Abstract

Bilingualism and Language Pedagogy brings an understanding of language as a social practice, and bilingualism as the study of bidirectional transitioning, to the examination of bilingual settings in the US, Europe and developing countries. The volume suggests that language pedagogy needs to reflect new understandings of bilinguals. Focusing both on bilingual linguistic competence and educational politics and practice, the chapters provide valuable practical proposals and models for developing sociocultural and linguistic competencies among bilingual practitioners and students. The volume situates teachers as mediators and explores the key roles that they have as language and content educators. In discussing the experiences of learners, it takes up the linguistic competence of bilinguals, highlighting how their language use constitutes a resource for meeting the demands of social interactions, and foregrounds the significance of developing academic language proficiency in English among minority children to decrease the barriers facing them in residential and academic settings.

Janina Brutt-Griffler is on the graduate faculty at the University of York, where she directs the MA programme in TESOL. She is the author of World English: A Study of its Development and has published extensively in several journals. Her scholarship bridges the fields of English studies, second language acquisition, language policy and bilingualism.

Manka M. Varghese is currently Assistant Professor in the College of Education at the University of Washington. She received her PhD in Educational Linguistics from the University of Pennsylvania in 2000. Her area of specialisation is language teacher education and identity.