Relationship between culture and language in linguistics

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION


According to the leading Russian linguist, professor of Moscow State University S. Ter-Minasova, the solution to the urgent task of teaching foreign languages as a means of communication between native speakers in different languages, and, consequently, representatives of different cultures, consists in the fact that "languages should be studied in indissoluble unity with the world and culture of peoples speaking these languages." [5]. She writes: "Every foreign language lesson is a crossroads of cultures, this is a practice of intercultural communication because every foreign word is a reflection of another world and another culture: each word hides a peculiar view of the world typical of this particular culture". It should be stated that even more important is communication with a member of a different culture for whom his/her native language is not just a way of expressing thoughts and ideas but for whom it is a living body directly related to his consciousness, self-understanding and understanding of the world around him. After a few years, in 2000 the textbook by S. Ter-Minasova called «Language and Intercultural communication» was published. The author defines intercultural communication as a communication between people of different cultures. S. Ter-Minasova quotes E. Vereshchagin and V. Kostomarov’s paper «A language and a culture», determined intercultural communication as an adequate understanding of two participants in a communicative act, belonging to different national cultures.
As E. Sepir stated, "language does not exist outside of the culture, that is, outside a socially inherited set of practical skills and ideas that characterize our lifestyle" [8].
Wardhaugh reported that there appear to be three claims to the relationship between language and culture: The structure of a language determines the way in which speakers of that language view the world or, as a weaker view, the structure does not determine the world-view but is still extremely influential in predisposing speakers of a language toward adopting their world-view . Wardhaugh also notes that people who speak languages with different structures (e.g. Germans and Hungarians) can share similar cultural characteristics, and people who have different cultures can also possess similar structures in language (e.g. Hungarians and Finns).
Culture cannot be taught; it can only be mastered in the process of the direct practice of intercultural communication. For this, in the educational process, special conditions should be created, which promote the mastery of the foreign language by students as effective means of intercultural communication [3]. What conditions allow being well aware of cultural norms and values, traditions of the learning language’s country, besides language norms and use those peculiarities in speech. Constantly monitor dynamics of intercultural communication’s development, be surrounded by a representative of other cultures and attend scientific events let improving methods of foreign language teaching, making them more modern. Students as future workers taught by modern methods may be successful in communication, being in demand in the labour market.