Crisis talk: Absolutism versus pluralism is SLA studies. A response to Lantolf, Poehner, and Rieker (2025)

An important way of guarding against the dangers inherent in the absolutist world view in any sphere of human endeavor, including science, is to let all the flowers bloom, not just a chosen few. You never know which ones will catch the eye to become tomorrow's realities (Lantolf, 1996, p. 739). Thirty years later, and now joined by Matt Poehner and Jacob Rieker (Lantolf et al., 2025; hereafter Lantolf et al.), Lantolf seems to have reversed course: He and co-authors take the special issue (SI) of Modern Language Journal co-edited by myself, Marije Michel, and Amable Ribeiro, and co-authored with 14 other SLA1 scholars (Atkinson et al., 2025a—hereafter Atkinson et al.), to indicate “a state of crisis” (p. 1) in the field. They furthermore make the same claim for three other major “dialogic” efforts in SLA studies—Douglas Fir Group (2016), Hulstijn et al. (2014), and Hulstijn et al. (2015)—all of which Lantolf was centrally involved in. In this response, I therefore find myself in the novel role of arguing not so much against Lantolf et al. as for Lantolf's (especially 1996) earlier position, which I believe has been critical in the field. That is, I argue for a pluralistic and dialogic (maybe even floral) SLA studies. The special issue (SI)…, along with other dialogues in the field (e.g., Douglas Fir, Group, 2016; Hulstijn et al., 2014, 2015), are indicative of a crisis in SLA/T…. Diagnosing a crisis is an essential step for SLA/T to move forward as a scientific discipline (p. 991). In particular, Lantolf et al. liken this “crisis” to the many so-called crises proclaimed in the field of psychology over the last 150 years, so many in fact that Sturm and Mühlberger (2013)—the source Lantolf et al. cite for their inspiration—characterized them largely as “crisis talk.” For Sturm and Mühlberger, crisis talk is an “actor's category,” functioning “to promote the proclaimers’ own research agenda or even personal careers” (p. 6). As a result, “many researchers fail to take such proclamations seriously” (p. 4). Lantolf et al. note two main “indicators” of the alleged crisis in SLA studies, which I will try to summarize. Summarizing in this case is both necessary because their critique is long and winding and risky due to the possibility of oversimplification. Ultimately, however, I will conclude that the solution to their “crisis,” as they understand it, is in fact a simple one: sociocultural theory. any scientific theory must first and foremost be conceived as a methodological system based on a theory of scientific cognition. In other words, the cognitive orientation of researchers affects the kinds of questions they ask, theories they propose to answer their questions, and technical procedures they deploy to assess the validity of their theories. (p. 992) Lantolf et al. problematize three of the “methodological orientations” found in Atkinson et al.: (1) Sasaki's “logical science” orientation, wherein “causality is a linear cause > effect relationship that privileges quantitative analysis of covariance…and not internal mechanisms that underlies sic external behaviors” (pp. 992-993); (2) Lowie's complex dynamic systems theory orientation, wherein “complex systems ‘consist of an infinite number of changing components’ (Atkinson et al., 2025c, p. 53)” (p. 993), thus making SLA impossible to study systematically; and (3) three “eclectic” orientations, which in Vygotsky's (1997, p. 261) words “can result in ‘monstrous distortions’” (p. 994) because they combine incompatible components in apparently Frankenstein-like ways. Second, SLA studies is rife with “terminological inconsistencies” (p. 994). Two examples are: (1) the different understandings of language assumed by special issue contributors Alexopoulou (Universal Grammar) and Pekarek Doehler and Eskildsen (Usage-based SLA/linguistics),2 of which Lantolf et al. ask: “Can both theories be right? What are the consequences of these two ways of conceptualizing language for research and most especially for practice? How can the difference be resolved?” (p. 994); and (2) the role of “prediction” for different authors in Atkinson et al. Third, although overlapping with their first point in this section, Lantolf et al. refer critically to the diverse “research procedures” mentioned in Atkinson et al. Thus, they question the value of observational research in SLA studies because “it yields descriptions of behavior but not knowledge of the processes underlying that behavior” (p. 995). They likewise question the use of statistics, having earlier cited with apparent approval Toomela (2010), whose title is “Quantitative methods in psychology: inevitable and useless.” As an alternative, Lantolf et al. offer “qualitative experimentation”: “experimentation in artificial settings….guided by theory regarding…the psychological mechanisms that underlie observed conduct,” employing “a series of experiments with a small cadre of participants whereby procedures are continuously modified until the researcher feels an understanding of the psychological processes has been achieved” (p. 995). Dynamic assessment (DA) is offered as an instantiation of this approach: Poehner (2008), after discovering that different learners had difficulties learning verb time and aspect distinctions in French, was able to “remediate” them. Lantolf et al. conclude that: “DA…corresponds to the clinical work conducted by Luria…in which he used mediation to recover mental functions damaged by brain injury or stroke by replacing missing elements, removing problematic elements, or restructuring the relationship among elements” (p. 996). 