A Book Review of “Handbook of Second Language Assessment” By Dina Tsagari and Jayanti Banerjee (2016)

The handbook of second language assessment is a part of a long-lasting series called handbooks of applied linguistics. It has been published by De Gruyter Mouton since 1990s. Since that time, the field applied linguistics has gone through different ups and downs concerning the essence of the field. A hot debate was started by the experts involving in the field in which they sought the response to the essence of applied linguistics: Is it a disciplinary, interdisciplinary, or multidisciplinary field? The authors of different volumes went through the epistemological concepts of applied linguistics to frame their series. That said, they have established a programmic perspective toward applied linguistics in which they have searched solutions for the real world’s language and communication problems. This viewpoint can also be seen through the chapters of this handbook of second language assessment. In their introductory chapter on the handbook of second language assessment Karlfried Knapp and Gert Antos go through the distinction of “pure” and “applied” sciences. They state that due to the critical and reflecting nature of science to solve problems, we deal with the “applied” version of it to answer our world’s problems. However, from the very time we stick to the “applied” science, we encounter the question raised to investigate the role of sciences in a range of problems: from individual to interpersonal and social; moreover, from intercultural to political problems. This conception is the backbone of the current book. The chapter goes with several distinctions such as that of theoretically applied linguistics versus practically applied linguistics. The authors of this chapter, later on, state the objectives of the applied linguistics series; paving the ground for why it is necessary to have a handbook on second language assessment.