Bienvenidos a la conversación:跨科学和工程教育研究的跨语言考试

IF 3.6 1区 教育学 Q1 EDUCATION & EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH
Greses Pérez, María González-Howard, Enrique Suárez
{"title":"Bienvenidos a la conversación:跨科学和工程教育研究的跨语言考试","authors":"Greses Pérez,&nbsp;María González-Howard,&nbsp;Enrique Suárez","doi":"10.1002/tea.22010","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<p>In May 2023, the three of us met with Professor Emerita Ofelia García to share our goals for this Special Issue. Given her expertise in translanguaging, we asked if she would contribute a closing commentary. Noting our admiration of her and her colleagues' work over the past decade (García, <span>2011</span>; García &amp; Kleyn, <span>2016</span>; García &amp; Li, <span>2014</span>; Otheguy et al., <span>2015</span>) and the ways it has impacted our thinking and areas of research, Dr. García humbly expressed, “All I have done in my work is to describe what I have seen and observed as a way to deconstruct what others have done before.” Mirroring her seemingly simple, yet powerful statement, our vision for this Special Issue is to foster space for critical conversations within our frequently siloed disciplinary communities, where scholars can share observations they have made as a means to decolonize, and transform perspectives around language and the experiences of language-minoritized individuals in science and engineering education (García et al., <span>2021</span>; Takeuchi et al., <span>2022</span>). Further, in response to the increased interest in and uptake of translanguaging theory and pedagogy in STEM education research (e.g., Jakobsson et al., <span>2021</span>; Pérez et al., <span>2022</span>), this Special Issue was born out of our desire to understand whether there is—or could be and/or should be—consensus around what it means to engage in translanguaging practices, frameworks, and scholarship in science and engineering education.</p><p>The manuscripts in this Special Issue capture the different and robust ways in which translanguaging as theory and as pedagogy have been taken up by science and engineering researchers and educators from around the world who are working across grade levels and learning environments. From high school science classrooms in the Midwestern US (Bonilla &amp; Morales-Doyle, this issue) to out-of-school science programs for refugees in Lebanon (Salloum, Debs, &amp; BouJaoude, this issue) to kindergartners in Luxembourg (Siry, Wilmes, &amp; Sportelli, this issue), these articles invite us to reckon with science and engineering education from a perspective that centers what individuals from language-minoritized backgrounds <i>are</i> capable of doing, figuring out, and understanding when their language-related resources and practices are viewed in expansive ways (González-Howard et al., <span>2023</span>). In particular, the manuscripts highlight the brilliance and experiences of individuals who identify, or are identified, as multilingual because they use multiple named languages (e.g., Spanish, Portuguese, and Mandarin) in addition to English (González-Howard &amp; Suárez, <span>2021</span>), or as multidialectal because they use multiple varieties of the same named language (e.g., African American Vernacular English, Black English, Garifuna, and Caribbean Spanglish) (Baker-Bell, <span>2020</span>; Degraff, <span>2005</span>; García et al., <span>2024</span>; Rickford, <span>2007</span>). Aiming to foster learning between scholars, this Special Issue brings researchers into <i>conversación</i>, encouraging us to consider and reflect upon different conceptualizations of translanguaging and the ways they are being taken up across disciplinary spaces.</p><p>For the sake of clarity around how the three of us enter <i>la conversación</i>, we take a moment to present a definition of translanguaging from its origins within bi/multilingual education that aligns with our definition of this construct, and then share how we think the construct can contribute to realizing equitable science and engineering education. For the purposes of this Special Issue, we broadly define translanguaging as the deployment of a bi/multilingual speaker's full semiotic repertoire—which includes multimodal, multisensory, and multilingual elements—without regard for the socially and politically constructed boundaries of named languages, registers, and/or modalities. From this perspective, translanguaging asks researchers and educators to develop expansive perspectives on how minoritized individuals use language, for instance, to make meaning, interact socially, and achieve goals with others. It also asks us to move away from the idea that a bilingual/bidialectal person is made up of two monolinguals wrapped into one (García, <span>2011</span>; García &amp; Li, <span>2014</span>). Instead, people have <i>one</i> complex semiotic system (i.e., their idiolect) that comprises multilingual, multimodal, and multisensory dimensions from which they draw upon and use different resources to communicate based on the context they are in (Li, <span>2018</span>; Otheguy et al., <span>2015</span>) and their audience (Bell, <span>2002</span>). Moreover, a translanguaging perspective is inherently political as it questions and pushes back upon socially recognized categories, such as named languages or varieties of those that are privileged, which are intrinsically connected to power structures (e.g., Farsi, Spanish, English, high German), as more legitimate than others. Our conceptualization of translanguaging is not what some call “code-switching” because we, like García and Li (<span>2014</span>), reject the premise that there are codes to switch between. Instead, such moments are evidence of individuals fluidly laminating linguistic resources associated with different named languages to accomplish a specific goal (Suárez, <span>2020</span>). In the context of science and engineering education, translanguaging can help us extend research and pedagogy that considers and values the heterogeneous nature of how learners share their ideas and engage with each other's thinking (e.g., Rosebery et al., <span>2010</span>; Warren et al., <span>2020</span>). Specifically, it offers a theoretical construct and an analytical tool to better study and explain how language-minoritized learners engage in meaning-making and/or design, interact with others, and problem-solve.