Not so Fast: Some Thoughts on Theory Culling, Relativism, Accepted Findings and the Heart and Soul of SLA

Abstract

This paper is meant to be a response to claims made by several prominent applied linguists in recent articles about second language acquisition (SLA) research These claims are as follows (1) The existence of multiple theories in SLA research is problematic (Beretta 1991), and the field should be united around a single theory or a few theories (Long 1993), (2) The alternative to such a concerted effort is a relativistic stance where ‘anything goes’ (Long 1990a, 1993, Beretta 1991), (3) There is now an ample body of ‘accepted findings’ which a good theory of SLA will have to account for (Long 1990a, Larsen Freeman and Long 1991), (4) The existence of ‘accepted findings’ means that SLA researchers should get on with the task of putting the findings to the test, attempting to falsify them through replication studies I begin by disagreeing with each of these suggestions and then go on to elaborate my own view of SLA research This view sees SLA as a process of exploration (Schumann 1993) and speculation (Davies 1991) rather than one of discovery and proof In addition, I suggest that SLA is multi-dimensional in nature, including not only cognitive mechanisms (Long 1990a), but also the social psychology of the classroom (Allwright 1989) I end by considering how SLA research carried out according to the principles I outline might be evaluated