Introduction

Why a new handbook on applied linguistics for language educators?

Language teacher education and applied linguistics share a close-knit, albeit not always clear cut relationship. As two transdisciplinary fields that draw extensively from scholarship and practice in linguistics and education, both have an overlapping interest in not only how research related to learning and teaching can benefit students in their linguistic development but also and relatedly in the experiences, beliefs, cognition, and decision making of those individuals who enact language education–namely, the teachers themselves. Research in applied linguistics that examines, alongside linguistic aspects, the cognitive, social, cultural, and political dimensions of language teaching and learning is essential to this work. After all, at the center of applied linguistics is the very system that shapes and supports our ability to communicate social values and ideas, as well as cultural norms and mores, to make sense of the world, ourselves and others within it and to regulate the relations of power and authority that govern all of the above.

At this moment perhaps more than ever, those who prepare teaching methods classes for pre- and inservice language teachers or are otherwise actively involved in the professional learning of language educators already have a variety of resources available to them. Methods guides for language teachers are as old as the profession itself but the last couple of decades have seen a heightened interest in language teacher education, both as a site of inquiry and potential intervention, and, subsequently, there has been a move away from simplified how-to or best practices guides.

An early example of this trend is the 2002 book Applied Linguistics in Language Education, by Steven McDonough. The book includes 12 chapters across four sections: (1) What is applied linguistics?, (2) Language, linguistics, and teaching, (3) Language learning, and (4) Applied linguistics and the teaching profession. Like many works in the field, the author relies heavily–almost exclusively–on examples from English as a second language teaching and learning, thus obscuring many of the specific considerations that adhere in the teaching of other languages. As a field, applied linguistics is presented primarily as a combination of “linguistics applied,” i.e. the service of descriptive linguistics in the practice of teaching and of scholarship related to the cognitive processing of learned languages. At the same time, McDonough’s commitment to making applied linguistics theory and research accessible to educators is indicative of a larger trend in language teacher professionalization in the 2000s, which includes more than just methods and strategies for the classroom.

The edited volume Applied Linguistics and Language Teacher Education (2005) is also in this same vein, but puts an even greater emphasis on applied linguistics research related to the education, development, and professional knowledge of language educators, rather than addressing inservice teachers as such. The collection features studies on the attitudes, beliefs, impact, and efficacy of various kinds of language teachers’ knowledge of applied linguistic topics. These include those focused on a particular aspect of language and language use, such as phonetics, phonology, orthography, pragmatics, and metaphor, as well as chapters on specific frameworks for analyzing and conceptualizing language (e.g. systemic-functional linguistics and discourse analysis), and a smaller number of contributions that focus on a dimension of language development (e.g. language transfer or second language reading). In the conclusion to the volume, the editor, Nat Bartels, notes that the research to date at that point both demonstrated that applied linguistics can have a positive impact on teachers’ and their teaching, and that it can have a much more significant impact if their education recognizes that knowledge does not directly transfer to practice. Bartels writes, “…when designing applied linguistics courses for language teacher education programs, it is not enough to simply provide a short apprenticeship in applied linguistics and hope for the best because the knowledge that teachers use in their practice is more complicated that just knowing facts and general conceptions of language and language learning” (p. 419). Bartel’s argument here is perhaps reflected in the range of publications within applied linguistics that focus on language teacher education^[1]; and yet, for both teachers and teacher educators there is a need to start somewhere.

Where language teacher education often starts is with the introductory teaching methods course. It is notable that even those books from the last two decades that are more methods-oriented tend to emphasize research-informed practices, which speaks to this broader trend. However, in contrast to the caveats offered by Bartels, applied linguistics research is often positioned as less a space of inquiry and more a collection of empirically-grounded truisms. For example, volumes such as Bryfonski and Mackey’s The Art and Science of Language Teaching (2023) and Henshaw and Hawkin’s Common Ground: Second Language Acquisition Theory Goes to the Classroom (2022) both explicitly suggest that their task is to present fundamental scientific principles. Both thus also take a mainstream approach to language learning as the acquisition of “input” and focus on maximizing particular forms of communicative competence that are in turn assumed to be the undisputed, singular, and relatively uncomplicated language goal. There is considerably less consideration of learners, their life worlds, how these may or may not collide with the language classroom, or of language as a social semiotic through which they may navigate these complex, layered social spaces within which they will use language.

