Research on interactional feedback has typically focused on feedback learners receive from native speakers (i.e., NS-learner contexts). However, for many second language (L2) learners, the majority of their opportunities to engage in interaction occur with other learners (i.e., learner-learner contexts). The literature has suggested that feedback…

In this article, we begin by delineating the background to and motivations behind Firth and Wagner (1997), wherein we called for a reconceptualization of second language acquisition (SLA) research. We then outline and comment upon some of our critics' reactions to the article. Next we review and discuss the conceptual, theoretical, and…

This article argues for a reconceptualization of Second Language Acquisition (SLA) research that would enlarge the ontological and empirical parameters of the field. We claim that methodologies, theories, and foci within SLA reflect an imbalance between cognitive and mentalistic orientations, and social and contextual orientations to language, the…

This article argues for the crucial role of alignment in second language acquisition, as conceptualized from a broadly sociocognitive perspective. By "alignment," we mean the complex processes through which human beings effect coordinated interaction, both with other human beings and (usually human-engineered) environments, situations,…

Argues that not only is the study of interaction in second language acquisition (SLA) predicated on a socially impoverished view of interaction, but also that the types of data frequently used for investigating questions of interaction in a second language may not be adequate for determining what really occurs in such interactions. (15 references)…

Reviews the theories which assert the necessity for prolonged intensive listening without expectations of production for some time in language teaching. Asserts that comprehension and production are indissoluble partners in the two-way process of communicative interaction and that teacher-directed and dominated classrooms are not interactive…

For some time now second language acquisition (SLA) research has been hampered by unhelpful debates between the cognitivist and sociocultural camps that have generated more acrimony than useful theory. Recent developments in second generation cognitive science, first language acquisition studies, cognitive anthropology, and human development…

Examines controversial interactions between children, a group generally overlooked in second-language acquisition research. Specifically, the research focuses on (1) whether children can negotiate for meaning, (2) what strategies they use, and (3) whether there are differences between the ways adults and primary school children negotiate for…

Discusses recent research in reading comprehension, discourse analysis, and literary theory as it bears on the way in which the teaching of literary texts can be integrated into a general approach to the teaching of language as social discourse. Suggests a new approach to integrating language and literature in foreign language teaching. (SED)