2. The absence of “shared values and accountabilities” (p. 996) - For Lantolf et al., SLA studies is in crisis because it “offers competing (and contradictory) visions of language, learning, and teaching without mechanisms for resolving fundamental disagreements” (p. 997), which may cause it to become irrelevant to all stakeholders concerned. A Vygotskian alternative is suggested, in which theory and practice are symmetrically accountable to each other, and in which language development depends not on natural processes but on teachers’ “knowledge of how to artificially manipulate the social environment of the classroom” (p. 997).3 Lantolf et al. assert that this view is “at odds with that of the contributors to the SI….where we find frequent mention of the belief that students should be viewed as already competent learners, free to pursue their own interests and goals with their own approaches to learning,” thereby “casting…teachers in a reductive and diminished role…as passive recipients of research insights rather than as professionals who require…sophisticated theoretical and pedagogical knowledge” (p. 998). Relatedly, Lantolf et al. worry that teacher education will be particularly impacted if “‘one-size-fits-all approaches to language teaching’ (Atkinson et al., 2025b, p. 58)” are rejected and “evidence-based practices derived from disparate theoretical frameworks” (Lantolf et al., p. 998) are embraced. Lantolf et al. effectively conclude their critique by suggesting that a “general theory of SLA” is needed, like the one Vygotsky (1997) proposed for psychology. This would comprise a “second-order theory”—a meta-theory not replacing but bringing into agreement “specialized theories” in the field, and “above all agreement on a definition of language” (p. 999). This theory would specify “the essence of SLA” (p. 1000), determine its role in teaching, and “be addressed in ‘rational discussion’” (p. 1000). The aim and conduct of the project Lantolf et al. critique is summarized in the introduction to this section of MLJ (Michel & Atkinson, 2026). In the following comments on their critique, I speak only for myself, not the other 16 contributors to Atkinson et al. identifiable groupings of scholars—socioculturalists, conversation analysts, and action theorists, for example—who persist in seeing external learner behavior, even group behavior, not mental states, as the proper domain of inquiry. More generally (and more vaguely) there are “critical theorists” and an often overlapping group of self-professed epistemological relativists, who express general angst with SLA's cognitive orientation and/or its growing accountability to one or more theories and to empirical findings while offering no alternative but the abyss. In this light, it is not surprising that indications abound of increasing tensions and fragmentation within the field (p. 867). The aim of the SLA rationalists was therefore to rid the field of those who did not share their ontological (i.e., cognitivist) and epistemological (i.e., experimental hypothesis-testing) views. As indicated in the preceding quotation, a major target was Lantolf himself, as both sociocultural theory's main developer in SLA studies and, in those days, a “self-professed epistemological relativist” (Lantolf, 1996). Quite ironically, the rationalists’ devotion to mentalism, as well as their expressed desire to weed out theoretical approaches incompatible with their own (Long, 1993 referred to it as “theory culling”), is strikingly similar to Lantolf et al.’s absolutist position. As explained in the introduction to this section of MLJ, the purpose of Atkinson et al. was to move in the opposite direction. In a sense, the dream of the SLA rationalists, although absolutist, was understandable in the 1990s: SLA studies had emerged as a more or less independent field just two or so decades previously (Atkinson, 2011), and, as with many new fields, the scope of phenomena investigated and range of theoretical approaches were limited, making it at least possible to imagine that a limited set of factors could explain much of SLA (e.g., Krashen, 1985). Thirty years on, however, SLA is almost universally acknowledged to be a highly complex process, no less complex (in my own view, at least) than the complex human creatures who undertake it. This does not mean, of course, that we throw up our hands in despair and give up studying SLA. On the contrary, complex realities require complex forms of research, and complexity almost inevitably requires plurality. When initially conceptualizing the special issue Lantolf et al. critique, the co-editors were responding to a felt sense that while there are currently many and varied approaches to studying SLA, including our own, the developers of those approaches are often locked away in their own workshops, focusing on their own work. This is, of course, an essential part of the SLA enterprise—to develop and empirically investigate specific approaches—but, like some other academic endeavors, it can be an isolating one. If SLA truly is as complex as is widely believed, then shouldn't we all also be working together, one way or another, in a common space rather than just locked away in our own workshops? In Atkinson et al. (2025c), we likened this situation to the seven ancient philosophers each exploring their own part of a large and complex elephant, and—unless they then somehow discussed together—continuing to believe that their part of the elephant was the whole elephant. The project on which the special issue was based was an attempt to transcend, at least for that moment, this isolationist way of thinking—to get people who had devoted substantial parts of their lives to developing different approaches to SLA together to talk seriously and synergistically about their approaches. Conferences may sometimes provide a weaker version of this activity, and of course, we talk to those whose work is close to our own, or who we went to graduate school with and/or are compatible with, but how often do we really sit down and explore what makes us different, what makes us similar, and see what comes out of that? Without that kind of exploration—and the more the better—I have little doubt that Lantolf et al.’s worry that the field will “fragment into increasingly isolated subspecialties and self-satisfying echo chambers” (p. 7) will come true. My antidote—pluralism—is in some ways the opposite of Lantolf et al.’s. Yet pluralism is not blind eclecticism—it does not mean that everything is equally explanatory or correct or worth everyone's whole-hearted efforts all the time. What it does mean, however, is that, in studying something complex, we first of all honor its complexity, without trying to melt it down to one thing or force it into a single mold. I welcome all the different neo-Vygotskian sociocultural ideas and approaches—theoretical, methodological, and pedagogical—Lantolf et al. describe as potential parts of the rich and complex SLA elephant. What I do not welcome is their attempt to impose their view, their “truth,” or their sense that they are right and others wrong regarding SLA, any more than Lantolf welcomed the absolutist efforts of the SLA rationalists in the 1990s. In sum, I stand with Lantolf (1996), who stood resolutely against absolutism then, and against the idea that any single approach to SLA, including neo-Vygotskian sociocultural theory, should dominate the field now. I thank Hunter Langenhorst, Jorge Mejía-Laguna, Marije Michel, and Amable Ribeiro for their always awesome co-sociocognition on this response.