Second Language Acquisition, WE, and language as a complex adaptive system (CAS)

The field of Second Language Acquisition/Development (SLA/D) has evolved to a point where the paradigm gap between SLA/D and world Englishes (WE), identified by Sridhar and Sridhar (1986), has narrowed. The closing of the gap is due in part to SLA/D and WE leaving behind their ontological inheritance of a static competence from linguistics and finding common ground in a view of language as a complex adaptive system. While differences between the two fields are real and will rightly prevail, there may now exist an opening for a dialogue that can lead to a closing of the gap.