Poststructuralist SLA framework and the concept of second language identity

Abstract

Cognitive and psycholinguistic perspectives largely shaped early research in Second Language Acquisition (SLA). These approaches, popular in the 1970s and 1980s, focused on how language learners processed input, internalized linguistic structures, and produced output [6]. Although these models were influential, they tended to treat learners as isolated individuals, paying limited attention to the social environments, power dynamics, and shifting identities that shape language learning experiences. As a result, early SLA research often overlooked how learners understand themselves and how their experiences and identities change as they acquire a new language.