Language and Education

ISSN: 0950-0782 (Print) 1747-7581 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rlae20

Cultural Stereotyping and Intercultural

Communication: Working with Students from the
People's Republic of China in the UK

Kate Stephens

To cite this article: Kate Stephens (1997) Cultural Stereotyping and Intercultural Communication:
Working with Students from the People's Republic of China in the UK, Language and Education,
11:2, 113-124, DOI: 10.1080/09500789708666722

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09500789708666722

Published online: 29 Mar 2010.

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Cultural Stereotyping and Intercultural
Communication: Working with Students
from the Peoples Republic of China in the
UK
Kate Stephens
D iv ision of E d u c a tio n , Univ e rsity of S h e ffie ld , Sh e ffie ld S1 0 2 JA , U K
This paper considers the problem of cultural stereotyping in work on intercultural
communication. Recent interest in culture in relation to language learning is described,
and the problematic nature of the concept of culture is discussed. A recent study of
Chinese students attitudes towards academic study is described and the results are
presented of a small-scale attempt to test the generality of its findings: 12 Chinese
visiting scholars were given the opportunity to reflect upon and respond in writing to
some comments from the earlier study. It is concluded that Chinese attitudes to towards
academic study are diverse. It is argued that the results support the view of culture as
a contested area of discourse. It is suggested that ideas about Chinese culture should
be set in historical context, and some historical description is given. Sources are quoted
regarding the recent history of English language teaching in China. It is argued that
communication problems may be more economically explained in terms of aspects of
language proficiency rather than cultural differences.

