Recent evaluations of the influence of linguistics on language teaching indicate that there is a growing gulf between the two fields. Linguistics failed to provide a sound theoretical foundation for language teaching; it did not alter the content of language teaching, nor did it successfully modify the attitudes of teachers. The parameters of the generative semantics controversy are considered, since it is the dominant issue underlying much of the discussion in contemporary linguistic theory. Current linguistics is preoccupied with theory building, and the concepts being elaborated are not likely to be of immediate relevance to language teaching. An example of divergence between theoretical linguistics and language pedagogy is the development of the competence-performance distinction. There is a need to expand the data base of research into language learning. A fruitful application of linguistic research is the study of error analysis, which could be thought of as the successor of contrastive analysis. Trends in developmental psycholinguistics, neurolinguistics, and sociolinguistics that might be promising to language teaching are discussed. (SW)