“It’s Not Fair”: Discourses of Deficit, Equity, and Effort in Mixed Heritage and Second Language Spanish Classes

ABSTRACT

This study used peer-led focus groups to investigate heritage language (HL) and second language (L2) students’ language ideologies and identities in “mixed” Spanish courses. We analyzed students’ perceptions of themselves and each other, their understandings of fairness in mixed classes, and the relationship of such perceptions to language ideologies and broader educational discourses of belonging in Spanish language education. Our analysis revealed that L2 participants reproduced the standard language ideology as well as an essentialist ideology that frames Spanish as being natural and easy for HL students. HL participants largely resisted these ideologies while also portraying L2 students as deficient speakers who “artificially” slow the class, thus challenging the dominant construction of L2 students as the default student type. Participants deployed competing conceptions of fairness to construct and perform identities as hard working students. Our findings highlight the need to incorporate the critical analysis of ideologies in mixed HL/L2 settings and beyond.

KEYWORDS:

• Critical pedagogy
• heritage language education
• language ideologies
• second language learning
• Spanish

Notes

1. We use Latinx, rather than Latino or Latina/o, as the generic form to avoid privileging masculine forms and to be inclusive of non-binary and queer identities.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Jennifer Leeman

Jennifer Leeman is Professor of Spanish Linguistics at George Mason University. Her research examines Spanish in the United States; ideologies of language, identity, and belonging; language policy; and teaching Spanish as a heritage language. She is co-author of Speaking Spanish in the US: The Sociopolitics of Language (Multilingual Matters), with Janet Fuller.

Ellen J. Serafini

Ellen J. Serafini is Associate Professor of Spanish Linguistics at George Mason University. Her research explores the dynamic impact of social, pedagogical, and individual factors within various settings such as second language, heritage language, study abroad, community-based learning, and dual immersion. Her work appears in edited volumes and journals such as The Modern Language Journal and the International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism.