On the importance of developing the intercultural communicative competence in EFL learners

Language education should centre around the development of the intercultural communicative competence in learners as it enables them to appropriately interpret messages belonging to foreign contexts. It is not sufficient to be fluent and accurate in English for successful communication to occur if little attention is devoted to the intercultural communicative competence. Learners might interpret the message from their ethnocentric points of view and not value the otherness in the interlocutors. The article analyses the observation of a class in English C2 Level in which the learners failed to appropriately interpret the messages of the texts they had to deal with. It appeared that their intercultural communicative competence was poorly developed, although their fluency and accuracy in English were rather good. It becomes clear that language educators should prioritize the development of intercultural communicative competence, particularly at present when the global village has become a reality.