Abstract
The study explores different ways of describing advancedness - using CEFR descriptors, the AdLs' self-perceptions, the views of their teachers and, finally, through a sample analysis of spoken production of advanced learners (recorded for the international corpus LINDSEI). The study argues that in order to prevent the advanced learner from remaining stranded on a plateau an active approach is to be taken by both the learners and their teachers using analyses of learner and native-speaker language and challenging the learners to use complex and idiomatic language well beyond the boundaries of their habitual language use.