Critical Bi(multi)lingual Youth Voices: Leveraging Students' Insights to Realize the Democratic Promise of Bilingual Education

• In Event: Contentious Issues and Cutting-Edge Perspectives in Education

Abstract

Abstract
This paper argues for a return to critical bi(multi)lingual education that attempts to realize the empowering, transformative ideals of the Civil Rights Era and the Chicano Movement in particular. Schooling for emergent bi(multi)lingual students has increasingly been driven by destructive educational policies, English-only ideologies, and deficit perspectives. I draw on empirical data to demonstrate the harmful ways this narrow focus leads to ambiguity, contradictions, and tensions for these students. By re-centering students’ critical perspectives and insights on language, power, and schooling, I argue their that sensibilities can help us realize the revolutionary beginnings of bilingual education and foster equitable approaches that realize the democratic promise of critical bi(multi)lingual education.

Author

• Mariana Pacheco, University of Wisconsin - Madison