  We study the long wavelength limit of a spin S Heisenberg antiferromagnetic
chain. The fermionic Lagrangian obtained corresponds to a perturbed level 2S
SU(2) Wess-Zumino-Witten model. This effective theory is then mapped into a
compact U(1) boson interacting with Z_{2S} parafermions. The analysis of this
effective theory allows us to show that when S is an integer there is a mass
gap to all excitations, whereas this gap vanishes in the half-odd-integer spin
case. This gives a field theory treatment of the so-called Haldane's conjecture
for arbitrary values of the spin S.
