Abstract Language problems and language barriers are challenges facing not only immigrants but also minorities and people in rural/semirural areas. This study examines individuals’ bi- and multilingual repertoires, language practices and attitudes in a Hokkien-speaking community in Kangar, a semirural town of northern Malaysia bordering Thailand. Through questionnaire surveys and interviews, we investigate how these notions can be used as a means to understand/reflect bilingualism and multilingualism and, more importantly, the potential disparity between what people want to do/say and what people eventually manage to do/say. While there is a shift in language practice from a local- and ancestral origin-induced pattern towards a more “global” and “pan-Chinese” paradigm, the findings also reveal the linguistic “dislocations” of the Hokkien-speaking community across ALL generations regardless of ethnicity. The language issues in the community reflect—and are likely to be reflections of—society at large. The vast contrast between individual/societal linguistic aspirations and the actual linguistic repertoire/communicative competence among the locals indicates the need to redress an absence of major efforts to close urban-rural/city-town/dominant-dominated social divides across the (language) education landscape at the national level.
{"title":"“What I want to do I do not do”: on bi- and multilingual repertoires and linguistic dislocation in a border town","authors":"Seong Lin Ding, Wei Han Chee","doi":"10.1515/multi-2021-0096","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/multi-2021-0096","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Language problems and language barriers are challenges facing not only immigrants but also minorities and people in rural/semirural areas. This study examines individuals’ bi- and multilingual repertoires, language practices and attitudes in a Hokkien-speaking community in Kangar, a semirural town of northern Malaysia bordering Thailand. Through questionnaire surveys and interviews, we investigate how these notions can be used as a means to understand/reflect bilingualism and multilingualism and, more importantly, the potential disparity between what people want to do/say and what people eventually manage to do/say. While there is a shift in language practice from a local- and ancestral origin-induced pattern towards a more “global” and “pan-Chinese” paradigm, the findings also reveal the linguistic “dislocations” of the Hokkien-speaking community across ALL generations regardless of ethnicity. The language issues in the community reflect—and are likely to be reflections of—society at large. The vast contrast between individual/societal linguistic aspirations and the actual linguistic repertoire/communicative competence among the locals indicates the need to redress an absence of major efforts to close urban-rural/city-town/dominant-dominated social divides across the (language) education landscape at the national level.","PeriodicalId":46413,"journal":{"name":"Multilingua-Journal of Cross-Cultural and Interlanguage Communication","volume":"1 1","pages":"315 - 338"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2021-12-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"72681346","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract This paper focuses on the integration of translanguaging practices in a public preschool situated in a small village in North-West of Italy. Mobility processes and local Italian families’ school choices have led to the raise of the number of students with an immigrant background enrolled at the studied preschool up to 85%. After a brief overview regarding mobility and translanguaging in education, particularly in relation to preschool domain, I describe the macro and micro contexts of this ethnographic case study. I then focus on the analysis of the main learning activities designed by teachers to engage children’s multilingual repertoires. Later, applying qualitative content analysis, I outline the main patterns and categories emerging from interviews and focus groups conducted with teachers and parents to investigate how they experienced the marginalization of immigrant minority children in their preschool and how they received the introduction of multilingual education approach. The results shows that the adoption of a translanguaging lens contributed to the educational legitimation of language diversity and to the acknowledgment of immigrant families. Finally, I discuss the results in terms of democratic language education and social justice, underlining their implications and relevance for preschools teachers’ professional development and agency.
