”It’s not a term that I’ve ever used” - Teachers’ Interpretations of Interculturality in EFL-teaching

Abstract: The purpose of this degree project was to investigate teachers’ conscious and unconscious interpretations of interculturality. We interviewed five teachers from different schools in order to analyse how intercultural their teaching of culture in EFL is. We investigated how their schools encourage cultural diversity, whether intercultural aspects are incorporated in their EFL-teaching and how they interpret the term interculturality. The Swedish national curriculum (Skolverket 2011a), Byram’s (1997) five savoirs and Sercu’s (2006) IC-teacher profile provided us with the theoretical background for the analysis. Our findings suggest that there are teachers who do not incorporate intercultural aspects into their EFL-teaching, as well as teachers who include some aspects. Among our five teachers there is an uncertainty concerning interculturality and how it should be a part of their teaching. Our conclusion is that since it is no longer optional in Swedish schools to incorporate interculturality into EFL-teaching, it is necessary to raise an awareness of the term among principals, teachers and teacher students.