The Creation of an Intercultural Learning Experience in EFL Contexts

The present Study aimed to examine the efficacy of using literary texts in promoting intercultural communication competence, and intercultural awareness and understanding within language teaching contexts. The participants were 50 Iranian undergraduate students of English Literature, 20 male and 30 female, with their ages ranging from 19 to 24 engaged in reading and discussing literary texts with an emphasis on their social and cultural themes and contents. 9 English and 2 Persian short stories were the main material implemented, and these were supplemented by 6 American and 2 Iranian movies with their screenplays adopted from literary works. The themes attended to included racial discrimination, social class, gender roles, and ethnic minorities.  Based on Byram’s (1997) proposed model of Intercultural Communication Competence (ICC), five factors of the students’ ICC development, Savoir Comprendre, Savoire Etre, Savoire S’engager, Savoirs and Savoire Apprendre/Faire, were observed throughout a 14-session course. A Content analysis of students’ writing assignments and an examination of how fruitful they found the tasks and materials in enhancing their cultural understanding demonstrated a noticeable involvement of all the studied ICC factors in reading, discussing and contemplating on the literary texts and their cultural content.