Beyond Behavior: Goals of Cultural Learning in the Second Language Classroom

In foreign language education where culture has been integrated as a core curricular component, a “categorical approach” to the concept of culture has been the mainstay. Depending on the orientation of the times, academic debate has been focused on what category of culture should be emphasized in the second language classroom. “Behavioral culture” has replaced “achievement culture” as the center of instruction in many foreign language programs. Although supporting its many premises, this article intends to point out the inadequacies of such a focus through an exposition of the original interconnectedness of each category of culture. Stressing the importance of the “cultural mind” in communicative processes, this article argues for going beyond behavior in the instruction of culture to identify, through an interdisciplinary approach, the values and beliefs that shaped a given behavior in a second culture in the first place.