It all begins with words.

Abstract

This article introduces international vocabulary research to an Icelandic audience. Many prominent scholars in SLA/FLA have turned their attention towards what role vocabulary plays in second/foreign language acquisition so this is constantly becoming a larger part of their research. The article also presents a historical overview of different ideas about vocabulary and its importance in language teaching and learning. Scholars have tried to figure out how language learners memorise vocabulary and use it to communicate. Methods have been developed on how to evaluate and measure the nature and extent of vocabulary, as well as the importance of the language learner’s knowledge of various semantic fields of words and phrases in order to gain native fluency in the language.  This discussion brings to light how important it is that the findings from this research be accessible to the Icelandic educational system, and also how urgent it is to carry out more Icelandic research in this field.

Keywords: vocabulary, vocabulary research, language acquisition, foreign languages, language learning