{"title":"Multilingual education in an Italian public preschool: teachers and families among mobility processes and inclusive practices","authors":"Valentina Carbonara","doi":"10.1515/multi-2021-0124","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/multi-2021-0124","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract This paper focuses on the integration of translanguaging practices in a public preschool situated in a small village in North-West of Italy. Mobility processes and local Italian families’ school choices have led to the raise of the number of students with an immigrant background enrolled at the studied preschool up to 85%. After a brief overview regarding mobility and translanguaging in education, particularly in relation to preschool domain, I describe the macro and micro contexts of this ethnographic case study. I then focus on the analysis of the main learning activities designed by teachers to engage children’s multilingual repertoires. Later, applying qualitative content analysis, I outline the main patterns and categories emerging from interviews and focus groups conducted with teachers and parents to investigate how they experienced the marginalization of immigrant minority children in their preschool and how they received the introduction of multilingual education approach. The results shows that the adoption of a translanguaging lens contributed to the educational legitimation of language diversity and to the acknowledgment of immigrant families. Finally, I discuss the results in terms of democratic language education and social justice, underlining their implications and relevance for preschools teachers’ professional development and agency.","PeriodicalId":46413,"journal":{"name":"Multilingua-Journal of Cross-Cultural and Interlanguage Communication","volume":"1 1","pages":"321 - 340"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2021-11-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"90262234","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract International mobility has caused a need for language education where adults can learn the language(s) used in their new country. In Sweden, the language programme SFI (Swedish for immigrants) provides basic second language education for adult immigrants. For those learners who are not yet functionally literate, basic literacy education is included. This article aims to explore the concept translanguaging pedagogy in relation to the articulated and embodied language norms of one SFI teacher. The empirical data, produced by ethnographic methodology, consists of classroom observations and semi-structural interviews. The method of analysis comprises a set of sociolinguistic questions, three categories of language norms (double monolingualism, integrated bilingualism and polylingualism) and discourse analysis, centering on deictics, indexical signs and reported speech. Findings show that although the teacher does engage in translanguaging practices, her teaching practices cannot be referred to as translanguaging pedagogy because she has made no deliberate decision to include the students’ full linguistic repertoires and there are contradictions both within and between her articulated and embodied language norms. It is concluded that it is crucial for educational development in contexts characterised by mobility that teachers in linguistically heterogeneous classrooms increase their awareness of their language norms and the students’ linguistic resources.
{"title":"Language norms in L2 education for adult migrants – translanguaging pedagogy in the age of mobility","authors":"Annika Norlund Shaswar","doi":"10.1515/multi-2021-0123","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/multi-2021-0123","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract International mobility has caused a need for language education where adults can learn the language(s) used in their new country. In Sweden, the language programme SFI (Swedish for immigrants) provides basic second language education for adult immigrants. For those learners who are not yet functionally literate, basic literacy education is included. This article aims to explore the concept translanguaging pedagogy in relation to the articulated and embodied language norms of one SFI teacher. The empirical data, produced by ethnographic methodology, consists of classroom observations and semi-structural interviews. The method of analysis comprises a set of sociolinguistic questions, three categories of language norms (double monolingualism, integrated bilingualism and polylingualism) and discourse analysis, centering on deictics, indexical signs and reported speech. Findings show that although the teacher does engage in translanguaging practices, her teaching practices cannot be referred to as translanguaging pedagogy because she has made no deliberate decision to include the students’ full linguistic repertoires and there are contradictions both within and between her articulated and embodied language norms. It is concluded that it is crucial for educational development in contexts characterised by mobility that teachers in linguistically heterogeneous classrooms increase their awareness of their language norms and the students’ linguistic resources.","PeriodicalId":46413,"journal":{"name":"Multilingua-Journal of Cross-Cultural and Interlanguage Communication","volume":"14 1","pages":"341 - 358"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2021-11-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"73698194","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract Variationist researchers are increasingly adopting intersectionality approaches to analyse identity-linked practice. However, the field of sociolinguistic variation is yet to embrace the full ramifications of intersectionality as an analytical framework. The current paper offers a new method for integrating intersectional approaches into variationist studies by operationalising Blommaert, Jan & Anna De Fina. 2017. Chronotopic identities: On the timespace organization of who we are. In Anna De Fina & Jeremy Wegner (eds.), Diversity and super-diversity, 1–14. Washington: Georgetown University Press chronotopic frame theory. This method is used to examine how the intersectionality of ethnic, national, and peer-group identities is structured and reproduced in different ways through Chinese Indonesian youths’ selection of multilingual variants of an agreement marker in their peer-to-peer interactions at educational institutions in Pontianak city, West Kalimantan, Indonesia. The results illustrate how chronotopic frame approaches to studying identity-linked variation heed calls for integrations of intersectionality to move beyond accounting for intracategorical complexity and instead examine the dynamic mutual constitution of social categories that better represents marginalised people’s lived experiences.
