This presentation draws on current new materialist scholarship in applied linguistics and language education to unfold realms of possibilities for language teaching, learning, and the associated research. Both strength and limitations of new materialist research are considered to open lines of thought not otherwise conceivable and contribute to a future yet to come for language education.
We live in a fast-changing and connected world and more than ever before language teachers and researchers are faced with the challenge to constantly adapt, be creative, and (re) think familiar educational and scientific practices by disrupting taken for granted relationships with language, education, and the world. Within this context, a growing number of scholars in applied linguistics and language education (Toohey, 2019; Pennycook, 2018; Canagarajah 2020; etc.) have turned to new materialist theorizations (Barad, 2007; Braidotti, 2013; Deleuze & Guattari, 1987) to face the problems currently presenting themselves in the fields of applied linguistics and language education and use alternative conceptual and methodological tools that accommodate the ever-changing and entangled world we live in (Bangou, Waterhouse, and Fleming, 2020). New materialist scholarly contributions to the fields of applied linguistics and language education relate in part to re-theorizing the role, function and impact of matter and language in education, as well as developing new methodologies to research micro-level singularities and the potentiality for transformation (Bangou & Vasilopoulos, 2018).
With this in mind, this presentation draws on current new materialist scholarship in applied linguistics and language education to unfold realms of possibilities for language teaching, learning, and the associated research. Both strength and limitations of new materialist research are considered to open lines of thought not otherwise conceivable and contribute to a future yet to come for language education.
