Narrative review of language education in a complex and ecological perspective mediated by media and technologies

Abstract

Every natural ecosystem comprises sustainable communities, which form webs of complex and self-organizing interactions. Such modes of organization of these interactions of the functioning system are objects of ecological theories. A theory of chaos and complexity is an example of an ecological theory that excludes attempts to reduce the components in part isolated and uses the paradigm of distinction-conjunction-multidimensionalization. Affordance is an ecological concept as it describes a possibility of action available in a niche for an individual. In this work, we will approach complex systems of communities of mother tongue and second language or foreign language speakers as an object to research language learning mediated by the use of digital and technological media. The methodology used was the bibliographic research of the literature about theories of chaos/complexity and affordance with application to two excerpts extracted from the research project Aprendendo com Memórias de Falantes e Aprendizes de Língua Estrangeira (AMFALE), in terms of affordances in learning linguistic. We conclude that it is possible to broaden the understanding of language learning through the ecological theoretical approach that includes pedagogical practices and electronic and digital materials in the learning process.