Collective (Re)constructions of Linguistic Surveillance at Home: Transfronterizx Families as Cultural and Linguistic Guardians

ABSTRACT

In the current anti-immigrant context, Latinx families, children, and communities experience language as a highly contested and surveilled practice with consequential effects. In this study, I drew on the concept of literacies of surveillance and translanguaging to examine how language was embodied and rationalized in the context of three homes of Latinx, transfronterizx families. This critical multiple-case study led to three main findings: (1) Parents and children are linguistic guardians and surveil from a place of love and care, (2) embracing Spanish-English parallel monolingualism is a form of respeto, and (3) translanguaging is a way of being for bilingual children moving in and out of surveilled moments. The findings have important implications for reconstructing the concept of linguistic surveillance in research and reframing parents’ and children’s roles in school when it relates to designing and authoring children’s bilingual futures.

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No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. For more on the Roman Imperium, see, Richardson (1991).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Idalia Nuñez

Idalia Nuñez is an assistant professor in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign. She specializes in bilingual and English as a second language education, and her research interests include exploring Spanish-English translanguaging, bilingualism, and biliteracy; linguistic equity in educational settings; bilingual and English as a second language pre- and in-service teacher education, teaching, and identity; and the agency and resistance efforts of Latinx families and youth. Her research, teaching, and advocacy efforts are on supporting the educational needs of students from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds.