Language culture and language cultural exchange, as two key concepts in offi cial and academic discourse, have acquired special signifi cance in the context of contemporary China. They have to be reinterpreted and integrated into the government’s grand vision of creating a community of shared future for mankind. In this paper, various understandings of “language culture” are reviewed. Then it discusses the three layers of language culture based on Xu’s (2017) classification. This paper also examines the connotations, functions and formation mechanism of language cultural exchange. It argues that language culture exchange is fundamentally a kind of information and knowledge interchange as well as intercommunication, which entails mutual learning of languages and the communication of culture and language values. The author also proposes some principles of language culture exchange. In conclusion, language cultural exchange is indispensable in the creation of community of shared future for mankind.