Centering southern perspectives in translanguaging research

ABSTRACT

The last decade has witnessed the momentum of “trans-” turn in applied linguistics and language education. Within these conversations, the term translanguaging—as practice, theory, and pedagogy—articulates a paradigmatic shift in how we think about language(s) and how we can serve multilingual learners in ways that are more humanizing and justice-oriented. While there has been an exponential growth in translanguaging research, the majority of the extant studies have taken place in the Global North contexts so far, and we are still missing a broader understanding of translanguaging from a southern perspective. This special issue features four articles, contributed by scholars who are both residing in and have deep connections with the Global South contexts, and a commentary by Professor Li Wei. Using a mixture of methodological tools, the papers offer new possibilities to problematize and expand translanguaging as a construct in various classroom contexts in China, South Africa, Brazil, Australia, and Canada to better understand pertinent issues of (English) language teaching/learning in relation to a broader agenda of achieving linguistic, epistemic and social justice. This special issue emphasizes the significance of (re)centering southern perspectives in translanguaging research and decentralizing traditional knowledge construction that favors the Global North.

KEYWORDS:

• Translanguaging
• southern perspectives
• multilingual students
• Global South
• social justice

Disclosure statement

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