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Plenary Speech
Revised version of a plenary address given at the AILA Congress, Beijing, 28 August 2011.
1.
Introduction
Modern-day interest in second language acquisition (SLA) began over forty years ago. A lot has been learned in these four decades. However, it may be time to re-examine its founding premise, specifically, that what is of scholarly concern is the acquisition of second languages. As applied linguists know very well, how we use language both constructs and reflects our understanding, also potentially transforming it. For this reason, it is important that we use terms that do justice to our concerns as applied linguists. In this plenary, I suggest that a more apt designation for SLA is multilingual or second language development (SLD). I adopt the lens of Complexity Theory (CT) to give twelve reasons why I think SLD is a better way to conceptualize this academic area. Although, admittedly, some of the reasons are overlapping, I maintain that it makes a big difference to our understanding when we use 'development' rather than 'acquisition'. I will conclude by saying what the implications are for this understanding in research and teaching.
So, to begin: we applied linguists, of all people, know that how we use language makes a difference. It makes a difference in how we conceive objects of interest. I coined the term grammaring, for instance, to challenge the notion of grammar as a static system with a finite number of rules. The term lexico-grammar (which I first encountered in the work of Michael Halliday) is a portmanteau that suggests that it is unproductive to separate lexicon from grammar. Although Halliday used the term before the advent of computer-assisted corpus analysis, corpus linguistics has certainly demonstrated the fact that grammar and the lexicon are intertwined in the production of phrasal units. When English speakers use separate lexical items in speaking of language and culture, instead of langaculture as Michael Agar (1995) proposes, we imply that each is different, overlooking the links between the two that cognitive linguists argue are there to be made. Further, Tecumseh Fitch (2011: 141) speculates that because English lacks a word for a drive to share our thought with others, 'perhaps this propensity to talk has escaped...