Межкультурная коммуникация и языковая компетенция

As a global language English influence can be found in many aspects of social life on the post-Soviet space. English has become the main foreign language chosen to study at school, college or higher establishments, its knowledge is required in many spheres of professional activity, it is abundantly used in commercial names in all post-Soviet cities and towns, it penetrates into everyday speech.

In this respect it is quite evident that EFL learning and teaching problems come to the foreground. They can be universal and nationally and culturally conditioned. EFL learning and teaching problems are viewed in this article by using cross-cultural approach to EFL learning and teaching on the example of Chelyabinsk State University and its branch in Kazakhstan.

One or two foreign languages are included in all high school programs; sometimes a foreign language can be taught even in the primary school if this school has a status of lyceum or school specializing in teaching some subjects in a foreign language. However, the results of foreign language learning at school are often rather poor, and many future students have to start learning a foreign language from the beginning after entering the university.

It is possible for Russian university students to choose a foreign language to study, however in practice the choice is often limited to English. The selection of English is justified by its global status in modern science, by the opportunities to study abroad, students’ mobility, by the recognition of Russian diplomas in some countries, and by teaching in English in some Russian universities [14].

However, Kazakhstan takes a very low 67th place out of 80 in English Profficiency Index which makes it rather problematic to start teaching some subjects in English in all Kazakhstan schools from September 2019 [4]. Russia takes 38th position [13].

In the interviews of 42 students from Kostanay branch of Chelyabinsk State University in Kazakhstan and from Chelyabinsk State University the problems in English teaching and learning were raised. The interviewees were 22 Kostanay second year students majoring in Transla_ tion, 20 Chelyabinsk second year students majoring in English. The questions asked included:

• 1)    What is your nationality?

• 2)    What is your native tongue?

• 3)    What is your level of English?

• 4)    Why do you think is English important?

• 5)    What are the main problems in studying English?

• 6)    Will you use English in your professional activity?

• 7)    Is it important to you how your knowledge of English is assessed at university?

• 8)    What would you like to improve in foreign language learning?

• 9)    What is your attitude to Changing Cyrillic alphabet to Latin in Kazakhstan?

(Only Kostanay students were asked the last question)

The interviewed Chelyabinsk university students included 10 ethnic Russians, 7 Tatars and Bashkirs, 1 Armenian, 1 Georgian, 1 Greek. All of them chose Russian as their native tongue. Although Chelyabinsk is a multicultural and multiethnic region Russian is the only language for the majority of its population.

Kostanay students also live and study in multicultural environment. However, they answered that their native language was Russian although only 8 students were ethnic Russians, 6 were ethnic Kazakhs, 5 Ukranians and 3 Germans. Kazakh is an optional subject at the university with 30% of the interviewees speaking it more or less fluently.

Students of both groups think that their level of English is intermediate.

All interviewees in Chelyabinsk and Kazakhstan complained that the number of teaching hours for English in the classroom decreased every year. Chelyabinsk students have classes with native English speakers and an opportunity to attend an English

Intercultural communication and language competence

S.A. Pitina, A.D. Shcherbov

club once a week. Kazakh students are deprived of such opportunity.

All students stressed the importance of learning English, but only 30% stated that they would definitely use it in their professional activity as teachers or interpreters and translators. Many of them are afraid that their level of English is not and will not be adequate enough to work in JV as interpreters. The author was a witness when graduate students refused to apply for a well-paid vacancy of interpreter in a Canadian company in Kazakhstan. However, after the practice in the final year graduate students often change their attitude to work as teachers of English.

The main mentioned problems of English study include:

• 1)    insufficient time in the curriculum (6-8 hours per week) to master the foreign language;

• 2)    poor writing skills;

• 3)    lack of connection between subjects;

• 4)    homework is not seldom boring and takes too much time;

• 5)    assessment demands are too strict;

• 6)    groups are big, as a result not all students are asked in class;

• 7)    English level of the student in one group is different, from nearly advanced to beginning.

