On Cultivating Intercultural Communication Competence in FLT 英语论文.doc

On Cultivating Intercultural Communication Competence in FLT 1.Introduction 1.1 The importance of developing students’ intercultural communicative competence 1.1.1 Boom of intercultural communication The world we live in is shrinking. Travel that once took months now takes hours. Business dealings that were once restricted to local economies have extended to an integrated world economy. Information that once took a long time to be spread now appears in the blind of an eye across a wide range of media. People in almost all locations of the globe are more mobile than ever and more likely to traverse into cultures different than their own. Literally and figuratively, the walls that separate us are tumbling down. Though we may not have fully become a “global village,” there is no denying that the various cultures of the world are far more accessible than ever before, and that the peoples of these cultures are coming into contact at an ever-increasing rate. Intercultural communication becomes one of the most prominent and significant activities in the 21st century. 1.1.2 Meeting the Need of Development Since China adopted the policy of reform and “opening up”, more and more transnational corporations have been crowding into China for investment. Exchange of culture, advanced science and technology becomes unprecedented frequent and important. Therefore, it is self-evident that a good command of intercultural communicative competence (ICC) is of high necessity and significance, especially when we enter the 21st century. In the 21st century, China’s modernizations are closely bound up with intercultural communication. Modernization is a process involving both economic development and evolution of value system, in which people make full use of advanced technology and other means to improve their physical and spiritual conditions. This dual nature of modernization and urgency of modernization determine the significance of developing learners’ ICC. Just as Hu Wenzhong (1997: