English Language Teaching in its Social Context

12 ROSAMOND MITCHELL AND FLORENCE MYLESis ‘picked up’ in the community). Some second language researchers have proposed aprincipled distinction between formal, conscious learning and informal, unconsciousacquisition .This distinction attracted much criticism when argued in a strong form by StephenKrashen (1 98 1); it still has both its active supporters and its critics (e.g. Zobll995; Robinson1997). We think it is difficult to sustain systematically when surveying SLL research in thebroad way proposed here, and unless specially indicated we will be using both termsinterchangeably.What makes for a good theory?Second language learning is an immensely complex phenomenon. Millions of human beingshave experience of second language learning, and may have a good practical understandingof the activities which helped them to learn (or perhaps blocked them from learning). Butthis practical experience, and the common-sense knowledge which it leads to, are clearly notenough to help us understand fully how the process happens.We know, for a start, that peoplecannot reliably describe the language rules which they have somehow internalized, nor theinner mechanisms which process, store and retrieve many aspects of that new language.We need to understand second language learning better than we do, for two basicreasons.1 Improved knowledge in this particular domain is interesting in itself, and can alsocontribute to more general understanding about the nature of language, of human learning,and of intercultural communication, and thus about the human mind itself, as well as howall these are interrelated and affect each other.2 The knowledge will be useful. If we becomc better at explaining the learning process,and are better able to account for both success and failure in L2 learning, there will be a payofffor millions of teachers, and tens of millions of students and othcr learners, who arestruggling with the task.We can only pursue a better understanding of L2 learning in an organi7ed and productiveway if our efforts are guided by some form of theory. For our purposes, a theory is a more orless abstract set of claims about the units that are significant within the phenomenon understudy, the relationships that exist between them, and the processes that bring about change.Thus a theory aims not just at description, hut at explanation. Theories may be embryonicand restricted in scope, or more elaborate, explicit and comprehensive. (A theory of L2learning may deal only with a particular stage or phase of learning, or with the learning ofsome particular sub-aspect of language; or it may propose learning mechanisms which aremuch more general in scope.) Worthwhile theories arc collaborative affairs, which evolvethrough a process of systematic enquiry, in which the claims of the theory are assessed againstsome kind of evidence or data. This may take place through a process of hypothesis testingthrough formal experiment, or through more ecological procedures, where naturallyoccurring data is analysed and interpreted. (See Brumfit and Mitchell 1990 for fullerdiscussion and exemplification of methods.) Finally, the process of theory building is areflexive one; new developments in the theory lead to the need to collect new informationand explore different phenomena and different patterns in the potentially infinite world of‘facts’ and data. Puzzling ‘facts’, and patterns which fail to fit in, lead to new theoreticalinsights.