In traditional Chinese opera, why are the parts of women played by men? Song
Liling, in Cronenbergs film version of the ambiguous M. Butterfly, tells us it is
because only a man really knows how a woman is supposed to behave. In the
film, Frenchman Gallimard falls in love with Song Liling after her performance
in the Italian opera Madame Butterfly. Song Liling explains that the Chinese dislike
the story because of its portrayal of the oriental woman. The opera tells of a
Japanese woman who, having remained loyal to her absent American husband,
kills herself when he returns with his new wife to take away her child. Song Liling
reminds Gallimard that if the woman had been an American, and the man
Japanese, her suicide would seem not romantic but insane. The story is a
European fantasy about the East.
But the film goes beyond observation on stereotyped notions of femininity and
Western fancy and confusion about the East. It also has something to say about
what is contained in the eye of the beholder, and about stereotyping as a form of
projection. Gallimard returns to Paris from his posting in China. Song Liling, after
a period of imprisonment by the Red Guard, follows him. Song Liling uses
Gallimards new government position to pass secrets to the Chinese, and is
eventually revealed as a spy. In the process he is also revealed as a man.
Gallimard can no longer love him because the woman of his imagination has been
destroyed. In prison, taking the part himself of a man portraying a woman in a
pantomime of Chinese Opera, Gallimard kills himself. We are left with the
question of Gallimards own role in the creation of Song Liling.
In working with students from China in Britain, the question of our own role
0950-0782/97/02 0113-12 $10.00/0 1997 K. Stephens
LANGUAGE AND EDUCATION Vol. 11, No. 2, 1997
113
1 14 L a n g u a g e and Educ a tio n
in the creation of images of the Chinese must be raised. It is my experience of
working with Chinese students in an academic context, that the idea of a
distinctive Chinese way of thinking has wide currency. Faced with Chinese
culture, westerners can have a great sense of difference. This sense of difference
can be expressed in allusions to authoritarianism and a more communal
approach to things, a lack of individualism and independent thought; the
Confucian legacy and the effects of the cultural revolution. This paper addresses
itself to the question of how far, in our concern to properly take cultural difference
into account, the problem of unhelpful cultural stereotyping can be avoided. It
also presents evidence from a small-scale study regarding how 12 Chinese
visiting scholars following a course for English Language teacher trainers in the
UK responded to some generalisations about their own culture generated a
research study by Jin & Cortazzi (1993).
In anthropology, the tension between internally and externally generated
category systems is well known. A culture can be described in terms of a set of
categories which are generated by the participants in that culture, emic
description, or it can be described using a system developed by outsiders to that
culture, etic description. The interplay between these perspectives is a matter of
concern for the process of cultural description.
Moreover, while some work on intercultural communication draws upon
notions of dimensions of cultural difference such as individualism/collectivism
(for example, Clyne, 1994), in anthropology the notion of culture has itself been
contested. Street (1993), in making arguments about the relationship between
culture and language, points out that the idea of culture involves an abstraction
and reification through the grammatical nominalisation of what should be better
conceived as a process subject to change. He suggests that the study of culture
should be concerned more with the process of how notions of culture arise and
are contested, than with cultural description:
Culture is an active process of meaning making and contest over definition,
including its own definition. (Street, 1993: 25)
And:
The reification and naturalisation of culture hides the kinds of questions
about power and social change that are currently at the forefront of
anthropological enquiry. (Street, 1993: 27)
He concludes:
if every time the term culture is uttered warning bells ring and neon
lights flash, then I shall feel that I have succeeded. (Street, 1993: 43)
There is a large literature on intercultural communication of relevance to
language teaching. Much of this literature is reviewed in a recent state of the art
article by Dirven & Putz (1993). Dirven & Putz claim that, since the early
anthropological work at the beginning of this century, there have been two peaks
of interest in the subject: one in the sixties and seventies, and a second even
stronger one in the eighties. The work they review includes attempts to map and
quantify cultural differences, studies of attitudes towards different cultures, and
W o rking w ith Chin e se Stu d e nts in th e UK 115
sociolinguistic studies of obstacles to communication between cultures. The
notion of intercultural competence has arisen at the interface between the study
of cross-cultural communication and applied linguistics. Kealey (1989) provides
an example of a study which concerns itself with the prediction of cross-cultural
effectiveness of Canadian technical advisors. Ruben (1989) locates the develop-
ment of the study of cross-cultural competence in the practical training needs and
adjustment failures of Americans working overseas. The accelerating pace of
globalisation, he points out, accentuates the need.
Fantini (1995) provides an overview to an edition of The International Journal
of Intercultural Relations which is concerned with the language culture relation-
ship. He is concerned with the apparent neglect of cultural issues by language
teachers. He suggests that students failures in linguistic communicative compe-
tence may be due to lack of cultural competence, and that the promotion of
cultural awareness is an integral part of the language teachers task. In the same
volume, the relationship between literacy and world view is explored by
Edwards & Nwenmely (1995), and Liu (1995) addresses the question of transfer
of sociocultural attitudes in second language use.
Of particular relevance to this paper is a contribution by Garrott (1995). She
describes historical studies of Chinese values alongside the results of her own
survey conducted while working as a foreign expert in China. She concludes
that, rather than tending towards the collectivism generally associated with
China, the students she surveyed tended towards individualism, and that there
is a great deal of diversity of attitudes depending on age, sex and subject of study.
She sounds a note of caution about the tendency towards overgeneralisation in
descriptions of Chinese cultural attitudes.
While interest in multiculturalism in British schools is widespread, Dirven &
Putz suggest that there is a relative lack of theoretical interest in the language
culture relationship in the UK. One exception to this apparent lack of theoretical
interest in Britain is the recent study of cultural orientation and academic
language use by Jin & Cortazzi to which this paper is in part a response. Jin &
Cortazzi focus on an alleged gap between British and Chinese ways of thinking,
and the problems this gap is believed to pose for communication between
Chinese students at British universities, and their supervisors. Their study has
broken new ground in giving a voice to the experience of the growing number
of Chinese students in higher education in Britain. They present a selection of
comments from supervisors and students, obtained in separate interviews, in the
form of an imaginary dialogue. The dialogue gives dramatic life to what appears
to be a radical mismatch in expectations.
However, there are a number of points to take issue with in Jin & Cortazzis
paper. Firstly, the voices of both British supervisors and Chinese students are
presented with an air of typicality, which does not seem to be supported by other
evidence. The views of another group of students presented below suggest a
range of variation and disagreement. Secondly, it is grounded in a view of
individually oriented and collectively oriented cultures, which has a surface
appeal, but which should be seen as part of a historically situated and contested
discourse. Thirdly, the view presented of Chinese academic norms and expecta-
tions is contrasted with an idealised view of academic life in Britain, which is
1 16 L a n g u a g e and Educ a tio n
itself better understood as a converse of the same discourse, than as a straight
forward description of empirical reality.

