(46) {{U}}Culture, in a broad sense, means the total way of life of a people, including the patterns of belief, customs, institutions, techniques, and language that characterize the life of the group.{{/U}} As culture is so inclusive, it permeates virtually every aspect of human life and influences predominantly people's behavior, including linguistic behavior.
(47) {{U}}When we learn a new word we tend to look for its meaning in the word itself; however, in addition to its dictionary meanings, the same word may stir up different associations in different people.{{/U}} Take the word dog for example. In the United States, the word dog in most instances conjures up an image of a furry, domesticated family pet. In some areas of the world, such as South Korea, however, dogs are considered to be a culinary amenity and often are eaten. Therefore, the word dog elicits a quite different meaning because of different cultural experiences. This example indicates that language is heavily tinted with its culture.
(48) {{U}}From the above, we can infer that a language not only expresses facts, ideas, or events which represent shared world knowledge of its people, but also reflects the people's attitudes beliefs, world outlooks etc.{{/U}} In a word, language expresses cultural reality. When a child acquires his mother tongue, he also acquires a language-specific culture and becomes socialized in certain ways. If he moves to another community or country, he may be recognized easily not as a member of the local community group but as a newcomer from the ways he uses his language. This implies that language embodies cultural identity.
As language is tightly intertwined with culture, learning a language is inseparable from learning its culture. (49) {{U}}When learning a foreign language, we should not only learn the mere imitation of the pronunciation, grammar, words and idioms but also learn to see the world as native speakers do, that is to say, learn the wags in which the foreign language reflects the ideas, customs, and behavior of that society, learn to understand their "language of the mind".{{/U}} We need to learn enough about the language's culture so that we can communicate in the target language properly to achieve not only the linguistic competence but also communicative competence. This is of great significance in learning a foreign language. (50) {{U}}Otherwise the ignorance of cultural differences between mother tongue and target language will inevitable create barriers in learning the target language, thus causing some misunderstandings and confusions frequently.{{/U}}