Exploring Culture

     After reading Morgan's chapters, I felt that he did a wonderful job of allowing me to visualize culture.  The iceberg illustration really helped me to understand how perspectives could go much deeper than other explicit, cultural facets.  It was also very nice to read examples of the five cultural spheres, such as the restaurant.  This allowed me to see these cultural elements in use.
     After breaking culture into these five categories, I wondered if Morgan was right in doing so.  Could culture be so easily broken down?  Can one really categorize the complexities of culture so easily?    It seemed like there was a lot of overlap within some of the categories.  There is a perspective aspect of culture, along with a Persons view.  It seemed that every persons would have a unique perspective, along with many of the other facets.  That seemed almost like an umbrella term, which may have very well been the goal of Morgan. This leads me to believe that, after completing the reading, these five categories act as good guidelines for culture.  It is important for people to understand that culture will be complex, and that categorizing can help get a better grasp, especially in language.
     The part of chapter 4 I found most interesting was the tu/vous relationship.  I never really thought of the scenario Morgan described.  This really exemplified the point Morgan was trying to make this chapter:  Language and culture are intertwined.  As he said, language and culture are two sides on the same coin.  By teaching language, you can really teach someone about the target language culture.

Introductory Post: ENG 343

Hello everyone!  My name is Nate Spreitzer, and this is my second semester of TESOL Courses at ISU.  I am originally a Secondary History Education major, but am pursuing a minor in TESOL.  At first, I looked into TESOL classes to make myself more marketable in the very narrow job market of history teachers.  After taking various TESOL courses, I have had the chance to explore many interesting articles and studies, which have helped broaden my understanding of language not only in the ESL field, but also in other realms as well.  I am really looking forward to discussing cultural issues, since those were some of my favorite topics of ENG 345.