变分论研究者越来越多地采用交叉性方法来分析与身份相关的实践。然而,社会语言学变异领域尚未将交叉性的全部后果作为分析框架。本文通过Blommaert, Jan & Anna De Fina(2017)的操作,提供了一种将交叉方法整合到变分主义研究中的新方法。时空身份:关于我们是谁的时空组织。在Anna De Fina和Jeremy Wegner(编),多样性和超级多样性,1-14。华盛顿:乔治敦大学出版社,时间框架理论。本研究通过在印尼西加里曼丹市Pontianak市的教育机构中,华裔印尼青年在对等互动中选择多语言的协议标记变体,研究种族、国家和同伴群体身份的交叉性是如何以不同的方式构建和再现的。研究结果表明,研究身份相关变异的时位框架方法需要整合交叉性,以超越对类别内复杂性的考虑,而是研究社会类别的动态相互构成,更好地代表边缘化人群的生活经历。
{"title":"Framing variation and intersectional identities within Indonesia’s ethnic Chinese minority","authors":"Jess Birnie-Smith","doi":"10.1515/multi-2021-0036","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/multi-2021-0036","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Variationist researchers are increasingly adopting intersectionality approaches to analyse identity-linked practice. However, the field of sociolinguistic variation is yet to embrace the full ramifications of intersectionality as an analytical framework. The current paper offers a new method for integrating intersectional approaches into variationist studies by operationalising Blommaert, Jan & Anna De Fina. 2017. Chronotopic identities: On the timespace organization of who we are. In Anna De Fina & Jeremy Wegner (eds.), Diversity and super-diversity, 1–14. Washington: Georgetown University Press chronotopic frame theory. This method is used to examine how the intersectionality of ethnic, national, and peer-group identities is structured and reproduced in different ways through Chinese Indonesian youths’ selection of multilingual variants of an agreement marker in their peer-to-peer interactions at educational institutions in Pontianak city, West Kalimantan, Indonesia. The results illustrate how chronotopic frame approaches to studying identity-linked variation heed calls for integrations of intersectionality to move beyond accounting for intracategorical complexity and instead examine the dynamic mutual constitution of social categories that better represents marginalised people’s lived experiences.","PeriodicalId":46413,"journal":{"name":"Multilingua-Journal of Cross-Cultural and Interlanguage Communication","volume":"31 1","pages":"339 - 366"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2021-11-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"86030636","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract This article investigates to what extent spaces created in the language introduction programme (LIP) in Upper Secondary School in Sweden close or open up for students’ varied linguistic resources, to create an understanding of the implementational spaces of the educational environments that the school represents, and of the ideological underpinnings that these imply. In the analysis, schoolscaping is used based on displayed language on the school premises in combination with language practices in classrooms. The material analyzed consists of photographs, both from classrooms and shared spaces, together with field notes from observations. The analysis made conflicting ideologies visible. Although students were invited to use their languages in classrooms, these were rarely made visible in written form, which is remarkable as written language is given great value in school. The relative invisibility of the LIP students’ languages in the schoolscape, except for in their own classrooms, together with the physical separation from other students at the school, paints a picture of expectations of assimilation and of a monolingual ideology, where the goal is that students become Swedish-speaking. Thus, the conclusion is that there are implementational spaces in the partly closed space that constructs LIP, while ideological spaces are rather closed.
