Abstract
This article reflects on the notion of diversity and its implications for the Spanish Heritage Language (SHL) classroom. In doing so, I follow proposals on SHL education, multilingualism, multiculturalism and sociolinguistics that call for a critical, dynamic and historical perspective on diversity. I elaborate on the relevance of such approch for the SHL classroom, and the new pedagogical possibilities it brings to our work. The final goal is to provide teachers with conceptual tools to generate inclusive learning environments where we all —heritage and foreign language learners, along with teachers— engage in critical discussions about our place in today’s diversity, and how we are all contributing to the future of the Spanish language in our communities.
Highlights
A common question I have been asked by college and high school Spanish language teachers has been how to work with the broad range of linguistic and cultural backgrounds Spanish heritage language learners bring into the classroom
If we teach a mixed class with SHLLs and foreign language learners, such an approach can reinforce the “restricted and restricting tourism discourse and shallow treatment of diversity as multiplicity, not difference” (Kramsch & Vinall, 2015, p. 22) generally used in language textbooks
In Spanish heritage language courses (SHL), while linguistic diversity is likely to be acknowledged, it usually refers to the educated varieties mainly spoken by upper middle classes in the urban capital cities throughout Latin America and Spain (Leeman, 2020)
Summary
A common question I have been asked by college and high school Spanish language teachers has been how to work with the broad range of linguistic and cultural backgrounds Spanish heritage language learners (hereafter SHLLs) bring into the classroom. 9)— and how they relate and intersect with history and language usage can prevent teachers from designing an inclusive learning environment for students from all backgrounds, contributing to perpetuate the inequitable multilingual learning process many SHLLs have experienced throughout their lives, as racialised minorities in the United States (Ortega, 2019; Prada, 2019; Martínez & Train, 2020). I propose that embracing such critical reflection on diversity is a meaningful and urgent three-fold contribution to our classrooms: first, it could inform the design of learning environments to critically engage with narratives of colonialism in the Spanish-speaking world and in the United States; second, it could allow for critical reflections around issues of belonging and membership to the Latinx and the Spanish-speaking community in the. The final goal is to generate learning environments where we all —teachers, SHLLs, and FLLs— engage in critical discussions about our place in today’s diversity, and how such diversity in all of its complexity contributes to the future of the Spanish language and our many communities
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