Language and Culture: Can We Shape What the Future Holds?

CULTURA CULTURA INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHY OF CULTURE CULTURA AND AXIOLOGY Founded in 2004, Cultura. International Journal of Philosophy of 2015 Culture and Axiology is a semiannual peer-reviewed journal devo- 2 2015 Vol XII No 2 ted to philosophy of culture and the study of value. It aims to pro- mote the exploration of different values and cultural phenomena in regional and international contexts. The editorial board encourages the submission of manuscripts based on original research that are judged to make a novel and important contribution to understan- ding the values and cultural phenomena in the contempo rary world. CULTURE AND AXIOLOGY CULTURE INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHY INTERNATIONAL ISBN 978-3-631-66790-3 www.peterlang.com CULTURA 2015_266790_VOL_12_No2_GR_A5Br.indd 1 27.10.15 KW 44 19:44 CULTURA CULTURA INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHY OF CULTURE CULTURA AND AXIOLOGY Founded in 2004, Cultura. International Journal of Philosophy of 2015 Culture and Axiology is a semiannual peer-reviewed journal devo- 2 2015 Vol XII No 2 ted to philosophy of culture and the study of value. It aims to pro- mote the exploration of different values and cultural phenomena in regional and international contexts. The editorial board encourages the submission of manuscripts based on original research that are judged to make a novel and important contribution to understan- ding the values and cultural phenomena in the contempo rary world. CULTURE AND AXIOLOGY CULTURE INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHY INTERNATIONAL www.peterlang.com CULTURA 2015_266790_VOL_12_No2_GR_A5Br.indd 1 27.10.15 KW 44 19:44 CULTURA INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHY OF CULTURE AND AXIOLOGY Cultura. International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology E-ISSN (Online): 2065-5002 ISSN (Print): 1584-1057 Advisory Board Prof. Dr. David Altman, Instituto de Ciencia Política, Universidad Catolica de Chile, Chile Prof. Emeritus Dr. Horst Baier, University of Konstanz, Germany Prof. Dr. David Cornberg, University Ming Chuan, Taiwan Prof. Dr. Paul Cruysberghs, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium Prof. Dr. Nic Gianan, University of the Philippines Los Baños, Philippines Prof. Dr. Marco Ivaldo, Department of Philosophy “A. Aliotta”, University of Naples “Federico II”, Italy Prof. Dr. Michael Jennings, Princeton University, USA Prof. Dr. Maximiliano E. Korstanje, University of Palermo, Argentina Prof. Dr. Richard L. Lanigan, Southern Illinois University, USA Prof. Dr. Christian Lazzeri, Université Paris Ouest Nanterre La Défense, France Prof. Dr. Massimo Leone, University of Torino, Italy Prof. Dr. Asunción López-Varela Azcárate, Complutense University, Madrid, Spain Prof. Dr. Christian Möckel, Humboldt University of Berlin, Germany Prof. Dr. Devendra Nath Tiwari, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, India Prof. Dr. José María Paz Gago, University of Coruña, Spain Prof. Dr. Mario Perniola, University of Rome “Tor Vergata”, Italy Prof. Dr. Traian D. Stănciulescu, Alexandru Ioan Cuza University Iassy, Romania Prof. Dr. Steven Tötösy de Zepetnek, Purdue University & Ghent University Editorial Board Editor-in-Chief: Co-Editors: Prof. dr. Nicolae Râmbu Prof. dr. Aldo Marroni Faculty of Philosophy and Social- Dipartimento di Lettere, Arti e Scienze Sociali Political Sciences Università degli Studi G. d’Annunzio Alexandru Ioan Cuza University Via dei Vestini, 31, 66100 Chieti Scalo, Italy B-dul Carol I, nr. 11, 700506 Iasi, Romania [email protected] [email protected] PD Dr. Till Kinzel Executive Editor: Englisches Seminar Dr. Simona Mitroiu Technische Universität Braunschweig, Human Sciences Research Department Bienroder Weg 80, Alexandru Ioan Cuza University 38106 Braunschweig, Germany Lascar Catargi, nr. 54, 700107 Iasi, Romania [email protected] [email protected] Editorial Assistant: Dr. Marius Sidoriuc Designer: Aritia Poenaru Cultura International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology Vol. 12, No. 2 (2015) Editor-in-Chief Nicolae Râmbu Bibliographic Information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data is available in the internet at http://dnb.d-nb.de. Cover Image: © Aritia Poenaru ISSN 2065-5002 ISBN 978-3-631-66790-3 (Print) E-ISBN 978-3-653-06461-2 (E-Book) DOI 10.3726/978-3-653-06461-2 © Peter Lang GmbH Internationaler Verlag der Wissenschaften Frankfurt am Main 2015 All rights reserved. Peter Lang Edition is an Imprint of Peter Lang GmbH. Peter Lang – Frankfurt am Main · Bern · Bruxelles · New York · Oxford · Warszawa · Wien All parts of this publication are protected by copyright. Any utilisation outside the strict limits of the copyright