Published in this series:
BACHMAN: Fundamental Considerations in Language Testing
BACHMAN and PALMER: Language Testing in Practice
BRUMFIT: Individual Freedom and Language Teaching
BRUMFIT and CARTER (eds.): Literature and Language Teaching
CANAGARAJAH: Resisting Linguistic Imperialism in Language Teaching
COHEN and MACARO (eds.): Language Learner Strategies
COOK: Discourse and Literature
COOK: Language Play, Language Learning
COOK and SEIDLHOFER (eds.): Principle and Practice in Applied Linguistics
DöRNYEI: Research Methods in Applied Linguistics
ELLIS: SLA Research and Language Teaching
ELLIS: Task-based Language Learning and Teaching
ELLIS: The Study of Second Language Acquisition (2nd edn.)
ELLIS: Understanding Second Language Acquisition
ELLIS and BARKHUIZEN: Analysing Learner Language
FOTOS and NASSAJI (eds.): Form-focused Instruction and Teacher Education
HOLLIDAY: The Struggle to Teach English as an International Language
HOWATT: A History of English Language Teaching
JENKINS: English as a Lingua Franca
JENKINS: The Phonology of English as an International Language
KERN: Literacy and Language Teaching
KRAMSCH: Context and Culture in Language Teaching
LANTOLF (ed.): Sociocultural Theory and Second Language Learning
LANTOLF and THORNE: Sociocultural Theory and the Genesis of Second Language Development
LARSEN-FREEMAN and CAMERON: Complex Systems and Applied Linguistics
MACKEY (ed.): Conversational Interaction in SLA
MEINHOF: Language Learning in the Age of Satellite Television
NATTINGER and DECARRICO: Lexical Phrases and Language Teaching
PHILLIPSON: Linguistic Imperialism
SEIDLHOFER (ed.): Controversies in Applied Linguistics
SELIGER and SHOHAMY: Second Language Research Methods
SKEHAN: A Cognitive Approach to Language Learning
STERN: Fundamental Concepts of Language Teaching
STERN (eds. P. ALLEN and B. HARLEY): Issues and Options in Language Teaching
TARONE and YULE: Focus on the Language Learner
WIDDOWSON: Aspects of Language Teaching
WIDDOWSON: Defining Issues in English Language Teaching
WIDDOWSON: Practical Stylistics
WIDDOWSON: Teaching Language as Communication
WRAY: Formulaic Language
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The history of acceptance of new theories frequently shows the following steps: at first the new idea is treated as pure nonsense, not worth looking at. Then comes a time when a multitude of contradictory objections are raised, such as: the new theory is too fancy, or merely a new terminology; it is not fruitful, or simply wrong. Finally a state is reached when everyone seems to claim that he had always followed this theory. This usually marks the last state before general acceptance.
(Lewin 1943:292)
I normally enjoy the process of writing a book, but this volume on the psychology of second language acquisition (SLA) has been an emotional roller-coaster at times. In fact, after I received the contract from Oxford University Press, I put off working on the manuscript for several years – I did have some good excuses, but the bottom line was that I was apprehensive about the enormity of the task: applied linguistics and second language research had clearly been shaken by a paradigmatic earthquake. This has been caused by (1) the rapidly growing influence of relevant brain research in psycholinguistics, neurolinguistics, neuropsychology, neurobiology, and more generally, in cognitive (neuro)science; and (2) the emergence of new cognitive approaches to the study of language acquisition, such as connectionism, emergentism, dynamic systems theory, complexity theory, and usage/exemplar-based theories. The resulting changes in our field have been so fast and profound that the word ‘blitzkrieg’ seems oddly fitting to describe what we are currently experiencing.