Nobody mentioned low background knowledge, lack of motivation. The most popular assignments include video watching and commenting, audiotasks, translation from English into Russian, presentations and reports making. Less popular tasks are translation from Russian into English, essay writing, extensive reading of English books in the original.

As in Pitina (2015), assessment results are important for Kostanay students in 2018 while Chelyabinsk second year students are more interested in the quality of teaching. They would openly complain if teaching does not satisfy them. Kostanay students are more passive, they would rarely complain due to a more vertical social model, different national mentality implying that administration is always right and due to the fear that complaining will only worsen the situation.

All interviewees mentioned that native English speakers should be invited to teach English on the constant basis, that Bachelor’s programme should be changed because there are some subjects such as physical education, history of Russia or Kazakhstan, etc. take much time and are not connected with their major.

Kazakhstan students answered that the change of alphabet in the republic will not be difficult for them but will be very difficult for their parents and grandparents because they do not know English and do not know the only state language Kazakh. This will naturally interfere with their careers.

According to the modern federal educational standards teaching/learning is based on the competences students are to master. For example in the Linguistics standard we find OPK 3 ‘mastering a system of linguistic knowledge including knowing the basic phonetic, lexical, grammatical and word building phenomena and regularities of the studied foreign language functioning and its functional variants’[7]. And OPK 5 ‘mastering the main discourse ways of realizing communicative purposes in accordance with the specifics of the current communicative context (time, place, purposes and conditions of communication)’ [7].

If we take a non-linguistic educational programme, say, Management, we find a shorter statement which is basically the same: ‘Ability to communicate in oral and in written forms in Russian and foreign languages to solve the tasks of inter-personal and intercultural interaction’[8].

Competence is aimed at preparing for practical activities. It includes theoretical element (knowledge), practical element (skills) and realization element (strategies of using the knowledge and skills to solve problems).There are different approaches to what competence is. Some researchers see it as a personal quality and some as a description of components that make it possible to efficiently solve the problems.

Take for example the definition by A.V. Khutorskoy ‘Competence is an alienated, pre-set social requirement (norm) to the educational preparation of the student, necessary for his/her efficient production activities in a certain sphere’ [2].

So, competence approach supposes that a complex of knowledge and skill is mastered to model student’s activities in future.

The Council of Europe document ‘Common European Framework of Reference: Learning, Teaching, Assessment’ [6;9] systematizes the approaches to foreign language teaching. “Competences” define what a student of foreign language needs to do in order to communicate, what knowledge and skills are to be mastered. The documents define the main concepts and descriptors of the aspects.

Competences are the sum of knowledge, skills and characteristics that allow a person to perform actions.

Communicative language competences are those which empower a person to act using specifically linguistic means.

Language activities involve the exercise of one’s communicative language competence in a specific domain in processing (receptively and/or productively) one or more texts in order to carry out a task.

Text is any sequence or discourse (spoken and/or written) related to a specific domain and which in the course of carrying out a task becomes the occasion of a language activity, whether as a support or as a goal, as product or process.

It is based on action-oriented approach that takes into account cognitive, emotional and volitional resources[11].

The basic aspects of language learning are: understanding (listening, reading), speaking (spoken interaction, spoken production) and writing. Therefore, foreign language learning activities can be seen as learning the activities of understanding and producing texts in the foreign language.

However, experience of teaching English both to language and non-language program students shows that both make mistakes [1]. Here are the typical ones.

Vocabulary

The institute is situated/located in Voroshilova street.

Correct: The institute is in Voroshilov street.

I eat eggs for breakfast. Correct: I have eggs for breakfast.

I visited the English class. Correct: I attended the English class.

Word order

I and my mother. Correct: My mother and I.

She is a beautiful person. Correct: She is beautiful.

Park of culture and rest named after Yu.A. Gagarin. Correct: Yu.A. Gagarin park.

Monument to I.V. Kurchatov. Correct: I.V. Kurchatov monument.

