This work brings together two significant domains of educational practice - foreign language education and critical pedagogy - linking them in a way that can help foreign language educators develop a critical awareness of the nature, purposes, and challenges facing foreign language pedagogy. It deals with the social, political, ideological, and economic aspects of language, language learning, and language teaching in our society and to connect the practice of foreign language education with these critical, and crucial, aspects of language and language use. The text emphasizes: what teachers and future teachers of foreign languages ought to know and understand about language; language attitudes, practices, rights, and policy; and focuses on helping students to move beyond pragmatic pedagogical concerns to the social and political concerns relevant to their teaching.