"We Must Remain Forthright": Language Ideological Conflict in District- and School-Level Discourse

• In Event: Roundtable Session 39
  In Roundtable Session: Voice, Dissent, and Language Ideology

Abstract

This study examines the language ideologies in educational policy texts, focusing on the ways in which these ideologies are presented as interacting or conflicting with each other. I present a discourse analysis of texts created at the district level and at the school level, with elements of rhetorical and multimedia analysis, illustrating through the evidence that the less anonymous the author of a text, the more conflicting the language ideologies and stances included in the text. This paper extends the literature on language ideologies in education by providing insight into the ideological environment within which districts, schools, and teachers situate student languages in an educational context.

Author

• Elizabeth Anne Mainz, University of California - Santa Barbara