{"pk":2257,"title":"Culture as Non-Consensus: Exploring Coherence Among Native Speakers’ Perceptions of German Expressions of Affection","subtitle":null,"abstract":"From early in their learning experience, foreign language (FL) learners at American universities explore socio-cultural connotations that, it is argued, are signified by FL words. Textbook authors and teachers follow an implicit canon of difference, a list of iconic words that over time—and without the benefit of empirical  evidence—have  come  to  represent  essential  differences  in  outlook  between  their  native  and the  FL  culture  (Kubota,  2004).  Despite  the  fast  progression  of  the  theory  of  teaching  culture  in  FL learning (Kramsch, 2015; Risager, 2015), large empirical gaps remain. Todate, there is little evidence that native speakers (NSs) of the FL perceive their cultural practices, including the cultural contexts in which language  is  used,  homogenously  enough  to  warrant  their  status  as cultural  traits. Using  the  example  of expressions  of  affection,  this  exploratory  study  drew  on  qualitative  and  quantitative  questionnaire  data to  investigate  whether  German  NSs’  (N=52)  accounts  of  their  own  and  of  most  fellow  Germans’ language  behavior  converged  enough  to  derive  a  comprehensive  and  reliable  cultural  norm.  Results indicated  a  lack  of  consensus  among  German  NSs’  self-reported  views,  eluding  the  assumption  of  a pertinent community-specific norm. Implications for FL teaching and learning, as well as directions for future research, are discussed.","language":"en","license":{"name":"Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives  4.0","short_name":"CC BY-NC-ND 4.0","text":"Attribution — You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your use.\r\n\r\nNonCommercial — You may not use the material for commercial purposes.\r\n\r\nNoDerivatives — If you remix, transform, or build upon the material, you may not distribute the modified material.\r\n\r\nNo additional restrictions — You may not apply legal terms or technological measures that legally restrict others from doing anything the license permits.","url":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0"},"keywords":[{"word":"Second Language Acquisition"},{"word":"foreign language teaching"},{"word":"Cultural Norms"},{"word":"the Native Speaker"}],"section":"Article","is_remote":true,"remote_url":"https://escholarship.org/uc/item/2q296720","frozenauthors":[{"first_name":"Friederike","middle_name":"","last_name":"Fichtner","name_suffix":"","institution":"California State University, Chico","department":"None"}],"date_submitted":"2019-08-11T04:59:20-07:00","date_accepted":"2019-08-11T04:59:20-07:00","date_published":"2020-03-26T16:53:23-07:00","render_galley":null,"galleys":[{"label":"","type":"","path":"https://journalpub.escholarship.org/l2/article/2257/galley/1426/download/"}]}