law, without the permission of the publisher, is forbidden and liable to prosecution. This applies in particular to reproductions, translations, microfilming, and storage and processing in electronic retrieval systems. This publication has been peer reviewed. www.peterlang.com CONTENTS Polycarp Ikuenobe 7 Cultural Dynamics, Moral Ignorance, and a Plausible Response to Immoral Acts Tomas Kačerauskas 27 Creative Society: Concepts and Problems Rubén Herce 45 Christopher Dawson on Spengler, Toynbee, Eliot and the notion of Culture Mahdi Dahmardeh 61 Language and Culture: Can we shape what the future holds? Weilin Fang 73 Anoixism and Its Idealistic Pursuit Georg W. Oesterdiekhoff 81 Evolution of Democracy. Psychological Stages and Political Developments in World History Alexandru Petrescu 103 Cultural – Philosophical Debate concerning the german Origin, the Specificity and the Evolution of the analytical Philosophy Mariana Momanu & Nicoleta Laura Popa 115 Nationalism and Europeanism in Education: A Critical Analysis of Alternatives Corneliu C. Simuţ 129 Promoting Ancestry as Ecodomy in Indigenous African Religions Cristian Iftode 145 The Ethical Meaning of Foucault’s Aesthetics of Existence Gulbakyt Shashayeva & Zhakhan Z. Moldabekov 163 Hospitality in Kazakhstan: The Empire Sings Back 10.3726/266790_61 Cultura. International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology 12(2)/2015: 61–72 Language and Culture: Can we shape what the future holds? Mahdi Dahmardeh (Corresponding Author) Assistant Professor & Faculty Member, The University of Tehran PO BOX: 14185 – 173, Tehran, Iran. E-mail: [email protected] Mr Hossein Parsazadeh Allameh Tabatabaie University, The ILI Teacher E-mail: [email protected] Abstract. The role of culture in a field as vast as applied linguistics is so pronounced and vital that even a highly selective overview might not be sufficient to be comprehensive. What follows might be a synoptic account of the role of culture in the realm of applied linguistics. The enigmatic point which even makes the vast field of applied linguistics goes to unbeaten tracks is the similar nature of culture. Due to the aforementioned point, here the canonical overlap of them is emphasised. More- over, as culture and language are intrinsically intertwined, we decided to have a more cultural stance rather than a linguistic one. Therefore, first, we go through the major studies in connection with language and culture. These studies might fall into three broad categories, namely those relating to epistemology of culture, those relating to its relation to language, and finally those relating to its presentation through a given language. Then, we touch on the trends, and in the end we try sum up and to un- ravel, or better to say, to come to grips with this enigmatic riddle, culture. In other words, in conclusion, we attempt to portray what culture will be. Keywords: language, culture, linguistics, acculturation, English INTRODUCTION The role of culture in a field as vast as applied linguistics is so pronounced and vital that even a highly selective overview might not be sufficient to be comprehensive. Put another way, whenever there is a language, there exists a certain culture with it, and having a negative view towards that culture might cause failure in the learning. The prime example could be the term acculturation coined by Schumann (1978). The term came from an often-quoted case study of a 33 year-old Costa Rican who could not acculturate to the target language community. Moreover, the reason was his antagonistic view towards the new language, English. 61 Mahdi Dahmardeh & Hossein Parsazadeh / Language and Culture Schumann then came to the conclusion that “second language acquisi- tion is just one aspect of acculturation and the degree to which a learner acculturates to the target-language group will control the degree to which he acquires the second language” (Schumann, 1978: 34). Nevertheless, acculturation has its own limitations. For example, For some theorists, one limitation of the acculturation model, as a theory of SLA, is that it does not explain the internal mechanisms of how an L2 is acquired; it is a sociopsychological model rather than a cognitive-processing model. (Barkhuizen, 2004: 562) As mentioned before, it is not possible to raise all the issues of culture theses day we are dealing with. Moreover, two crucial factors should be taken into account. First although here we focus mainly on English, the purpose is any language in power which might be another language in the future. Second, considering English as accepted norms should be called into question. Concerning the first issue, Halliday (2006) points out: It is naive to imagine that if the United Nations had decreed, back in 1950, that some other language –say Esperanto, or even Malay

Load more