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Why Is Reading in A Second Language Sometimes Difficult

1. The document discusses reading in a second language and how it can sometimes be difficult. Cultures organize ideas and texts differently, and it is harder to comprehend texts that do not follow the patterns of one's first language. 2. It then discusses how culture shapes thought processes. While Western scholars had assumed logical reasoning and other thought processes were universal, recent studies show people from different cultures think differently as well as think about different things. 3. The final section discusses how symbols are important for understanding culture and how not recognizing cultural symbols can lead to confusion and culture shock when visiting an unfamiliar culture.

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Samsiyah Febiyana
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142 views1 page

Why Is Reading in A Second Language Sometimes Difficult

1. The document discusses reading in a second language and how it can sometimes be difficult. Cultures organize ideas and texts differently, and it is harder to comprehend texts that do not follow the patterns of one's first language. 2. It then discusses how culture shapes thought processes. While Western scholars had assumed logical reasoning and other thought processes were universal, recent studies show people from different cultures think differently as well as think about different things. 3. The final section discusses how symbols are important for understanding culture and how not recognizing cultural symbols can lead to confusion and culture shock when visiting an unfamiliar culture.

Uploaded by

Samsiyah Febiyana
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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READING EXERCISES

Read the texts below and answer the questions.

1. Why Is Reading in a Second Language Sometimes Difficult?


Cross-cultural research shows that cultures have varying attitudes about language in general and that these
differences are reflected in the printed word. As a result, the way ideas are organized in expository writing (e.g., in
essays) varies across cultures. Originally called to our attention by Kaplan (1966), this suggestion has inspired
research in several different languages. Ostler, for example, found that the patterns of expository writing in a
language "reflect the patterns valued in the native culture." Researchers have found significant differences in text
organization between English and the Korean, German, Japanese, Arabic, and Athabaskan languages. It is logical to
conclude from this that when people read in a second language they comprehend best the texts that meet their beliefs
and expectations about the patterns of written language. To the extent that the patterns in the text of a second
language are different from those of the first language, the reader is likely to have difficulty comprehending.

A. Mark each statement T (true) or F (false).


1. Texts such as essays have the same form in every language.
2. Different cultures have different ways of organizing texts.
3. When you read in a second language, you can find the same patterns as in your first language.
4. It is easier to read in a language that has text patterns similar to those in your first language.

B. Lists of difficult vocabulary: ……………………………………………………………

C. What do you already know about the text? Tell using your own thoughts.

2. How Culture Molds Habits of Thought


For more than a century, Western philosophers and psychologists have based their discussions of mental life on a
cardinal assumption: that the same basic processes underlie all human though, whether in the mountains of Tibet or
the grasslands of the Serengeti.
Cultural differences might dictate what people thought about. Teenage boys in Botswana, for example, might
discuss cows with the same passion that New York teenagers reserve for sports cars.
But the habits of thought—the strategies people adopted in processing information and making sense of the
world around them—were, Western scholars assumed, the same for everyone, exemplified by, among other things, a
devotion to logical reasoning, a penchant for categorization and an urge to understand situations and events in linear
terms of cause and effect.
Recent work by a social psychologist at the University of Michigan, however, is turning this long-held view of
mental functioning upside down. In a series of studies comparing European Americans to East Asians, Dr. Richard
Nisbett and his colleagues have found that people who grow up in different cultures do not just think about different
things: they think differently.
"We used to think that everybody uses categories in the same way, that logic plays the same kind of role for
everyone in the understanding of everyday life, that memory, perception, rule application and so on are the same,"
Dr. Nisbett said. "But we're now arguing that cognitive processes themselves are just far more malleable than
mainstream psychology assumed."

A. Mark each statement T (true) or F (false).


1. People think about different things depending on where they live.
2. People all think in the same way.
3. A social psychologist has come up with a new idea about how we think.
4. Logic is the same in every culture.

3. Symbols
Reality for human beings is not action or feeling but meaning. Humans are symbolic creatures; a symbol is
anything that carries a particular meaning recognized by the people who share culture. A whistle, a wall of graffiti, a
flashing red light, a fist raised in the air—all serve as symbols. We see the human capacity to create and manipulate
symbols in the various ways a simple wink of the eye can convey interest, understanding, or insult.
We are so dependent on our culture's symbols that we take them for granted. Often, however, we gain a
heightened sense of the importance of a symbol when someone uses it in an unconventional way, say when a person
in a political demonstration burns a U.S. flag.
Entering an unfamiliar culture also reminds us of the power of symbols; culture shock is nothing more than the
inability to "read" meaning in one's surroundings. We feel lost, unsure of how to act, and sometimes frightened—a
consequence of slipping outside the symbolic web of culture.
Culture shock is both what travelers experience and what they inflict on others by acting in ways that may
offend them. For example, because North Americans consider dogs to be beloved household pets, travelers to the
People's Republic of China might well be appalled to discover people roasting dogs as a wintertime meal. On the
other hand, a North
American who orders a hamburger in India causes offense to Hindus, who hold cows to be sacred and thus unfit for
human consumption.
A. Mark each statement T (true) or F (false).
1. A symbol is usually written.
2. We always notice the symbols of our own culture.
3. In an unfamiliar culture, we feel confused by the symbols.
4. Culture shock is mostly about food.

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