The Students Views

Jin & Cortazzi surveyed the attitudes of 101 postgraduate students. They
present some quantitative data regarding language attitudes and language
competence. However, the force of their argument about cultural orientation
rests on a small number of selected voices, which are counterposed to the voices
of the students academic tutors. It is not clear from their report how far the
quotations used are representative of the range of students interviewed.
I invited a group of 12 Chinese visiting scholars, following a course for English
language teachers at a British university, to give me their own written comments
on the views expressed by the students in Jin & Cortazzis study. This was a small
group with whom I had been in almost daily contact for several months. The
visiting scholars were similar to Jin & Cortazzis sample in that they were
following a course of postgraduate study. They differed in that they were
practising teacher trainers, following a non-award-bearing course, while Jin &
Cortazzis students were studying for research degrees. No attempt was made
to match the samples, and the views expressed are not presented in an attempt
to offer alternative generalities. It is worth noting that the ages of the Visiting
Scholars varied with a range of 30 years, including those educated both before
and after the cultural revolution. The group members were asked to write their
views, and they were given the opportunity to discuss their responses while I
was not present. They were told that their views might form part of a report,
although they would not be identified as individuals. Their views, alongside
those presented by Jin & Cortazzis students, are presented below. They represent
a very small attempt to test the generality of Jin & Cortazzis view. The headings
used are those aspects of apparent cultural difference which Jin & Cortazzi invoke
in their report.

Independent/Collective Ways of Thinking

According to Jin & Cortazzi, individual and collective cultures tend to promote
individual and collective ways of thinking. The Chinese tend to think as the group
thinks. They quote one interviewee who said:
There are differences between the two cultures: the ways of thinking are
different too. I want to consider which angle they {the tutors} think about a
matter.
Most of the 12 visiting scholars agreed, but one wrote:
Difference between cultures is a matter of degree. There may be some
Chinese who have some ways of thinking in common with some British.
One of Jin & Cortazzis students said:
My supervisor said I should choose whatever I wanted But from a
Chinese way of considering the matter, I think I should obey whatever they
need I am so used to this way of working, i.e. I am told what to do, to do
W o rking w ith Chin e se Stu d e nts in th e UK 117
the research according to the need of the authority. So now I feel very
passive about choosing a research topic. But it seems to me that their way
of considering a matter is that you choose what you are interested in But
as for me I feel very embarrassed to ask, because perhaps they do not need
this aspect of research I dont know what they really think.
Most of the visiting scholar group expressed a qualified agreement with this
statement. But some referred to a difference in degrees of control of research
rather than fundamentally different ways of thinking. For example:
In China the interest of education is quite different from the British interest
of education. What I want to learn must be in accordance with the interest
of the state. I dont feel embarrassed here, because I think it is free for me
to choose any topic to write here.
The comments to the two groups say much about deference to authority. It
may be that apparent tendencies towards group-oriented thinking are overde-
termined by the demands of an authoritarian system. It is a complex matter to
separate out what is due to culture and what is due to historically situated
political circumstances. The way in which different situations may elicit different
responses is recognised in the comment above.

