Translating ‘Japanese culture’: a discourse approach to teaching culture

Abstract

ABSTRACT This study examines the potential of translation activities as a means for introducing a discourse approach to teaching culture in the beginner-level language classroom. For this purpose, a translation session was implemented to a group of beginner-level learners of Japanese at a UK university. Analysis of classroom interaction and students’ journals revealed that the translation activities enabled the students to analyse, discuss, and reflect upon how choice of words (including choice of script, etc.) can play an important role in constructing perceptions and how it influences the relations between writers/texts and their readers. Furthermore, they allowed the students to explore the symbolic meanings of language by themselves, through the very process of translating a given text. In this study, culture was taught through the analysis, discussion, and creation of specific texts, rather than through the transmission of prescriptive knowledge regarding culture A or culture B. The results suggest that translation activities have the potential to contribute effectively to the implementation of a discourse approach to culture, even in the beginner-level classroom.