Somayeh Ahangaran - Department of Human faculty, Garmsar University, Semnan, Iran

Culture is defined as the norms and rules that govern the behavior of a group of individuals. This behavior is unique to a group of people and therefore different groups of individuals enjoy different cultures. Culture is reflected in the language spoken by a society of community. When one group of individuals strives to learn a foreign language they are also exposed to the foreign culture. The question that arises at this point is whether the learners of a foreign language do acquire the foreign culture as well. In order to answer this question, this research compared two groups of learners learning English in Iran. One group were those learners who learned English through books designed by native speakers of English (Headway) and the other group were those who studied books designed by the Ministry of Education (Prospect). The former books were laden with the foreign culture whereas the latter were not. These two groups were compared using a questionnaire and found to be statistically similar. The cultural system held by these two groups were similar and cultural impact had not taken place. This shows that books do not transmit cultural values of the foreign language by themselves. The results show that the culture of people that is formed though time and as an outcome of their needs is not easily changed.

culture, cultural impact, language learning, foreign language learning, EFL books.