Local Culture and EFL Vocabulary Learning

Abstract

This paper attempts to investigate the influence of learners‘ culture on foreign language vocabulary. It seeks to demonstrate that there is a link between culture and lexico-semantic errors committed by learners of English as a foreign language among Dioula speaking students in Burkina Faso. A sample population of 157 of Dioula speaking students from two secondary schools was purposively selected, using the non-probability sampling technique. A language test composed of two written activities was used as the data collection instrument. These activities were translation activities from Dioula into English. A tape-recorder was used during a story-telling session as an oral activity to collect supplementary data. The data were analysed first qualitatively and then quantitatively. The SPSS software version 17.0 (2008) was used to process the quantitative data. The qualitative method was employed to determine the link between Dioula culture and lexico-semantic errors committed by learners of English as a foreign language. Similarly, the quantitative method was used to establish the seriousness of the influence of the Dioula culture on the learning of vocabulary as a foreign language. The results revealed that the Dioula speakers‘ English is influenced by their culture. These results have some pedagogical implications. They, therefore, suggest that we adapt the teaching of EFL vocabulary to learners‖ culture.