Empowering Teachers for Cultural and Linguistic Diversity via Multimodal Critical Identity Collages

Abstract

This chapter analyzes in-service teachers' critical reflections of their cultural and linguistic identities as represented in multimodal discourses. Designed to inform teaching-learning with multilingual students, while disrupting notions of White English and academic discourses, practicing teachers created collages at the start and end of a graduate course. Collages were analyzed using approaches from systemic functional linguistics, multimodal discourse analysis, and with attention to sociocultural aspects. Analyses were triangulated with teachers' written reflections. Major themes show how teachers positioned themselves as learners and caring educators, respected cultural and linguistic diversity, and recognized a need to challenge dominant ideologies. At the end of the course, teachers revised their collages and contemplated pedagogical shifts they could make to advocate adopting multilingual and multimodal practices in their classrooms to challenge prevailing norms and power structures.