ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education Volume 8, Issue 1, December 2019 p-ISSN 2301-7554, e-ISSN 2541-3643 https://journal.uniku.ac.id/index.php/ERJEE 157 INCORPORATING CULTURAL FACTORS IN EFL CONTEXT Aam Alamsyah Technocrat School of Foreign Language, Tangerang, Indonesia E-mail: alamsyah_expert@yahoo.com Mutaat Technocrat School of Foreign Language, Tangerang, Indonesia E-mail: mutaat@gmail.com Radik Darmawan Technocrat School of Foreign Language, Tangerang, Indonesia E-mail: radik.darmawan@yahoo.co.id APA Citation: Alamsyah, A., Mutaat, & Darmawan, R. (2019). Incorporating cultural factors in EFL context. English Review: Journal of English Education, 8(1), 157-164. doi: 10.25134/erjee.v8i1.2620. Received: 02-06-2019 Accepted: 10-08-2019 Published: 01-12-2019 Abstract: This study highlighted the issue of the incorporation of English cultures, cultural preference and diversity in relation to the students’ English program. The need to analyze the students’ perception is imperative since the students are considered as one of the most important factors in determining the success or failure of their own learning process. The respondents recruited for the present study were 80 part-time college students of different departments (i.e., Literature, Informatics, and Accounting). The use of mixed method aimed to elicit more elaborate data on the students’ perceptions toward the above issues. The instruments used in the present study were questionnaires and semi-structured interview. During the data collection, the questionnaire, and interview were administered within the same day. The results indicated that the students’ perception toward the incorporation of English culture was ambivalent. Of the 80 participants, there were only 48 students who voiced to agree and to strongly agree with the exposure; while the rest of the participants did not seem to agree. It was also found that most of the students preferred to learn Asian cultures instead of western ones. The most noticeable determinants affecting their preference were mainly the popularity of Asian cultures exposed on various media as well as their jobs which mostly involved Asian employers (Japanese, Korean, etc.). They were also found to appreciate the exposure conducted by the teacher as one of the relevant activity when learning foreign language. English grammar and vocabulary are skills to prioritize when speaking with Asians, and they did not find pronunciation important to support communication among them. Keywords: incorporating cultural factors; cultural preference; cultural diversity, Asian cultures; EFL. INTRODUCTION The importance of incorporating culture has been widely acknowledged by numerous scholars. The need to incorporate English culture in EFL is basically driven by the perceived connection between language and culture (Brown, 2001; Brown, 2007; Dema, & Moeller, 2012; Nguyen, 2017). In the same notion, the other scholars such as Doob (1985) and Schaefer (2011) postulated that language belongs to one of the cultural elements, thus indicating the close connection between language and culture as well. However, with the growing awareness of the students- centered paradigm in pedagogy the attempt to incorporate English-only cultures in EFL learning process has become the subject of criticism (Slavin, 2009). This is because the children, who enter their first learning process, will usually have absorbed their own cultural aspects as a result of their own parental upbringing (2009, p. 98). With this concept, exposing different culture to those who adhere to certain cultural beliefs may result in unfavorable responses or rejections. In sum, scholars consider that the differences exposed to the students can possibly trigger cultural conflicts which leads to the students’ rejection in learning English (see e.g., Palmer, 2013). The present study aimed to investigate the students’ perceptions toward the incorporation of English cultures into their EFL program in order to allow the educators to have more complete pictures on how to incorporate cultural factors within the students’ learning process. Specifically, the present study aimed to provide those involved in higher education with more sound arguments for incorporating cultural aspects as well as serving their students better.