Translanguaging and transnational literacies in multilingual classrooms: a biliteracy lens

Abstract

As US classrooms approach a decade of response to No Child Left Behind, many questions and concerns remain around the education of those labeled as ‘English language learners,’ in both English as a Second Language and bilingual education classrooms. A national policy context where standardized tests dominate curriculum and instruction and first language literacy is discouraged and undervalued poses unusual challenges for learners whose communicative repertoires encompass translanguaging practices. Drawing on the critical sociolinguistics of globalization and on ethnographic data from US and international educational contexts, we argue via a continua of biliteracy lens that the welcoming of translanguaging and transnational literacies in classrooms is not only necessary but desirable educational practice. We suggest that Obama's current policies on the one hand and our schools' glaring needs on the other offer new spaces to be exploited for innovative programs, curricula, and practices that recognize, value, and build on the multiple, mobile communicative repertoires and translanguaging/transnational literacy practices of students and their families.