Literacies at the border: transnationalism and the biliteracy practices of teachers across the US–Mexico border

Abstract

This article examines the role of transnational literacy practices in the biliteracy development of Mexican–American teachers who grew up on both sides of the US–Mexico borderlands. Through an analysis of literacy narratives and language history maps of bilingual education pre-service teachers, the pre-service teachers recall their memories as transnational immigrant children and the ways in which their unofficial schooling experiences shaped their development of biliteracy outside of school. As most of the case study participants had little or no access to bilingual education beyond the assimilation model, these return trips back and forth afforded them opportunities to maintain their Spanish biliteracy and bicultural identities. These teachers lived in transnational spaces and recall the ways in which growing up on the border shaped their bilingual and biliteracy development.

Keywords:

• transnationalism
• teacher preparation
• biliteracy
• US–Mexico border
• bilingual education

Notes

1. At the time of data collection, the participants presented in this study were pre-service teachers enrolled in an undergraduate bilingual teacher preparation program in south Texas. Today they are all completing their third year in public school classrooms across central Texas. Although I have continued to collect qualitative data in six of their classrooms, for the purpose of this article, I focus on their experiences during their training to become teachers.

2. The term ‘el bloque’ literally means ‘the block.’ Pre-service teachers and professors often use this term to describe the semester during which the maestras enroll in four courses together during the semester prior to student teaching. Zentella also used ‘el bloque’ to describe the block that was home to the children who were the subjects of her book, Growing Up Bilingual (1997). The term, in English, is also used in Dyson and Genishi (2005) to describe Madlenka's block in order to capture the sociocultural context in which the case study is located.