Transformative interviewing and the experiences of multilingual learners not labeled “ELL” in US schools

ABSTRACT

Recent research has documented the ways that schools adapt to increasingly multilingual and multicultural student bodies. This qualitative study explores the schooling experiences of nine K-12 multilinguals not identified as English language learners in US schools. Using “deep interviewing” strategies, the authors expose the racializing function of language, but also semiotic processes such as markedness, iconicity, and erasure and sociological concepts such as habitus that are revealed through analysis of the participants’ discourse about language and schooling. Additionally, the authors illustrate how transformative interviewing practices can spur development of learners’ own agency in creating more equitable learning contexts for themselves.

Notes

1. We use “multilingual learners” to refer to speakers of two or more languages (and a number of varieties of each), since this term positively recognizes their heteroglossic language practices (García, 2009a), but is also inclusive of students such as our participants, who are not recognized as needing language support.

2. Readers might note that transitional bilingual education programs in the US is built on this foundation.

3. As Velázquez (2018) found, mothers often take on the largest load in families in terms of language socialization/transmission. Hence, although we asked families in general to be interviewed, only mothers ended up participating along with their children.

4. This age was determined based on cognitive/social levels we felt were necessary to understand and articulate answers to our questions. Participants varied from ages 9–17, and our study represents children at all levels of schooling (elementary, middle, high school) in the US.

5. As mentioned earlier, translanguaging is a “pedagogical approach that emphasizes the dynamic use of multiple languages to enhance learning and make schools more welcoming environments for multilingual children, families, and communities” (MacSwan, 2017, p. 191) and it encourages children to use language in school just like they do naturally in their homes and in the community (Van der Walt, 2015).

6. R = Researcher.

7. Words bolded by the authors identify elements of focus in the analysis and discussion.

8. M = Carina’s mother, but in general in this paper, M = Mother of participant in focus.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Theresa Catalano

Theresa Catalano, PhD, is an Associate Professor of Second Language Education/Applied Linguistics at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Her research focuses on education and migration, multilingualism, dual language education, and critical language studies.

Lydiah Kananu Kiramba

Lydiah Kananu Kiramba, PhD, is an Assistant Professor of Educational Linguistics in the Department of Teaching, Learning and Teacher Education at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Her research focuses on communicative practices of multilingual and multicultural students in super-diverse classrooms and literacies of Black immigrant children in K-12 classrooms.

Kara Viesca

Kara Viesca, PhD, is an Associate Professor of Teaching, Learning and Teacher Education at the University of Nebraska Lincoln. Her scholarship focuses on advancing equity in the policy and practice of educator development, particularly for teachers of multilingual learners.