Cultural representation in Arabic textbooks: unveiling intercultural gaps and pedagogical implications in Indonesian Islamic higher education

Cultural representation in Arabic textbooks is essential for fostering students’ intercultural awareness, yet critical studies in Indonesian universities remain limited. This study examines cultural representation in six Arabic textbooks in Indonesian Islamic universities and their contribution to students’ intercultural awareness. Using Krippendorff’s content analysis of verbal and visual texts, the study applies a framework of cultural elements (people, products, practices, perspectives) and cultural types (source culture/SC, target culture/TC, international target culture/ITC), supplemented by a semi-open questionnaire with six lecturers. Results show an imbalanced representation: products dominate while practices and perspectives remain underrepresented; SC and TC appear more frequently than ITC. This confirms that Arabic textbooks are still oriented toward linguistic skills rather than intercultural competence. Pedagogical implications include reflective and comparative assignments, the integration of cross-contextual authentic materials (ITC), and the strengthening of lecturers’ roles as cultural mediators—providing a basis for improving textbook design to support intercultural competencies.