Chicana M(other)work: My Testimonio Navigating Access to Dual Language Education for My Children

• In Event: "Hasta La Raíz": Rooting Justice-Centered Dual Language Bilingual Education in Illinois

Abstract

I have been a Spanish language educator for over a decade, but it was until four years ago, when I began the school search process for my daughter, that I became knowledgeable about the language education programs available for emergent bilingual students in Chicago Public Schools (CPS). During this journey, I learned that DLBE programs in CPS belong to a school choice paradigm and therefore only certain schools offer these programs. As a doctoral student, I had access to a plethora of resources that helped me navigate the process of enrolling my children in a DLBE program. During this challenging, stressful and sometimes painful journey, I realized that this process is in-accessible to most Latinx CPS parents.

This experience motivated me to document my testimonio which is grounded in Chicana/Latina feminist theory. The process of crafting my testimonio has helped me recover papelitos guardados, untold lived experiences exploring the intersections of race and language, and openly share them as a narrative that “.. conveys personal, political, and social realities'' (Delgado Bernal, et al., 2012). My testimonio documents my process of coming to critical consciousness about the inequitable educational opportunities emergent bilinguals are afforded to maintain their heritage language, shares the findings of a literature review investigating the benefits of bilingual education and the different language services available for emergent bilinguals, and presents the findings of a Critical Race Spatial Analysis (Author, 2022) I conducted, which explored how accessible DLBE programs in CPS are to Latinx student communities. Finally, I share how this work has led me to collaborate with other Women Scholars to form a DLBE research collective in Illinois.

This testimonio was written as a labor of love for my children, as a way to advocate for heritage language rights, and as a form of linguistic resistance against a school system that is not supportive of heritage language maintenance. Crafting this testimonio allowed me to conduct Chicana M(other)work (Caballero et al, 2019) and engage in research where I can weave (tejer) together my identity as researcher, mother, heritage speaker and Chicana. My testimonio shines light on the racial and linguistic injustices embedded in the US schools system which position DLBE programs as a commodity and consequently continues to harm the communities it is supposed to be serving. I share my testimonio as a form of activism in the search of social justice for myself, my children and mi comunidad (Pérez Huber, 2010). Crafting a testimonio was a healing and liberating process of “telling but also political in its production of awareness to listeners and readers alike” (p. 527). As a Chicana madre in academe, my goal is to be a language activista to ensure that mis hijos, mis sobrinos, and other Latinx bilingual children have access to high quality bilingual education that will facilitate their heritage language maintenance. Sharing my testimonio with other Latinx parents, students, scholars and community members is an important step to achieve this goal.

Author

• Nancy Domínguez-Fret, Northern Illinois University