A Comparative Analysis of the China Culture Component in the 2022 Revised Curriculum : Focusing on the 2022 Revised Chinese Language and Chinese Culture Textbooks

This study comparatively analyzes the organizational structure and content distribution of the cultural domain in seven Chinese Language textbooks developed under the 2022 Revised Curriculum and five newly introduced Chinese Culture textbooks. The findings reveal that the two groups of textbooks simultaneously exhibit both commonalities and distinctions in their objectives and functional orientations toward cultural education. Overall, Chinese Language textbooks incorporate cultural content as a supplementary and contextual element within the framework of communication-oriented foreign language education, whereas Chinese Culture textbooks clearly establish themselves as independent cultural subjects that offer a multidimensional view of Chinese society and culture. The two subjects are complementary in nature, and in future classroom practice, it will be necessary to integrate and utilize them organically according to learners’ proficiency levels and instructional objectives. Furthermore, in subsequent curriculum revisions, it would be desirable to establish a certain level of standards for core components and activity types within the cultural domain in order to mitigate excessive disparities among textbooks and to promote a balanced quality of cultural education.