Complex Systems and Applied Linguistics

This book introduces and develops the potential of complex systems as a metaphor or supra-theory for systems in applied linguistics. Change and heterogeneity are central to complex systems theory and to the resonances that we find between complex systems and applied linguistics systems. The book explores these resonances and what happens when complex systems theory is used to make sense of central areas of applied linguistic concerns: language, language learning, discourse and the language classroom. Principles of complex systems theory are explained, drawing on work that has been most developed in the biological sciences and that is being extended into the social sciences, developmental psychology and other…