Other handbooks for language teachers, similarly attempt to focus commonalities across contemporary approaches or frameworks, by centering practices that are evidence-based and widely-accepted, while taking a broader view of what language teaching and learning entails. One example of this trend is ACTFL’s two-volume series Enacting the Work of Language Instruction (Glisan & Donato, 2020a and b). The first volume is organized around six high-leverage teaching practices that have been continuously deemed integral to language teaching: facilitating target language comprehensibility, building a classroom discourse community, guiding learners to interpret and discuss authentic texts, focusing on form in a dialogic context, and providing oral corrective feedback to improve learner performance.  The second volume introduces four additional high-leverage teaching practices: establishing a meaningful and purposeful context for language instruction, using an iterative process including backwards design, engaging learners in purposeful written communication, and developing contextualized performance assessments. The ACTFL volumes deliberately avoid subscribing to a particular teaching method or approach (see 2020a, p. vi), although there is a clear emphasis on use- and meaning-oriented philosophies of language education, including communicative language teaching, task-, literacy-, and genre-based approaches.

It may indeed be impossible to write a guide for teachers that is truly agnostic in terms of the approach or framework to language and language teaching and learning that it espouses. And it is notable that the volumes mentioned and others like them attempt to avoid the claim that they present a unique model of good language teaching, by acknowledging that language education is “not monolithic” (Henshaw and Hawkins 2022, p. ix). And yet, one shared feature of the books included here and many others is that they are dispositionally oriented towards commonality. The primary emphasis is placed on consensus rather than complexity. This can obscure important debates in the field about how we realize the kinds of high-leverage teaching practices described by Glisan and Donato. At the same time, the applied linguistics handbooks for educators, such as those described earlier in this introduction, engage with emergent research and conversations, but they are not necessarily addressed to classroom teachers. They are also often led by their broad orientation to the field of applied linguistics to heavily emphasize English language teaching and learning contexts and to neglect less commonly taught languages.

Alongside the body of handbooks and methods guides for language teachers is a vibrant, burgeoning field of language teaching education research and resources, which collectively attempt to address the ongoing calls for building stronger connections between research and practice in language teaching and language teacher education alike. Federally funded Title VI National Resource Centers have built a network of materials and organizations for language teacher education specifically. This includes the biennial conference dedicated to the topic of Language Teacher Education, which was Initiated at the University of Minnesota in 1999, before being taken up by the Center for Research on Advanced Language Learning (CARLA) on that same campus, and supported through multiple centers over the years.

All of this is to say that the handbook you have before you participates in an incredibly vibrant web of discussions within and between applied linguistics and language education. As scholars of applied linguistics, who have taught multiple iterations of world languages teaching methods graduate courses and have directed or been advisors to directors of language programs at the university level, we have benefited directly from these conversations. We have also taught with and learned from many of the existing teacher guides–and continue to do so. At the same time, we recognized a need in our own classrooms and programs, which we heard echoed by many of our colleagues and students; while language teachers needed a foundational sense of the research-informed practices that form the common knowledge of the field, both seasoned and novice language instructors must also be able to engage with and explore more contemporary discussions in applied linguistics. They must gain an ability to think critically and apply insights that are emerging from ongoing debates in the field. Relatedly and as a result, this handbook does not espouse a specific method, framework, or approach; instead it offers a constellation of diverse ontological and epistemological perspectives intended to augment, complicate, and enhance the best practices and prevailing methods of other resources and/or of a language program.

What is included in the handbook?

This handbook provides a deliberately multifaceted introductory understanding of concepts, discussions, and debates in applied linguistics (AL), which are chosen to welcome preservice teachers and advanced students in second language studies into key contemporary conversations that are ongoing in the field. The ten chapters engage readers in the systematic engagement with and discussion of different current theories for language analysis and their potential applications to the practice and research of language teaching and learning. Although they are eclectic in other ways, they share a common understanding of language as a semiotic resource used to make meaning. Relatedly, the authors in this collection talk about learning as not only situated and embodied, but also mediated by learners’ social identities, their investment and agency, literacy and instructional practices, and language ideologies. Each chapter includes hands-on activities based on the interpretation, reflection on, and application of theoretical points included in the chapter, often exemplifying the concepts and/or providing data from less commonly taught languages (LCTLs), such as Swahili and Urdu. As a whole, the collection of chapters offers reflexive mediational tools for expanding assumptions about language as a bounded, uniform system to be acquired and adopting more inclusive, culturally responsive teaching approaches in multiple languages.

