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This paper analyses three B1-level textbooks used in EFL in Spain to gather information about how culture is taught, given that language learning and culture learning are closely related. A model of culture learning based on previous work by Paige, Jorstad, Paulson, Klein, and Colby (1999) and Lee (2009) has been designed in order to examine the textbooks’ cultural content. This functional framework gathers every theme and aspect of culture needed to develop each of the competencies that are required to accomplish an integrated language and culture learning, i.e., to achieve intercultural communicative competence as the ultimate goal of language learning. Findings show that the invisible aspect of culture (small “c” target-culture learning), which is crucial to understanding the values and ways of thinking of a society, was neglected in all three textbooks. Thus, despite some promising changes in the way of addressing culture learning in EFL textbooks, we are still far from developing intercultural speakers.
