do you end with dessert? With a pickle? With tea? Nuts and cheese? Just have one course with no concluding dish? Or, in these modern times, do you dispense with a sit-down meal altogether? Or consider how you know if someone is treating you in a friendly manner: do they shake hands? keep a respectful distance with downcast eyes? leap up and hug you? address you by your full name? These sorts of daily rules are learned by osmosis -- you may know what tastes "right" or when you're treated "right", but because these judgments are under-the-waterline, it usually doesn't occur to you to question or explain those feelings.

The teaching and learning of a culture should not remain above the water line but it must show as deep as it can so that students have the possibility to seize the culture from its roots and so understand and valuate it better. This can be made by working out the socio-cultural aims and contents appropriately. TEACHING SOCIO-CULTURAL CONTENTS IN THE LANGUAGE CLASSROOM The National Educational Curriculum for Primary education establishes some important contents and assessment criteria for the inclusion and consideration of socio-cultural aspects in the classroom. These are: 1ST CYCLE SOCIO-CULTURAL CONTENTS 1. Curiosity and interest for a language and culture different from the own one. 2. Open attitude towards the people speaking the foreign language. 3. Use and recognising of basic expressions and formulae for social relationship, such as saying hello, goodbye, thanks or please in concrete communicative situations. 4. Co-operation when doing the activities by showing interest to understand the others. 5. Positive attitude about the own capacity to understand a foreign language. ASSESSMENT CRITERIA 1. Pay attention to close people communicating in a foreign language. 2. Show interest for close and concrete socio-cultural aspects.

3. Use basic relationship expressions in guided communicative situations. 4. Co-operate in the realization of different activities, making efforts to reach a mutual understanding. 5. Show self-confidence in the capacity for learning a foreign language. 2ND CYCLE SOCIO-CULTURAL CONTENTS 1. Respect towards the people who speak another language and have a different culture. 2. Valuation of the own culture. 3. Use and recognising of basic expressions and formulae for social relationship, such as asking things, asking for permission or asking for help, in concrete communicative situations. 4. Valuation of the use of the foreign language as a means of communication in the classroom. 5. Recognition of similitude and differences between aspects of daily life in the foreign speaking countries and the own ones. ASSESSMENT CRITERIA 1. Show attitudes of respect and tolerate towards people communicating in other language and have a different culture. 2. Recognize and appreciate our own cultural aspects in contrasts to others. 3. Use expressions and basic formulae of social relationship adequately in concrete communicative situations. 4. Use the foreign language as the main mean of communication in the classroom. 5. Identify some aspects of the daily life in countries where the foreign language is spoken and contrast them with the own ones. 3RD CYCLE SOCIO-CULTURAL CONTENTS 1. Identification of similitude and differences between peculiarities, habits and traditions from the countries where the foreign language is spoken and the ones represented in the classroom, using strategies to facilitate the intercultural meeting. 2. Use of social interaction formulae in concrete communication situations such as showing agreement, differing, respecting the turns, 3. Extension of the uses of the foreign language as the means of communication in the classroom. 4. Interest towards the relationship with foreign language speakers, establishing personal contacts through the mediums provided by the Information and Communication Technologies. 5. Valuation of the achievements and difficulties in the own learning process in order to improve it. ASSESSMENT CRITERIA 1. Identify similitude and differences between peculiarities, habits and traditions from the countries where the foreign language is spoken which are similar or different to the ones represented in the classroom, showing positive attitudes towards values from other societies and countries. 2. Relate to other people, using different formulae of social relationship which demand situations of oral and written communication. 3. Use the foreign language in an appropriate way to communicate in the classroom. 4. Establish contacts with foreign language speakers through e-mails, web sites and other mediums provided by the Information and Communication Technologies. 5. Participate actively in self-evaluation, observation, debate and discussion processes allowing the continuous improvement in the learning of a foreign language. All these contents and criteria must be combined within an approach or method to be fully developed. The one which has proved to be most effective in the treatment of culture has been developed in recent years: The Intercultural approach. THE INTERCULTURAL APPROACH The intercultural approach in foreign language learning can be positioned within student-centred educational theories and the philosophical framework of social constructivism. Accordingly, the student perspective on ways to learn about 'the other' should be vital for developing teaching strategies and materials. Intercultural awareness in language learning is often talked about as though it were a 'fifth skill' - the ability to be aware of cultural relativity following reading, writing, listening and speaking. There is something

