An Evaluation of the Cultural Content of the First Year Middle School EFL Textbook “My Book of English”

Abstract

The present study aimed at evaluating the cultural content of the Algerian first year middle school textbook of English “My Book of English”. More specifically, it investigates the adequacy of the cultural components included in the textbook and the extent to which these components help the learners in developing their intercultural communicative competence. To achieve the aims of the research, the data were collected by means of a content analysis. The latter is carried out through using a checklist that heavily relies on Merrouche’ framework(2006). The findings showed that despite of the fact that the textbook includes different cultural aspects, the representation remains incomplete and imbalanced. The analysis revealed that there is a preference for big ‘C’ culture at the expense of small ‘c’ culture, that the textbook focuses on the source culture while it covers to some extent the target culture and underestimates the presence of the international culture and that the cultural components do not help the learners to engage in deep reflection as they merely belong to the knowledgeoriented level. Hence, the textbook fails to promote the learners’ intercultural communicative competence. Based on the results obtained, some pedagogical recommendations are suggested.