The collection starts with a set of chapters, on Machine Translation and Multimodal Literacies, which draw attention to the realities of communication in a digital age, reminding readers that literacy is no longer solely text-based nor confined to a single language. The next set of chapters foreground access and equity, highlighting how language education intersects with social justice concerns. Disability, Access, and Inclusion and Gender-Just Pedagogies underscore the importance of designing language learning spaces where all learners can fully participate and their lived experiences are taken into account. The chapters on Critical Intercultural Pedagogies, Race and Anti-Racist Pedagogical Possibilities, and Decolonization and Language Teaching also foreground issues of equity, inclusion and social justice, providing language educators with tools to disrupt some of the cultural and historical power dynamics that shape classroom discourse and learner identities. The next set of topics, Beyond Unit Thinking, Translanguaging Pedagogies, and Post-Standardization in Language Teaching, challenge the dominance of monolingual and standard language ideologies or biases (Ortega, 2013) by emphasizing the multilingual nature of interaction, and the multiple linguistic repertoires that students can draw on to make meaning and negotiate a variety of identities, both within and outside of the language classroom. Finally, the last chapter, dedicated to Dual Language Immersion illustrates how bilingual programs can reflect but more importantly challenge existing language hierarchies. Together, these chapters aim to prepare educators not only to teach a language, but to foster classrooms that are critically aware, inclusive, and adaptable to the diverse needs, challenges, and resources of language learners in a multimodal and multilingual world. Crucially, they engage teachers in beyond-surface reflexive activities that promote critical approaches to teaching and learning languages.

The first chapter, written by Emily Hellmich and Kimberly Vinall, recommends that language learners develop Machine Translation (MT) literacy to better understand how MT tools operate. That is, rather than reject MT as an unreliable tool with no learning potential, they advocate for a thoughtful integration, which involves students with MT output critically and thus leads to meaningful language learning. At its core, Hellmich and Vinall’s chapter pushes back against a narrow conceptualization of translation as the accurate transfer of meaning across two distinct codes (or languages). Instead it embraces an understanding of (machine) translation that redefines it as a dynamic process of communication and meaning making. To illustrate their approach to MT, they present two classroom activities that encourage students to critically reflect on some of the symbolic gaps and potential in the output generated by a range of MT tools.

The second chapter addresses the topic of Multimodality, Multimodal literacy and Multiliteracies. In it, Sébastien Dubreil and Natalie Amgott provide several examples of multimodality in the francophone world, through an analysis of modes, intertextuality, and context in sign meaning making, multimodal composition and multimodal literacy. The first activity borrows from the field of Linguistic Landscape to lead readers through an analysis of multimodal meaningmaking that draws on signs displayed in Angers (Western France), and considers aspects such as spatial arrangement, use of color, and language choice. The second activity is a multimodal analysis of ad campaigns in France to show how the understanding of multimodal labels, signs and campaigns is significantly richer if taking into account the specific geographic, historical and cultural context surrounding their origin and reception. The last data driven activity is situated in the language learning in study abroad context and describes multimodal composing and translanguaging practices that allowed students to reflect on their experiences studying French during a six-week study abroad in Paris.

In the third chapter, Sanya Malik and David Gramling critically appraise the use of Universal Design for Learning (UDL) in language teaching. They argue that even when working within this framework multilingual Disabled learners can sometimes find themselves sidelined from decisions surrounding curricular decisions. As an alternative to UDL, the authors propose a more inclusive approach that forefronts Disabled learners’ desires and requirements, and emphasizes the benefits of additional language classes for their growth and well-being. Promoting a definition of Disability by Disabled people can involve, for example, drawing on such pedagogical frameworks as Disability Wisdom and Justice (Lautermilch, 2022). Overall, the authors promote adopting a more critical stance toward UDL within multilingual classrooms which takes into account language diversity. The chapter concludes with an illustrative case study following the experiences of one of the authors. This case study is used as a springboard for a set of reflexive questions for language instructors wishing to develop a more inclusive and equitable experience for Disabled language learners.

