Introduction

Tammy Gregersen, Peter D. MacIntyre and Sarah Mercer

A hand making ripples in the water struck us immediately as an embracing and suitable image for our book on positive psychology in applied linguistics. For us, water represents an ever-moving and changing environment in which we can be fully immersed. As individuals, we can influence our environments, we have agency and exercise it at times by extending a hand to others. We can cause perturbations in our surroundings, sending ripples from the slightest action that might expand to create waves from even the smallest of actions. It is this interaction of context and individual, their complete symbiosis with the potential for human agency that so captures how we feel about socially situated views of human psychology in language practice. The positivity flows fluidly from the inherent hope in having agency to be able to affect our lives and those of others, as well as how we think and feel about them.

In their seminal article outlining positive psychology, Seligman and Csikszentmihalyi (2000) each wrote about a source of inspiration for them. That idea appeals to us as well, as we write about positive psychology in SLA. As editors, we have each taken one element from our cover image (hand, ripple, water) to tell our personal story about a source of inspiration that describes why positive psychology appeals to us, stories that we would like to share with readers.

When Tammy saw the hand causing ripples in the water, her mind was immediately drawn to another famous pair of hands that acted as agencies of positive change, reaching out in a most sacrificial of ways to literally 'pay it forward'. The story is of the Dürer brothers, Albrecht and Albert, who grew up in 15th-century Nuremberg. Both were incredibly gifted artists; both wanted to pursue their talents in art school. As two of 18 children, their goldsmith father had to labor 18 hours a day to feed the family. The boys understood that their parents could never afford to finance either of them to study. After many long conversations, the brothers came to the decision that they would leave their fates to the flip of a coin. The winner would attend the academy, while the other earned money in the depths of the nearby mines. Upon completion of art school, the winner would finance the other's art education either through artwork sales or, if need be, by toiling in the mines. Albert lost the toss, and slogged away in the dangerous mines. Albrecht, the winner, attended school, financed by his brother. His etchings and woodcuts became an immediate sensation, netting sizeable sums for his commissioned art. After four years, the young artist's homecoming was a festive affair with a family meal full of music and laughter. At dinner's end, from his honored place at the head of the table, Albrecht rose to deliver a toast to his beloved brother's long years of sacrifice. He extolled Albert's good will and told his cherished brother that it was now his turn to go to Nuremburg to pursue his dream. Albert, tears streaming down his face, slowly shook his head from side to side and sobbed, telling his brother that he could not go. Holding his hands close to his face he softly lamented that it was too late, that four years in the mines had ruined his hands. Every bone in every finger had been broken at least once, and his arthritis was so bad that he could not even return his brother's toast, much less use his hands to make the delicate motions demanded by parchment or canvas. Several years later, to honor Albert for everything he had forfeited, Albrecht Dürer meticulously drew his brother's battered hands, palms together and fragile fingers stretched skyward. He called his powerful drawing simply Hands, and, after 450 years, many are now familiar with only that one famous piece of Dürer's work.

Tammy continually challenges her pre-service language teachers by asking whether there is a more poignant reason for becoming a teacher than to 'pay it forward'. She is inspired by the symbolism of the hands in this story because it suggests that no one ever accomplishes treasured dreams alone, that it is in the context of community that important goals are achieved.

Peter's inspiration is related to the notion of ripples; it comes from a story by Art Buchwald, who was a fascinating American satirist and humorist. Buchwald's humor skewers the wealthy and privileged and his sentiments have always appealed to Peter, but one story in particular touched his heart. 'Love and the Cabbie' tells of Buchwald's harrowing taxi ride through the busy streets of New York with one of his most optimistic friends. When the driver delivered his passengers safely to their destination, the friend gave a genuine, unexpected compliment to the driver along with a nice tip. After some convincing that the praise was both genuine and well earned, the driver accepted the compliment and went about the rest of his day. A small seed had been planted. The driver was now going to have a slightly better day than he otherwise would have, and maybe he will be a little nicer to his next passengers, who, being just a little happier themselves, would be a little nicer to their family and friends. In this way, one small random act of kindness might reach 1000 people in a...