Language Learning as Chaos/Complexity System: Evidence Based on Iranian EFL Learners’ Backgrounds

Abstract

Language learning process was traditionally investigated through the reductionist perspective treating language learning as a fixed, linear, cause and effect phenomenon in addition to imposing three levels of reductionism including context reduction, data reduction, and complexity reduction on the field of SLA. With the emergence of Chaos/Complexity Theory (CC/T), language learning was considered as a nonlinear, complex, and dynamic system evolving, growing, and changing from the bottom-up in an organic and unpredictable manner through the dynamics of language. In complex systems such as language learning, the Language learning process was traditionally investigated through the reductionist perspective as a fixed, linear, cause and effect phenomenon in addition to imposing three levels of reductionism including context reduction, data reduction, and complexity reduction on the field of Second Language Acquisition (SLA). With the emergence of Chaos/Complexity Theory (CC/T), language learning was considered as a nonlinear, complex, and dynamic system evolving, growing, and changing from the bottom-up in an organic and unpredictable manner through the dynamics of language. Considering language learning as a complex system, its complex behavior as a whole is influenced by a large number of factors, forces, and agents within or beyond its boundaries which is more than the behavior of its individual components. Despite the fact that C/CT provides new insights, understandings, and implications for researchers in the field of SLA, very few practical attempts are available which investigate the complexities of language learning. Accordingly, ten male/ female Iranian EFL learners participated in this narrative research based on purposive sampling. The researcher used semi- structured interview to elicit participants’ histories and stories concerning their language learning process. After the transcription of the data, the participants’ personal experiences and histories in terms of time and place were reorganized, analyzed, and shaped into a framework on the basis of a chronological sequence. In regard to the theoretical underpinnings and insights of C/CT, the derived meanings and themes showed the pieces of evidence to justify the complexities of Iranian EFL learners’ language learning.