The next chapter introduces a new way of thinking about how language, learning, and gender connect through the concept of Gender-Just Language Pedagogies. The chapter is based on an understanding of language as an act that agentive speakers engage in with others (often captured by the term ‘languaging’). Whether speakers are (made to be more) conscious about gender due to their circumstances or not, Knisely makes the case that gender nevertheless influences their positionalities (i.e., identities that speakers take up at different times, as molded by their contexts, and their influence on their worldviews) and how they engage in and perceive languaging by others. Trans linguistic practices, then, bring to the surface ways of doing gender in language that cannot fit neatly within traditional binary systems, and support pedagogical practices aimed at equity, justice, literacy and languaging. The exercises at the end of the chapter illustrate some of the different frameworks and tools-for-thought that gender-just language pedagogies provide to teachers, which they can apply to challenge cisnormativity and cislingualism.

The next chapter, by Adriana Diaz, introduces Critical Intercultural Language Pedagogies (CILP). CILP are a collection of situated, principled pedagogical practices shaped by interrelated theoretical frameworks and concepts (e.g., “interculturality” or “critical”). Diaz maps out the genealogy of the key concepts and theoretical frameworks behind CILP, and then explores how they shape the design of transformative (language) learning experiences which have the goal of promoting disruption, reflection, and sophistication in how learners think, act, relate to others, and understand values, ways of thinking, and emotions (such as manichaean, or binary views of understanding the world). Diaz then provides sample CILP activities that demonstrate how language instructors can pique students’ interest and reflection, and expand their imagination in relation to language by, for example, reimagining a language learning curriculum through the lens of transformational concepts such as memory, voice, and truth.

In Chapter Six, Hongni Gou and Wenhao Diao draw on Critical Race Theory (CRT) and existing applied linguistics research to explain the role of race/racialization in the language learning experiences of students of Languages Other than English (LOTEs) and ways to resist, disrupt and/or dismantle white supremacy and racism. Their review of the literature addresses three different language learning contexts – world languages, bilingual education and study abroad programs – including existing proposals for antiracists classroom practices (world language classroom instruction), reports on racism and racialization and their occasional disruption in pedagogical practices and materials (bilingual education), and the potentials to denormalize US racism (study abroad). The data-driven exercise asks students to reflect on excerpts from a K-12 school Chinese teacher’s understanding of discourses of (anti-)racism and how they shape her teaching practices.

In the following chapter, Emma Trentman addresses Translanguaging Pedagogies, tracing the monolingual and bilingual language ideologies behind it as well as its more recent developments within Applied Linguistics. Trentman explains that dominant monolingual ideologies in the language classroom, which see multilinguals as a set of separate monolinguals, can discourage language learners from home language use, reinforce the supremacy of the standard form of the local language, and promote the idea that languages can and must be kept separate to be learned effectively. Translanguaging, on the other hand, reimagines current teaching practices by promoting a nuanced understanding of how language learning occurs through strategic use of all of learners’ linguistic resources, which enhances their metalinguistic awareness and supports a more equitable and socially responsive language instruction. Trentman then discusses and provides examples of how translanguaging can be approached in the classroom through reframing existing practices and creating transformative spaces in a first semester Arabic class.

Continuing the critique of monolingual language ideologies, Neriko Musha Doerr, Kimiko Suzuki, and Jisuk Park dedicate the next chapter to offering practical alternatives to what they term “Unit Thinking”—the notion that languages are internally uniform, stable, and tied to specific nation-states. They challenge the dominance of standardized forms as the only valid instructional targets, highlighting the power relations that underlie and sustain such norms.  As part of their Beyond Unit Thinking project, they introduce two practical activities designed to question these assumptions. The first activity, centered on kanji and stroke order, invites students to question ideas of correctness that might prevail in the language classroom. The second uses “role language” to prompt reflection on how language style intersects with identity negotiation. These activities are part of a broader initiative that merges theory (Doerr, 2022) with practice (Suzuki and Park) and aims to support educators via workshops and instructional materials.

