Language is a part of culture. For example, when someone wants to learn English as a foreign language, he or she should also learn culture. There will be a problem when he or she cannot or doesn't have opportunity to travel or live at the English speaking country, then how to overcome this matter?
Once I asked my Professor about it and he said to me that I had to read novel as often as possible since such book represents the culture. Is it true? Based on my experience in learning English, I found that reading novel and even watching English movies without subtitle helped me much in understanding the culture.
There is one important competency that students should have which is called pragmatic competence. The competence is about students' ability to translate the hidden meaning of word. For example, the utterance "Would you mind helping me?" is culturally considered more polite than "Can you help me?"
By reading novel we can see a certain utterance for a certain situation. When friend speaks to another friend, the formal utterance will be used. Or else, he or she will be considered arrogant. In contrary, when someone is expected to speak formally, for instance, in a conference or alike, he or she is expected to be able to speak formal or else, he or she will be considered to be uneducated.
Ideally, someone should have experience living in one of English speaking countries to deepen his or her knowledge about the foreign language he or she is learning. The limitation of time and money are the problems. The online course can also be very helpful.