to be said for this as an initial attempt to understand or define something that may seem a difficult concept but, as Claire Kramsch points out... "If...language is seen as social practice, culture becomes the very core of language teaching. Cultural awareness must then be viewed as enabling language proficiency ... Culture in language teaching is not an expendable fifth skill, tacked on, so to speak, to the teaching of speaking, listening, reading and writing" (in Context and Culture in Language Teaching OUP,1993). Language itself is defined by a culture. We cannot be competent in the language if we do not also understand the culture that has shaped and informed it. We cannot learn a second language if we do not have an awareness of that culture, and how that culture relates to our own first language/first culture. It is not only therefore essential to have cultural awareness, but also intercultural awareness. Plurilingual and pluricultural competence refers to the ability to use languages for the purposes of communication and to take part in intercultural interaction, where a person, viewed as a social agent has proficiency, of varying degrees, in several languages and experience of several cultures. This is not seen as the superposition or juxtaposition of distinct competences, but rather as the existence of a complex or even composite competence on which the user may draw. The customary approach is to present learning a foreign language as an addition, in a compartmentalised way, of a competence to communicate in a foreign language to the competence to communicate in the mother tongue. The concept of plurilingual and pluricultural competence tends to: move away from the supposed balanced dichotomy established by the customary L1/L2 pairing by stressing plurilingualism where bilingualism is just one particular case; consider that a given individual does not have a collection of distinct and separate competences to communicate depending on the languages he/she knows, but rather a plurilingual and pluricultural competence encompassing the full range of the languages available to him/her; stress the pluricultural dimensions of this multiple competence but without necessarily suggesting links between the development of abilities concerned with relating to other cultures and the development of linguistic communicative proficiency. A general observation can nevertheless be made, linking different distinct language learning components and paths. It is generally the case that language teaching in schools has to a large extent tended to stress objectives concerned with either the individuals general competence (especially at primary school level) or communicative language competence (particularly for those aged between 11 and 16), while courses for adults (students or people already working) formulate objectives in terms of specific language activities or functional ability in a particular domain. This emphasis, in the case of the former on the construction and development of competences, and in the latter case on optimal preparation for activities concerned with functioning in a specific context, corresponds no doubt to the distinct roles of general initial education on the one hand, and specialised and continuing education on the other. In this context, rather than treating these as opposites, the common framework of reference can help to relate these different practices with respect to one another and show that they should in fact be complementary.

IV.

THE IMPORTANCE OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE IN TODAYS SOCIETY

According to David Crystal, what makes the second half of the twentieth century - and the 1990s in particular - a highly significant period in the history of language is that we find a coming together of three major trends, each global in its implications: First, there has been the emergence of English as a genuinely global language, and the accompanying development of new varieties of English around the world. Second, there is the realisation that huge numbers of languages are endangered or dying , which has resulted in a sense of crisis and fresh initiatives towards preservation and regeneration. And third, there is the arrival of Internet technology, which has supplemented spoken and written language with a linguistically novel medium of communication, and added a further dimension of variety to our linguistic experience. Due to these factors, English is generally acknowledged to be the WORLDS MOST IMPORTANT LANGUAGE. There are thousands of different languages in the world, and each will seem uniquely important to those who speak it as their mother tongue, but there are more OBJECTIVE STANDARDS of relative importance to establish the world-wide reach of a language. One criterion we may follow for the objective establishment of the importance of a language is the NUMBER OF SPEAKERS, second the EXTENT TO WHICH A LANGUAGE IS GEOGRAPHICALLY DISPERSED, third its FUNCTIONAL LOAD and fourth the ECONOMIC AND POLITICAL INFLUENCE of the nations speaking that language. Taking these factors to English, we see that the number of speakers of English is more than 300 million; the spread of English over most of the world as an international language is a unique phenomenon in the worlds history: about 1500 million people (over a third of the worlds population); English lead as the primary medium for twentieth-century science and technology; and English is the language of the United States, whose gross domestic product in 1980 was more than double than of his nearer competitor, Japan. So these factors lead us to think that English is the most important language. The choice of an international language, or LINGUA FRANCA, is never based on linguistic or aesthetic criteria, but always on political, economic and demographic ones. English is spoken as a NATIVE LANGUAGE by more than 300 million people, most of them living in North America, the British Isles, Australia, New Zealand, The Caribbean and South Africa. But those whose native language is not English will have English as their SECOND LANGUAGE for certain governmental, commercial, social or educational activities within their own country (about 25 countries have English as an official language: 10 of them as the sole official language and in some 15 others it shares this status with one or more languages). On the other hand, no language is more widely studied or used as a FOREIGN LANGUAGE (by foreign language we mean a language used by people for communicating across frontiers or with others who are not from their country) than English. The desire to learn it is at present time immense.