I English Language: section 11, Second Language Acquisition

Abstract

Applied linguistics has been traditionally understood as embracing both second language acquisition (SLA) research and second language teaching (SLT) research. SLA is a discipline that dates back to the 1970s, when research showed that learners construct their own mental grammatical representations (interlanguage grammars) worth investigating in their own right, irrespective of pedagogical concerns. This review therefore focuses on L2 (inter)language as a system and it covers child and adult L2 acquisition, with a focus on L2 English empirical studies. The general term L2 acquisition will be used to refer both to the acquisition of English as a second language (L2) in naturalistic settings and as a foreign language (EFL) in instructed settings. I will exclude other acquisition contexts, for example heritage speakers of English, third language (L3) learners of English, simultaneous child bilingualism, English first language (L1) acquisition and L1 English attrition/loss. In short, the range of studies reviewed here responds to this question: how is knowledge of the L2 interlanguage acquired (L2 acquisition) and put to use (L2 processing)?