The last chapter, by Hina Ashraf, draws on Ruiz’s (1984) orientations to language (i.e., as a resource, a right, or a problem) to outline the main policy issues related to setting up bilingual programs in the United States, and discusses the general lack of support that tends to exist for bilingual programs that target Less Commonly Taught Languages (LCTLs). Through its discussion of a particular type of bilingual programs, Dual Language Immersion (DLI), and an illustration from an Urdu-English DLI program, Ashraf argues that seeing language as both a right and a resource can address several of the challenges faced by LCTL DLI programs in the US. This case study traces different steps involved in the creation of an Urdu-English DLI program, which has been running successfully since 2018 at a public elementary school in the southeastern US. The chapter concludes with a set of discussion questions that engage readers in reflection about language practices and policy drawing on interviews with the instructors in the program, as well as the school’s DLI goals.

Where from here?

The ideas discussed in the chapters in this handbook are part of a wider set of conversations which continue to evolve in language classrooms, language teacher training courses, applied linguistics research, and professional communities at large. For world languages teachers and advanced students in second language studies, staying engaged with these conversations is just as important as mastering a set of teaching techniques that seem to work. This type of reflective work requires educators not just to engage cognitively with current advancements but also to have a disposition to methodically gather information about their own teaching practices and, in collaboration with others, to draw on these insights to “make informed decisions about their practice both inside and outside the classroom” (Farrell, 2015, p. 123). Reflective practices should also recognize sociopolitical and moral issues that impact classroom practices, which are never neutral –from the choice of materials, to the “theories-in-use” behind lesson planning, to the framing of assessment (Farrell, 2016), to whose voices are centered and whose are erased. As the chapters here show, what is needed is more than surface-level gestures of equity and inclusion, but rather the rethinking of how language learning connects to and/or participates in larger power struggles for language, gender, racial, and disability justice.

Looking ahead, language educators and students in world languages studies will most likely encounter renewed opportunities and challenges that extend beyond the topics collected here. Most obvious are the opportunities and challenges presented by the rapid pace with which such technologies as artificial intelligence and generative tools advance and affect how learners access, engage with, and/or imagine language use. Other changes will be brought about by forces already in motion, such as neoliberalism and authoritarianism, and/or sped up by climate change and increased mobility, conflict, migration, and displacement, increasing the need for, for example, more justice-affirming practices (Kubota & Motha, 2025). Finally the increasing incorporation of non-western perspectives and epistemologies can also open the doors to more and alternative pedagogical practices.

One of the strengths of the handbook’s open access format is that it allows it to change alongside these shifts. While each individual chapter is a socio-historical snapshot at the time of writing, the collection as a whole is intended as a living document that can be expanded, to continue to engage readers with new questions, new research, and new practices. Teachers can return to it over time, using it not only as a reference or a supplement to their current/adopted textbook(s), but also as a springboard for rethinking their own classrooms and practices. The handbook can help language educators adapt to their students’ evolving needs while also experimenting with new ways of thinking about language and language teaching.

Ultimately, this handbook is intended to be both a resource and an invitation –it provides teachers with tools to engage with current debates in applied linguistics, but more importantly it encourages them to extend those debates, by participating in and testing new approaches, and reflecting critically on their own practices.

References

Bartels, N. (2005). Applied linguistics and language teacher education: What we know. In Applied linguistics and language teacher education (pp. 405-424). Springer US.

Bryfonski, L., & Mackey, A. (2024). The art and science of language teaching. Cambridge University Press.

Doerr, N. M. (2022). Fairies, ghosts, and santa claus: Tinted glasses, fetishes, and the politics of seeing. Berghahn Books.

Farrell, T.S.C. (2015). Promoting reflection in second language education: A framework for TESOL professionals. Routledge.

Farrell, T.S.C. (2016). The practices of encouraging TESOL teachers to engage in reflective practice: An appraisal of recent research contributions. Language Teaching Research, 20(2), 223-247.

Glisan, E., & Donato, R. (2016). Enacting the work of language instruction. Alexandria: ACTFL. Print.

Henshaw, F. G., & Hawkins, M. D. (2022). Common ground: Second language acquisition theory goes to the classroom. Hackett Publishing.

Kubota, R., & Motha, S. (2025). Justice-affirming orientations in language teacher education. Modern Language Journal [Special issue commentary]. https://doi.org/10.1111/modl.13015