Using Translation in Foreign Language Teaching to Understand a Foreign Culture
Journal Title: Çankaya University Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences - Year 2018, Vol 12, Issue 1
Abstract
The purpose of this paper is to explain how teaching a foreign language benefits from taking images of its culture into account, through presentation of curiosities related to the respective culture, cultural background and knowledge of the context of communication. The paper brings an interdisciplinary studies approach to foreign language teaching, by looking for efficient teaching methods going through the fields of foreign language teaching, evolutionary psychology (the humans’ need for stories), pragmatics, cultural curiosities, linguistics and student psychology. The conclusions of the paper show that the tendency towards visual thinking in learning leads to efficient ways of teaching techniques in order to fix new notions. The linguistic theories claiming that different languages can offer different ways of understanding and looking at the world may be used to arouse interest and motivation in learners. We notice in YouTube video tutorials for foreign language learning, such as a Russian in Three Minutes video, the tutor mentioning that in Russian, the equivalent for the English greeting “good morning” is, literally, “kind morning”. Such examples can help learners form a true picture in their minds of the different mindset and the different perspectives the foreign language they learn opens up to them. Keywords: Visual thinking, pragmatics, imagination, mindset, linguistics.
Authors and Affiliations
Irina-Ana Drobot
Keywords
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