Independent/Dependent Way of Working

Jin & Cortazzi describe the Chinese expectation of being told exactly what to
do by the supervisor, and they contrast this with the British expectation of
independence and self-expression. They quote a student who said:
Here we have to learn how to do things on our own. Our supervisors wont
bother to tell us. But in China, our supervisors would guide us step by step
to start the research and help us all the way through.
My group confirmed the view that Chinese students do appreciate a need to
be independent in study in Britain, but three took issue with the view of how
things are in China:
In China some students would do like this mentioned above, but some
wouldnt.
This may be true about undergraduate experience, but it is definitely untrue
with postgraduate experience.
Its true that we here have to learn to do things on our own. Its not quite
true that supervisors in China would guide their students step by step to
start the research and help them all the way through
These three views point to the difficulty of making generalisations about
studenttutor relationships in China. It seems that in China some students work
independently, the degree of student support varies and there is a difference in
postgraduate and undergraduate work. An impression is gained from these
responses of a varying texture of views regarding the nature of academic study
in China, depending on a variety of factors. The visiting scholars are clearly
resisting the generalisations of the earlier study.
1 18 L a n g u a g e and Educ a tio n

Discourse Patterns in Writing

According to Jin & Cortazzi, British tutors see Chinese students as having
difficulty with academic writing. The voice of the tutor we are given claims that
the Chinese tend to rely on proverbs and have difficulty with structuring their
writing in a logical fashion.
Jin & Cortazzi claim that their students believe that a Chinese style exists. My
group all concurred that there is an identifiable Chinese style, although none
offered any descriptive information about what this style might be.
Jin & Cortazzis student claimed:
The Chinese style of writing is constructed with reasons and feelings. The
conclusion comes from step by step reasoning. From Confucius time, we
have been told we must present a source and origin, otherwise the
reasoning cannot be made clearly. There is no present without the past and
origin. Therefore we should report from the root.
One of the visiting scholars wrote:
Im not sure what is being said here about the Chinese style of writing. But
I would not regard this as typically Chinese. For it is also a basic
requirement to provide sources and review literature in the West when one
writes on a research topic.
While neither of these individual comments provide compelling evidence for
generalisations of any kind, together they show the existence of a contested
discourse. The second comment is pointing out that what is described as
Confucian in the first comment, might be viewed as typical also of a Western
academic style.

TutorStudent Relationships
On the question of the relationship to the supervisor in China, the visiting
scholars all agreed that the supervisor has a superior role, that one should take
care not to give offence, and the nature of ones personal relationship with the
supervisor might affect the progress of the research.
On the question of disagreement with a supervisors words, one of Jin &
Cortazzis student claimed:
We generally wouldnt disagree with our supervisors words or instruc-
tions, no matter whether they suit us or not if they dont agree they just
keep silence or if they say something, they just hint a little bit, very
implicitly. The majority are like this. Even the minority who are more
straight forward, they wouldnt say something back straight, they say it
round about.
The following are comments from the visiting scholar group:
No, thats not true, perhaps the idea from the traditional China a few years
past, but the situation has changed now. Students can arise questions which
they dont agree with.
I disagree with the idea above. Sometimes, if the supervisors or instructors
W o rking w ith Chin e se Stu d e nts in th e UK 119
words dont suit us Chinese students, some, if not many, may point out the
point which they think doesnt hold water or something like that. Some may
just keep silence. It may also be that those who keep silence are not quite
sure or quite understand what the supervisor said.
Somewhat true. Usually, the student will offend the supervisor if they
refuse too much.
The tendency of conformity is strong in China. But still there are people
who are very critical and outspoken. Its difficult to generalise the attitude
of the we.
These comments were made by individuals spanning the broad age range of
the group. Sometimes differences in perspective seemed to reflect age, with
education before, during and after the Cultural Revolution seeming to have an
effect. These are only a small number of voices speaking on the question of the
culture of one quarter of the worlds population. All that can be concluded from
them is that differences of opinion do exist. Chinese and Western cultural
difference is constructed differently by different individuals. This is, however, an
important conclusion, suggesting that Jin & Cortazzis view is oversimplified,
and confirming the view of culture as an area of contested discourse rather than
a reified construct.
In general, the visiting scholar group sometimes accepted generalisations
about the nature of Chinese culture, but they were not always willing to do so.
The idea of variation and change were referred to. Jin & Cortazzis picture of a
collective culture, in which the individual is unwilling or unable to assert his or
her own ideas is not entirely confirmed. If there is a lack of individual freedom
in research in China, this comes across as historical and circumstantial rather than
attributable to profound differences in ways of thinking.
The visiting scholars agreed that they were expected to be independent in their
studies in Britain. They did not, however, agree that constant support would be
given at every step and at every level in China. On the question of writing, the
comment that presentation of sources is not particularly Chinese, but a basic
feature of all academic writing is illuminating. On the question of the possibility
of a conflict of ideas arising in the relationship with the supervisor in China, my
group presented a mixed picture which included the possibility of disagreement.
Regarding my personal relationship with these students, I found that friendly
disagreement was a constant feature of our discussions.
Questions could be asked about the differences between the level of response
given by the two groups, which may have been conditioned by their relationship
to me and the institution in which they were studying. The visiting scholar group
were not working towards a degree. I knew them well, they did not need my
good opinion, and I have considerable confidence in the honesty of their
responses. They were deliberately given time to reflect and discuss before
committing themselves to paper. It is possible that Jin & Cortazzis group were
willing to invoke available stereotypes, which they might have been less willing
to endorse given the opportunity for a more reflective approach. Similarly, my
group might have expressed more stereotyped views if their relationship to the
institution had been different.
1 20 L a n g u a g e and Educ a tio n

