I talk normal: A comparative case study of raciolinguistic socialization in preschool

Abstract

This study analyzes how raciolinguistic ideologies shape children’s identity construction within two American preschool classrooms. Specifically, I attend to the ways three-, four-, and five- year-old Dominant American English-speaking children adopted white listening subject positions and shaped peer interactions in the classroom. Ethnographic data for this comparative case study included children and teacher interviews, classroom observations, and classroom artifact collection. Within- and cross-case analyses revealed three salient raciolinguistic socialization processes: marking of language, racialization of differences, and enacted raciolinguistic hierarchies. Children’s participation within these raciolinguistic processes reflected the local particulars of the classroom, including curriculum, educators’ pedagogies, and classroom demographics. Implication for research and practices that attend to young children's raciolinguistic socialization are discussed