Decoding, Denouncing, and Decolonizing Educational Policy for Emergent Bilinguals

• In Event: Immigrant Education and English Learners: Policy and Praxis

Abstract

States’ educational policy greatly affect the programming structures, assessment (in)equities, and curriculum for emergent bilinguals (EBs). Through a critical framework, we search for subtle, yet dangerous, acts of symbolic violence (Bourdieu, 1977) evident in colonizing patterns (Freire, 2018) in the education policies in one state. In decoding and denouncing these policies, our analysis illustrates that symbolic violence toward racialized EBs occurs through policy that privileges English and the dominant culture in both subtle and overt ways of regulating language education programming, assessment, and the content of the instruction. As citizen-scholars, we illustrate ways of re-imagining policy to decolonize both students’ and educators’ minds.

Authors

• Victor Antonio Lozada, University of North Texas - Dallas

• Phyliciá Anderson, Prosper ISD

• Yismelle Durán, Texas Woman's University

• Germaine Koskina, Texas Woman's University

• Paul Parkerson, Texas Woman's University

• Christina Salazar

• Mandy Stewart, Texas Woman's University