Cultural Difference, Change and Cultural Knowledge

I do not wish to suggest that there are no generalisable differences between
the British and the Chinese which affect educational attitudes and organisation.
The idea of exchange of ideas would not make sense without some notion of
difference. Moreover, stereotyping is part of a psychological process of social
cognition, by which we organise ourselves for new experiences. Stereotypes my
change in response to new experiences, and become dysfunctional prejudices
when this change cannot or does not take place.
Nevertheless, there is a risk in overgeneralising about differences between the
ways in which Chinese and British people think. A broad brush view of the
Chinese as collectively-oriented and the British as individualistic may say
something about the historical development of ideology, but in relation to
contemporary culture it may miss as much as it reveals. It misses the
astonishment of one newly-arrived Chinese student at the orderliness of British
society, from the behaviour of drivers on the roads to the tendency to accept
authority in the absence of obvious sanctions. This student commented that order
in China is maintained in much more explicit and authoritarian ways. He claimed
that the rhetoric of this authoritarian order is maintained because individualistic
chaos is never far from the surface and concluded that in British society
conformity is more thoroughly internalised than in China.
The idea of the lack of individualism in Chinese students essential psycho-
logical make-up needs to be considered in relation to the history of highly
centralised and authoritarian government, as well as the anti-intellectual climate
of the cultural revolution. The way in which the cultural revolution affected
peoples way of thinking by disrupting their education needs to be considered in
detail. The determination of families for the educational and economic success
of their children may cut across some of the expectations of academic life.
Something needs to be known about the modernisation of China and the way in
which the goal of economic development and market orientation have legiti-
mised individualism. That is, any consideration of individual versus collective
attitudes in China should be considered in a historical context.
Bastid (1987) describes the history of successive foreign influences on
education in China, and the political repudiation which much of this influence
has attracted. She gives a detailed and fascinating account of these influences,
and Chinese reactions to them, from early Jesuit missionaries of the seventeenth
and eighteenth centuries to the influence of Britain, Japan, America and the Soviet
Union. This political history probably explains more of Chinese caution in
relation to foreign educational practices than the existence of fundamentally
different ways of thinking. She explains the recent period of eclecticism in terms
of wider attainment of basic education.
Cheng Kai-Ming (1994) gives an informative account of the influence of
cultural tradition on the organisation of post-compulsory education in China. He
draws connections between a centrally controlled education system, and the
relative lack of individual consciousness in traditional Chinese culture. But he
goes on to describe the emergence of the idea of choice and job selection alongside
the market orientation of post-cultural revolution China. This picture of a system
in process of change is confirmed by Shen (1994).
W o rking w ith Chin e se Stu d e nts in th e UK 121
It may be that an anti-individualism ideology in China took sustenance from
a collectively-oriented traditional culture. But the extent to which ideologies of
collectivism are internalised in the thought processes of Chinese people in
general can be overstated. There is a difference between the values which groups
explicitly avow, and those which are implicit in their behaviour. As Cheng points
out, the recent political sanctioning of individual choice, has found its way into
the education system via, for example, the vast expansion of self-study
programmes, the growth of vocational high schools in which students choose
jobs rather than having them assigned to them, and even the appearance of
careers guidance on the school curriculum. With the acceptance of economic
development as a national goal, there has been an explosion of entrepreneurial
activity in China. It is hard to believe that there is not a strong and developing
individualistic strand in Chinese culture which has given impetus to the
economic changes of the last decade.
My own experience of working with mainland Chinese students has dis-
abused me of more stereotypes than it has supported generalities. Familiarity
with any cultural group can reveal individual differences which eventually seem
more pronounced than initially perceived or expected similarities. I have found
independent-mindedness, liking for argument, cynicism about authority, and
individual differences consistent with differing educational experiences and
home environments. I have had a sense of cultural difference and discord within
Chinese groups. If a collectively-oriented culture signifies an overriding ten-
