Target cultural dimensions in Malaysian english language textbooks

Abstract

The relationship between language and culture is deeply rooted and that culture is important to language acquisition. Learning a language is not only learning the alphabet and the syntax of a language, it also involves learning the behavior of the society and its cultural elements. If one teaches language without teaching about the culture in which it operates, the students are learning empty or meaningless symbols or they may attach the incorrect meaning to what is being taught. As textbooks prescribed by the MOEM are currently used as the core material in the Malaysian classrooms, this paper sought to evaluate the Malaysian Form 1 to Form 5 English Language textbooks. In particular, the study focuses on one of the categories of the cultural orientation of the native speakers of English culture in the textbooks, which is the semantic sense. It adapted a model, constructed by Adaskou, Britten and Fahsi (1990). This study also seeks to ascertain how the contents of the teaching materials are presented and applied to facilitate successful language learning.