WHAT IS APPLIED LINGUISTICS?<br />GHAITH SALEH MAHDI<br />AL-MUSTAQBAL UNIVERSITY COLLEGE<br />[email protected]<br />Applied Linguistics entails using what we know about language, about how it is used, and about how it is learned in order to solve some problem in the real world.<br />Applied Linguistics uses language-related research in a wide variety of fields (e.g. language acquisition, language teaching, literacy, gender studies, language policy, speech therapy, discourse analysis, censorship, workplace communication, media studies, translation, lexicography, forensic linguistics).<br />AL is the utilisation of the knowledge about the nature of language achieved by linguistic research for the improvement of the efficiency of some practical task in which language is a central component.<br />Applied Linguistics is using what we know about (a) language, (b) how it is learned, and (c) how it is used, in order to achieve some purpose or solve some problem in the real world.<br />The focus of applied linguistics is on trying to resolve language-based problems that people encounter in the real world, whether they be learners, teachers, supervisors, academics, lawyers, service providers, those who need social services, test takers, policy developers, dictionary makers, translators, or a whole range of business clients.<br />Autonomous, multidisciplinary and problem solving: uses and draws on theory from other related fields concerned with language and generates its own theory in order to find solutions to language related problems and issues in the real world.<br />• Practical concerns have an important role in shaping the questions that AL will address.<br />• Language related problems concern learners, teachers, academics, lawyers, translators, test takers, service providers, etc.