A Content Analysis of Multicultural Representations of Textbooks in Expanding Circle Countries: A Case of Vision Series in Iran

With the dissemination of the concept of intercultural citizenship and the growing demand for citizens to communicate in settings with a kaleidoscopic array of cultural diversity, EFL textbooks should reflect these multicultural values besides their attention to language. This study examines cultural contents/themes from written passages and pictures of Vision series, the Iranian senior high school textbooks. To this end, the cultural contents (source, target, international cultures) and cultural themes (big ‘C’ and little ‘c’) were qualitatively extracted. The results of the quantitative content analysis revealed that there were not any significant differences among the three books in terms of cultural categories. However, source cultural content gained higher frequency as compared to others; Big ‘C’ themes gained statistically more frequency than the little ‘c’ which could be the aftermath of the authors’ sole focus on L1 communicative competence. The study further concludes that the textbooks failed to foster intercultural communicative competence and intercultural communication. The findings have implications for syllabus designers and material developers to integrate the principles of English as an international language in their practice by further including target and international cultural content types.