Fostering Intercultural Communicative Competence in the Foreign Language Classroom: Pedagogical Implications

The development of learners' communicative competence has been regarded as the major goal of foreign and second language teaching. Several authors have advanced various communicative models in order to better explain how language teaching and learning work (e.g. Canale & Swain, 1980; Canale, 1983; Bachman, 1990; Celce-Murcia et al. 1995; Usó-Juan & Martínez-Flor 2006). One of the elements of the communicative model is that of intercultural competence (Byram, 1997; Usó-Juan & Martínez-Flor, 2008). This competence has been defined by Meyer (1991, p. 137) as "the ability of a person to behave adequately in a flexible manner when confronted with actions, attitudes and expectations of representatives of foreign cultures". Cultural dimensions play a paramount role in learners' learning process; however, there is not apparently a particular approach for its integration in the language classroom. Taken into account those aspects, in this paper, I attempt to provide an instructional approach for the integration of culture in the language classroom so as to foster learners' communicative competence. The present paper presents first a revision of different communicative models, then, a description of the notion intercultural competence is provided. Finally, an instructional approach for the teaching of this particular competence is proposed.