Elements of culture and civilization in textbooks of Italian as a second and foreign language (levels of competence A1-B1)

The paper provides an analysis of the way of presenting and assessing the input concerning culture proposed in some coursebooks for Italian as L2-FL published between 2014 and 2016 and covering levels A1, A2 and B1 of CEFR (namely il Balboni, Nuovo Espresso and Nuovo Contatto). The study is based on the theory of Geert Hofstede, who distinguished four categories of culture elements: symbols, heroes, rituals and values. The analysis confirms the presence of all these components in the studied materials, although it clearly highlights the imbalance between them. This is due to their intrinsic characteristics that affect the ease with which precise cultural information can be conveyed in a language class. Moreover, the distinction between cultura and civiltà has not been maintained. The conclusions also bring to light some issues that can be encountered by both Polish teachers and students if using the aforementioned resources within an FL course.