The critical study of localized context in Iranian foreign languages’ textbooks

Authors

1 PhD Candidate in French Education at Tarbiyat Modares University, Tehran

2 (PhD), Organization for Educational Research and Planning, Tehran

3 MA in English Language and Literature

Abstract

Based on the critics about national and social identity which occurred after the globalization phenomenon, especially in foreign languages education and language planning, new issues like localized knowledge and localization have been developed. Textbooks and educational contents are essential instruments in transferring the culture and religious issues, norms and values and they have influential role on developing children and teenagers’ personality. The aim of education at the present era is to protect and improve the identity and national values in students living in the global village. This study is going to criticize the localized context in English and French education textbooks in Iran’s education system. It is a documentary analytical study and it uses qualitative content analysis method for data analysis. The research population consists of guidance school French education textbooks and 7th and 8th grade English textbooks. We concluded that the amount of identity elements in English textbooks are more than French ones and we can see some national identity elements in both English and French textbooks which can be improved more.

Keywords