{"title":"Ideological and implementational spaces for translanguaging in the language introduction programme in Swedish Upper Secondary School","authors":"Åsa Wedin","doi":"10.1515/multi-2021-0126","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/multi-2021-0126","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract This article investigates to what extent spaces created in the language introduction programme (LIP) in Upper Secondary School in Sweden close or open up for students’ varied linguistic resources, to create an understanding of the implementational spaces of the educational environments that the school represents, and of the ideological underpinnings that these imply. In the analysis, schoolscaping is used based on displayed language on the school premises in combination with language practices in classrooms. The material analyzed consists of photographs, both from classrooms and shared spaces, together with field notes from observations. The analysis made conflicting ideologies visible. Although students were invited to use their languages in classrooms, these were rarely made visible in written form, which is remarkable as written language is given great value in school. The relative invisibility of the LIP students’ languages in the schoolscape, except for in their own classrooms, together with the physical separation from other students at the school, paints a picture of expectations of assimilation and of a monolingual ideology, where the goal is that students become Swedish-speaking. Thus, the conclusion is that there are implementational spaces in the partly closed space that constructs LIP, while ideological spaces are rather closed.","PeriodicalId":46413,"journal":{"name":"Multilingua-Journal of Cross-Cultural and Interlanguage Communication","volume":"25 1","pages":"359 - 377"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2021-11-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"75333050","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract This study discusses the impact of spatial, temporal and virtual mobility on how mobile individuals talk about language in their world, and how they use language offline and online to communicate over time and across space. We introduce the notion of chronotopic translanguaging to highlight the significance of merging time and place in sociolinguistics. Doing so, we present a rather stretched understanding of time to include references to real time, online compressed time, linguistic ideologies and practices carried over time and challenged in recent times, as well as understanding time as an ecological factor. We interviewed Ekram, an Algerian academic sojourner, and observed her Facebook profile before and after coming to the UK. Our findings suggest that the networked lives of the participant beget fluid translanguaging practices that are constantly (re)negotiated depending to the ecology of interaction. Through entering and existing multiple time-space frames, Ekram found herself reunited with communicative repertoires she has not used for years. She also developed new relationships with other repertoires. This study concludes by emphasising the usefulness of chronotopic translanguaging as a conceptual tool that permits, and accounts for, the time-place influence on how mobile individuals deploy their communicative repertoires.
{"title":"Chronotopic translanguaging and the mobile languaging subject: insights from an Algerian academic sojourner in the UK","authors":"Hadjer Taibi, Khawla Badwan","doi":"10.1515/multi-2021-0122","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/multi-2021-0122","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract This study discusses the impact of spatial, temporal and virtual mobility on how mobile individuals talk about language in their world, and how they use language offline and online to communicate over time and across space. We introduce the notion of chronotopic translanguaging to highlight the significance of merging time and place in sociolinguistics. Doing so, we present a rather stretched understanding of time to include references to real time, online compressed time, linguistic ideologies and practices carried over time and challenged in recent times, as well as understanding time as an ecological factor. We interviewed Ekram, an Algerian academic sojourner, and observed her Facebook profile before and after coming to the UK. Our findings suggest that the networked lives of the participant beget fluid translanguaging practices that are constantly (re)negotiated depending to the ecology of interaction. Through entering and existing multiple time-space frames, Ekram found herself reunited with communicative repertoires she has not used for years. She also developed new relationships with other repertoires. This study concludes by emphasising the usefulness of chronotopic translanguaging as a conceptual tool that permits, and accounts for, the time-place influence on how mobile individuals deploy their communicative repertoires.","PeriodicalId":46413,"journal":{"name":"Multilingua-Journal of Cross-Cultural and Interlanguage Communication","volume":"25 1","pages":"281 - 298"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2021-11-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"79685652","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract The paper focuses on translanguaging practices of highly skilled refugees in a transition program in Dutch higher education. The pathways for refugees to enter higher education are full of obstacles. Acquiring the new language at a university level is one of the biggest challenges. Many institutions offer ‘transition programs’ to prepare refugees for their studies. These are mostly focused on acquiring language skills and general basic skills in subjects such as Mathematics and Cultural Diversity. The Dutch transition program described in this paper was specifically developed to make use of students’ multilingual repertoires. The resource-oriented pedagogy of translanguaging is used to give space to all languages, leverage students’ resources and contribute to their academic and language development. In this research, data from one year of the Dutch transition program was collected to study a) how teachers engage in official translanguaging practices during instruction and b) to what extent teachers develop other practices to engage with their students’ multilingual repertoires. Results from interaction analysis show that the teachers, although mainly using the language of instruction (Dutch), did use a variety of translanguaging practices, and created other ways to encourage students’ multilingualism, such as engaging in language comparisons and raising language awareness.