dency to conformity and cooperation with the group, then my experiences of
working with Chinese students in the UK do not particularly lend it support.
In Jin & Cortazzis work, stereotypes of academic expectations of Chinese
students are set against an idealised view of British academic life. It is implicit in
their work that British academic life is conducted in a climate of intellectual
freedom and lack of political control. We are asked to assume that, here, personal
matters do not enter into the studenttutor relationship; students do not rely in
an over-dependent manner on their supervisors, and they freely offer profound
disagreement without fear of causing offence. Our understandings of culture are
prone to stereotype and unrealistic generalisation on both sides. What is
professed about the UK academic community may be expressed differently in
the behaviour of participants.

The Language Question

There is a possibility that behaviour due to apparent cultural differences may
be more economically explained. A tendency of Chinese students to rely heavily
on the their tutors could be a function of being in a very foreign land and having
to meet institutional requirements in a language in which one is less than totally
confident.
The circumstances of learning English in China have obvious implications for
the ability of Chinese students to communicate in English in Britain. Yao Xiuqing
(1993) gives an account of the history of foreign language teaching in China since
1949. English language has not enjoyed political approval during all periods in
China. It was politically out of favour during the period of Russian influence in
the 1950s, and again during the turmoil of the cultural revolution until 1975.
1 22 L a n g u a g e and Educ a tio n
During this latter period, foreign language textbooks were banned and criticised,
with teaching of English being often limited, according to Li Rushou (1992) to the
chanting of party slogans. Classical English texts and translations of Chinese texts
into English seem to have dominated classroom teaching until relatively recently.
Classroom activities have been largely limited to intensive reading, writing,
grammar and translation. The official curriculum in China recognises five skills
rather than four: it is widely recognised that one of the most important uses to
which English is put in China is translation from and into Chinese. While there
has been some influence of methods which emphasise the spoken language, these
have been limited in impact because of traditional views about the educational
process and teachers own English language competence. Exposure to native
speakers has been limited and, significantly for Chinese students who come to
the UK, these have more often been American than British. While communicative
methodology has begun to have an impact at tertiary level, it has met with some
resistance (Li Xiaoju, 1990)
In addition, the teaching of writing in Chinese itself has some special
characteristics which may influence the way in which foreign languages are
learned. Spoken Chinese consists of a variety of dialects which might be called
different languages. Because written Chinese is an ideographic language, it can
function as a written lingua franca for the nation. Writing therefore holds a
peculiarly central place in the process of education and cultural solidarity in
China.
A combination of circumstances may help to explain the limited English
language skills of some Chinese students. There is a generation gap between
those whose education was disrupted by the cultural revolution, and those
whose education took place either substantially before or after. There have been
differing educational opportunities between rural and urban areas. There is a
balance of competence in favour of the written language leading to a curiously
literary quality of some writing and a bookish, preformed feeling of some speech.
There seem to have been high standards of accuracy at the expense of fluency
and spontaneity. These factors together may account for the struggle for many
Chinese students in the early stages in Britain to listen to and understand English.
In higher education in particular, teachers seem to readily locate the source of
difficulty in communication in their students. Silence may be an indication of
profound disagreement which cannot be expressed. It may also be an indication
of incomprehension regarding the type of response which is expected. For
students communicating in a foreign language, it may also be an indication of
failure to understand the words which have been used.
It is my experience that Chinese students will participate freely and inde-
pendently in discussion where they understand the language that is being used,
and where the ground rules for the expression of ideas are made clear. Where
neither of these conditions are met, there may be an embarrassing silence.
Chinese students seem to be just as susceptible to this kind of embarrassment as
other groups. They can be sufficiently culturally sensitive to want to know what
the ground rules for interaction are before they express themselves.
W o rking w ith Chin e se Stu d e nts in th e UK 123

