One of the themes is about two language students, Beata and Kira who are faced with foreign cultural content in a textbook. In the workshop Adrian uses his grammar of culture to discuss and make sense of the different issues.
Watch part 1: Beata’s anxiety below
The textbook contains a dialogue in which two friends are sharing, or splitting the bill after eating in a restaurant. Beata feels uncomfortable because in her culture people always pay for each other, and it would be very unfriendly for anyone to suggest paying for themselves. The dialogue therefore seems to go completely against all her values, and that learning English threatens her culture.
We need to evaluate Beata’s viewpoint, that English represents a separate, foreign culture. It is now believed that English takes on the cultural realities of the places where it is spoken. In my own experience of bilingual Syrians, the English they speak fully represents their own cultural realities. Furthermore, though paying for each other is considered a cultural norm, people often also split the bill.
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Watch the other parts of this presentation.