The thesis tries to promote the importance of a critical approach to ELT textbooks and highlight the importance of intercultural competencies accompanying linguistic compe-tencies. The theoretical part of the thesis focuses on the different manners of representing cultures in ELT textbooks. Moreover, further attention is paid to the specific textbooks in question with regard to the specific countries’ different high-school English language education and textbook syllabi in their aims to develop students’ intercultural awareness and competence. The practical part is based on quantitative research leading to a small-scale comparative study of two textbooks using content analysis. Each textbook has its units coded and analyzed separately before being put in contrast. The results attempt to provide an idea of how two particular kinds of ELT textbooks differ in their approaches to presenting different cultures and the degree to which their representation is balanced.