Boundaries Crossed, and New Frontiers: Ongoing Theoretical, Empirical, and Pedagogical Issues in Language Education

Abstract

The aim of this volume was to question the idea of boundaries in language education. Challenging, in the sense used here, does not necessarily mean to negate. Rather, it involves raising awareness of such boundaries, tracing their lines, problematizing the processes that create and sustain them and the functions they serve, and imagining alternatives. The thirteen substantive chapters that make up this collection have done so, by examining various aspects of language education, and using a variety of theoretical perspectives and empirical methods. A central theme running through the book is that such boundaries, between theoretical viewpoints, between domains like research and practice, between curricular areas, and between geographical regions function less as rigid demarcation lines and more like interfaces of communication, or meeting spaces where new possibilities are created. This chapter summarizes some of these new connections, and suggests future directions for the field.