Repositioning White Monolingual English-Speaking Teachers’ Conceptions of Language: Counterstories and Embodied Learning

Abstract

Countries are seeing a rise in the number of families and schoolchildren who do not speak English as a first language. This study focuses on how two White monolingual English-speaking elementary teachers positioned language as it related to their Spanish-speaking students within a graduate teacher education program in the United States. Our work builds on previous cultural immersion studies by using embodied cognition and Latino Critical Theory (LatCrit) as analytical tools. Findings indicate that embodied experiences can increase teachers’ awareness of how speakers of English and Spanish are positioned by the dominant culture while LatCrit theory can illuminate future steps.