Conclusion
With the growth of interest in sociolinguistics and the recognition that
language as a system can never be entirely divorced from its social context,
teachers of English as a foreign language have become increasingly interested in
the role of culture in communication. It is now a commonplace belief that the
misunderstandings that can occur between people of different cultures may not
be reducible exclusively to language difficulties, but may be also attributable to
different sets of experiences, different expectations and even profoundly
different ways of thinking.
It is taken to follow from the corrective recognition that language and context
are interrelated, that language teachers should concern themselves with culture
in addition to language. According to Dirven & Putz, some theorists have
extended the debate between grammatical and communicative competence to
include a third-term cultural competence. It is now proposed by some theorists
that in addition to learning the language, attention needs to be paid to the
teaching of cultural competence.
However, where the medium of intercultural communication is English, there
is a huge problem of how far the language is embedded in a particular culture.
English is the most commonly used language of international communication.
The number of users of English as a foreign or second language is far in excess
of the number of people who use it as first community language. Like Chinese,
it is a major medium of intercultural communication. Written Chinese has a far
greater number of users than the users of any particular spoken Chinese dialect.
While specific cultures are implicated in the languages that we use, the spread of
a language must say something about its potential for becoming culturally
disembedded.
Language teachers without an interest in culture are obviously handicapped.
But the idea that words can be separated from the things they are meant to denote
was an important development in language study. While cultural differences
clearly exist, it is an obvious fact that one of the reasons we learn foreign
languages is to overcome cultural differences. Language is the cultural product
which makes cultural translation possible. It is largely through the foreign
language that foreign culture becomes accessible. In our concern to learn or teach
a culture we may overlook the fact that this is done through a language. In seeking
cultural explanations for miscommunication between Chinese students and their
tutors in the UK, there is a danger of overlooking what gaps may exist in students
language proficiency and experience, and at the same time resorting to
overgeneralisations about culture which have a surface appeal, but which are not
supported by strong research evidence. English language teachers should
perhaps follow the anthropologists lead in acknowledging the elusive nature of
culture, and focus instead on how the concept of culture is deployed in their
own discourse.

References
Bastid, Marianne (1987) Servitude or Liberation? The introduction of foreign educational
practices and systems to China from 1840 to the present. In Ruth Hayhoe and Marianne
Bastid (eds) Chinas Education and the Industrialised World. Ontario: Ontario Institute for
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1 24 L a n g u a g e and Educ a tio n
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