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ELT Journal 2002 56(1):57-64; doi:10.1093/elt/56.1.57
© 2002 by Oxford University Press
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Towards intercultural communicative competence in ELT

Cem Alptekin1

1 The Faculty of Education at Bogaziçi University in Istanbul, Turkey. Email: alptekic@boun.edu.tr

This article questions the validity of the pedagogic model based on the native speaker-based notion of communicative competence. With its standardized native speaker norms, the model is found to be utopian, unrealistic, and constraining in relation to English as an International Language (EIL). It is utopian not only because native speakership is a linguistic myth, but also because it portrays a monolithic perception of the native speaker's language and culture, by referring chiefly to mainstream ways of thinking and behaving. It is unrealistic because it fails to reflect the lingua franca status of English. It is constraining in that it circumscribes both teacher and learner autonomy by associating the concept of authenticity with the social milieu of the native speaker.

A new notion of communicative competence is needed, one which recognizes English as a world language. This would encompass local and international contexts as settings of language use, involve native–nonnative and nonnative–nonnative discourse participants, and take as pedagogic models successful bilinguals with intercultural insights and knowledge. As such, it would aim at the realization of intercultural communicative competence in ELT.


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