{"title":"Translanguaging pathways to higher education: a transition program for highly educated refugees","authors":"J. Duarte, Mirjam Günther-van der Meij","doi":"10.1515/multi-2021-0127","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/multi-2021-0127","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract The paper focuses on translanguaging practices of highly skilled refugees in a transition program in Dutch higher education. The pathways for refugees to enter higher education are full of obstacles. Acquiring the new language at a university level is one of the biggest challenges. Many institutions offer ‘transition programs’ to prepare refugees for their studies. These are mostly focused on acquiring language skills and general basic skills in subjects such as Mathematics and Cultural Diversity. The Dutch transition program described in this paper was specifically developed to make use of students’ multilingual repertoires. The resource-oriented pedagogy of translanguaging is used to give space to all languages, leverage students’ resources and contribute to their academic and language development. In this research, data from one year of the Dutch transition program was collected to study a) how teachers engage in official translanguaging practices during instruction and b) to what extent teachers develop other practices to engage with their students’ multilingual repertoires. Results from interaction analysis show that the teachers, although mainly using the language of instruction (Dutch), did use a variety of translanguaging practices, and created other ways to encourage students’ multilingualism, such as engaging in language comparisons and raising language awareness.","PeriodicalId":46413,"journal":{"name":"Multilingua-Journal of Cross-Cultural and Interlanguage Communication","volume":"35 1","pages":"299 - 319"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2021-11-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"89864835","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"A review of Jie Zhang’s Language policy and planning for the modern olympic games","authors":"Michael Chesnut","doi":"10.1515/multi-2021-0121","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/multi-2021-0121","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":46413,"journal":{"name":"Multilingua-Journal of Cross-Cultural and Interlanguage Communication","volume":"15 1","pages":"769 - 773"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2021-11-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"79274351","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-11-01DOI: 10.1515/multi-2021-frontmatter6
{"title":"Frontmatter","authors":"","doi":"10.1515/multi-2021-frontmatter6","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/multi-2021-frontmatter6","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":46413,"journal":{"name":"Multilingua-Journal of Cross-Cultural and Interlanguage Communication","volume":"18 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2021-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"80570883","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Rachel Showstack, Silvia Duque, Nikki Keene Woods, Ana López, Amy K. Chesser
Abstract An important component of social justice research is centering the voices of those individuals whose lives the research is intended to improve, not as subjects from whom researchers collect data but as active participants in a process of understanding and addressing issues of concern to the community. This ideal of community engagement slows the pace of dissemination of traditional social science or sociolinguistic scholarship but also allows scholars and community members to collaborate to identify and implement meaningful solutions to community problems. We describe a process of engagement of Spanish-speaking patients, interpreters, and healthcare providers in developing a health equity agenda for Spanish speakers in Kansas, grounded in a community-based participatory approach called Patient-Centered Outcomes Research. Stakeholders were engaged through sharing and amplifying their testimonios, stories that tied personal experiences of encountering language barriers in healthcare with calls to action, and they contributed to decisions about what to do with the stories and how to respond to the problems they identified. The result of our engagement process is the formation of a community-based team that has amplified the voices of Spanish-speaking patients and families to reach a range of audiences and responded to a number of evolving community needs. We provide recommendations for language researchers interested in pursuing community-engaged work and explore the possibilities for aligning such work with the expectations of academic institutions.
{"title":"Lifting the voices of Spanish-speaking Kansans: a community-engaged approach to health equity","authors":"Rachel Showstack, Silvia Duque, Nikki Keene Woods, Ana López, Amy K. Chesser","doi":"10.1515/multi-2021-0082","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/multi-2021-0082","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract An important component of social justice research is centering the voices of those individuals whose lives the research is intended to improve, not as subjects from whom researchers collect data but as active participants in a process of understanding and addressing issues of concern to the community. This ideal of community engagement slows the pace of dissemination of traditional social science or sociolinguistic scholarship but also allows scholars and community members to collaborate to identify and implement meaningful solutions to community problems. We describe a process of engagement of Spanish-speaking patients, interpreters, and healthcare providers in developing a health equity agenda for Spanish speakers in Kansas, grounded in a community-based participatory approach called Patient-Centered Outcomes Research. Stakeholders were engaged through sharing and amplifying their testimonios, stories that tied personal experiences of encountering language barriers in healthcare with calls to action, and they contributed to decisions about what to do with the stories and how to respond to the problems they identified. The result of our engagement process is the formation of a community-based team that has amplified the voices of Spanish-speaking patients and families to reach a range of audiences and responded to a number of evolving community needs. We provide recommendations for language researchers interested in pursuing community-engaged work and explore the possibilities for aligning such work with the expectations of academic institutions.","PeriodicalId":46413,"journal":{"name":"Multilingua-Journal of Cross-Cultural and Interlanguage Communication","volume":"40 1","pages":"489 - 517"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2021-10-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"79872965","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}