Capable Illiterates and Cultural Ambassadors: The Subjectivities of Bilingual Latinx Students in Spanish Curricular Materials

• In Event: Marriott Roundtable Session 8
  In Roundtable Session: Interrogating and Transgressing Texts and Curricular Materials

Abstract

The Spanish language abilities of bilingual Latinx youth in secondary schools have been measured through various indicators of proficiency: grammar competency, functional language use, and literacy. Several studies highlight the problematic tensions that arise around issues of identity, variance, equity, and power when proficiency fails to embrace the literacy practices that bilingual Latinx youth bring to Spanish classrooms (Carreira, 2004; Garcia, 2005, Spicer-Escalante, 2005; Valdés, 1989). This paper examines both the dominant discourses of proficiency operationalized in secondary Spanish curricular materials and the role of literacy in these discourses. It identifies two subject positions available for bilingual students and argues that conceptualizations of literacy, at best, support the development of illiterate subjectivities and, at worst, are integral to their maintenance.

Author

• Erica Saldivar Garcia, New York University