Engaging Language-Minority Preservice Teachers in “Race” Talk: Why Teacher Educator Identity Matters

• In Event: Race and Equity Issues in Teaching, Teacher Prepartion, and Educational Experiences

Abstract

This study explores how much the identity of a language minority teacher educator can matter in discussing the intersection of race and native speaker status with language minority pre-service teachers. By leveraging her minority narrative to help minority teacher candidates take on an anti-racist perspective, the researcher illustrates how teacher narratives can act as a medium through which minority students can challenge the power relations embedded in academic learning. Drawing on co-teaching experience with a white teacher educator, the researcher suggests that the teaching of race and language is not only about racialized and linguistic identity of teacher educators, but pedagogical approaches and strategies that actively promote critical reflection on identities and power imbalance inherent in academia.

Author

• Hyesun Cho, The University of Kansas