Evidently here we have personal aspects of comprehending the language and language behavior. The student is subconsciously influenced by the native tongue (Russian), projects the Russian words, word order and speaking habits onto the English environment just substituting the words or structures for what he/she thinks is equivalent when producing a text in the foreign language.

L.V. Shcherba noted this when he wrote that ‘there is an illusion we have when we know just one language, that their unchangeable notions are the same for all times and peoples’ and that the native tongue hampers the foreign one [10].

The learner faces problems when the text in the foreign language is produced. He/she is in search for words and phrases and is often not satisfied with the result. The problems seem to be at the personality level. Person is the product of a certain culture that governs his/her life.

Let us turn to intercultural communication. Language is an important element of culture. Representatives of different cultures respond to the outside world differently, they have values and norms of behavior accepted in their culture and not accepted in a different one. This situation is described in the

Intercultural communication and language competence

S.A. Pitina, A.D. Shcherbov

intercultural communication with the contrastive concepts of ‘us’ and ‘them’.

“Them” can be understood as

• -    alien, foreign, outside the native culture;

• -    alien, strange, unusual, contrasting to the usual environment;

• -    alien, not known, unheard of and non-cognizable;

• -    alien, supernatural, super-powerful, before it man is powerless;

• -    alien, sinister, dangerous [5].

The above listed definitions of the meaning ‘alien’ (them) make it seen in the broadest sense as everything outside the commonly understood and accepted phenomena and receipts. And, vice versa, “us” (mine) implies the common, usual, normal state of things.

When one faces another culture and its representatives one needs to understand them and communicate with them. It is only possible if efficient via empathy, or co-feeling. Empathy is aimed at understanding cultural differences.

The main characteristics of empathy are:

• -    listen attentively to what you are told; - try to understand what other people feel;

• -    be sincerely interested in what other people want to tell you;

• -    express sympathy to other people’s needs;

• -    be able to understand other people’s opinions. [3]

L.V. Shcherba believed that the problems of language learning can be solved if the differences are explained and there is enough practice in the language environment. Regretfully, there is usually not enough time and the language environment is to be modeled. So, it is proposed to intensify the language inculturation of students by emphasizing the emotional element of language learning. The idea is to break the barrier of “alien” text, so that the student could feel, and therefore understand, the text he/she is reading/listening to and producing.

Students are often egocentric (I and the language) and are focused on reproductive self-realization through mechanical imitation of the patterns they know. Cognitive mechanism is mainly involved. The idea of the proposed approach is to make student feel the cultural and language differences trying to take and accept the position of the native speaker in understanding and producing texts. Analytical element is important.

Some important features of English are abstract meaning of words, brevity of expression (English text is 20% shorter than the equivalent Russian one), verb centered phrases and strict word order.

It is proposed to use only authentic texts that provide real foreign language discourse for comprehension and speech samples.

The following tasks were practiced at the classes both for language major and non-language major students.

Comprehension and understanding of the text

• 1.    Expressive reading of prose and verse to practice text interiorization. The students were asked to formulate what they wanted to express, what ideas to render, why in this way.

• 2.    Listen to/read the text and point out the words and phrases that seem unusual, i.e. you would not say it this way.

• 3.    Say it in good English

These tasks teach the students to be attentive while reading/listening. Text ‘comes to life’ and becomes student’s text not ‘alien’, exterior one.

The student learns to be ready for the ‘unusual’ in the text.

The student begins to compare the foreign language and the native one, understanding and feeling the differences.

Text production

• -    express the idea as brief as possible;

• -    express this idea as dynamic as possible using verbs and verb phrases;

• -    use tenses to describe the situation precisely and in a nicely fashion.

The outcome of these tasks is the formed ‘language feeling’. The students learn see the idea and different ways of expressing it. They choose the most ‘English’ way of expression conscientiously.

It takes some time for the students to understand the approach or better to say to get accustomed to it. But after a month they start enjoying it and the quality of understanding and producing English texts improves greatly. The students start asking questions about the English way of expressing ideas, which means they are practicing their speech strategies. They are not afraid to change and enjoy their good English.