Acculturation

In the field of second language learning, acculturation is considered as being accustomed to foreign culture. Brown (2007) defines acculturation as the progress of adjusting and settling into a new culture, usually when one comes to new culture. This takes time and requires one to adopt certain behavior patterns of the culture.

People experience difficulty of identifying themselves within the new environment due to uncertainty that new culture and language bring to them. Therefore, Gao (2000) accounts a study on Chinese immigrants in Australia and their difficulty to identify themselves with their new environment because of cultural and linguistic problems, at least initially. Acculturation took place, at varying levels. An evidence of which will be “their difficulty to live in China if and when they go back” p. 8.

Brown (1990) questions whether language is value-free or independent of cultural background. Gao (2000) concludes in his abstract that “it is sometimes difficult to make out the difference between what is cultural and what is linguistic, that acquisition of a second language is not culturally value-free, that acculturation and linguistic competence goes hand in hand, and that acculturation indicates identity shift.”

 As a L2 speaker of English myself, I agree that it is indeed difficult, most of the time, to ascertain whether an utterance is brought about by either cultural or linguistic factors, the competence on either or both, or the lack of it. This something that we should avoid or escape when we are in foreign culture.  

References:

Brown, H. G. (2007). Teaching by principles: An interactive approach to language pedagogy. (3^rd ed.). White Plains, NY: Pearson Education Inc.

Gao, M. C. (2000). Influence of native culture and language on intercultural communication: The case of PRC student immigrants in Australia. Paper presented at the Symposium of Intercultural Communication, Department of Linguistics, Gothenburg University, Sweden. Retrieved from http://www.immi.se/intercultural/nr4/gao.htm