</p><p>In addition to showcasing the different robust approaches to translanguaging, as well as presenting our rationale for why translanguaging is productive for us, we would like to offer some considerations for science and engineering education scholars who are interested in embarking on this kind of work. First, we critically heed caution from our research community about translanguaging theory and pedagogy becoming diluted. And by that, we mean being used as a catch-all phrase with no precise meaning and not being taken up to intentionally disrupt harmful, dominant discourses, ideologies, and practices (García et al., <span>2021</span>; Li, <span>2023</span>). We have seen this occur before with other theories and pedagogies that were originally proposed for accomplishing transformative work; as they gain popularity, many of their foundational principles are lost (e.g., culturally relevant, responsive, or sustaining pedagogy; Ladson-Billings, <span>2021</span>). Proactively addressing this concern, we urged contributing authors of this Special Issue to explicitly define language and languaging (Li, <span>2018</span>) in their work and to articulate whose language and languaging they examined and why. Moreover, we encouraged authors to situate themselves in their research. Who we are, which includes (but is not limited to) the language resources and practices we use across spaces, time, and with different audiences, influences how we experience the world. And for educational researchers, it impacts how we view, relate to, and make sense of others' language and languaging (Boveda &amp; Annamma, <span>2023</span>; Martínez &amp; Mesinas, <span>2019</span>; Ríos &amp; Patel, <span>2023</span>). Implicating ourselves in this process, we next offer some insight into our positionings related to language and languaging and describe how they affect our research and the work we did with this Special Issue. We then share our takeaways from reading this collection of manuscripts and conclude with suggested questions for readers to keep in mind as they engage with the Special Issue.</p><p>As previously noted, it is of utmost importance that we make our positionalities as researchers transparent, especially those of us who work in learning spaces where prevailing power structures minoritize and undervalue/devalue language practices that do not align with those used by white, Western, dominant language-speaking individuals (González-Howard &amp; Suárez, <span>2021</span>; Takeuchi et al., <span>2022</span>). Like the authors whose work comprises this Special Issue, the three of us also represent a swath of intersecting identities, lived experiences, and positions of power (or lack thereof), all of which inform how we see the world, how we navigate the world, and how others view and interact with us in and out of academic spaces. This seemed particularly prescient for us to reflect upon, since all three of us contributed equally to the creation, managing, and finalizing of this Special Issue. For this reason, it is critical to situate ourselves in the work we have done, both as guest co-editors of this Special Issue and as researchers who are committed to making science and engineering education more equitable and just, especially for language-minoritized individuals (Pérez, <span>2022</span>). We do not intend to simply list our identities as markers of so-called “insiders” (Merriam et al., <span>2001</span>), but rather to wrestle with dynamics of power and knowledge production in relation to ourselves in science and engineering as disciplines and education (Boveda &amp; Annamma, <span>2023</span>; Martínez &amp; Mesinas, <span>2019</span>; Ríos &amp; Patel, <span>2023</span>). Moreover, the three of us have known each other for over a decade. We navigated graduate school and entered the early stages of our careers as faculty within institutions of higher education. Thus, our evolving positionings are informed by who we were, who we have become as individuals and as a collective, and our interactions with the US education system.</p><p>Yo, Greses Pérez, am an Assistant Professor of Engineering Education Research at Tufts University, a medium-sized private, Research 1, predominantly white institution in the Northeastern US. My relationship with language and engineering is informed by my experiences as a 1.5-generation Dominican-American, Black Latina, speaker of Caribbean Spanglish, civil engineer, and learning scientist. Most of my STEM professors were male English speakers, who rarely invited the systems of resources and practices of minoritized communities, but throughout my career, I have learned that even within Latinx spaces, the intersectional experiences of Afro and Indigenous Latines are often flattened and invisibilized. Yet, during my time at the University of Puerto Rico in Mayagüez and as a bilingual teacher in Texas, I experienced niche spaces of <i>fogaraté</i>, learning environments where people felt alive through who they were, where their full linguistic and cultural realities were empowered and invited in more than just one language. These rare experiences sparked my curiosity to investigate how people learn engineering in K-16 and how to design inclusive learning environments where people draw on their cultural understandings and language to develop equitable and just engineering solutions (Lemmi &amp; Pérez, <span>2024</span>; Pérez et al., <span>2024</span>; Pérez &amp; Marvez, <span>in press</span>; Secules et al., <span>2023</span>).</p><p>I, María González-Howard, am an Associate Professor of STEM Education at The University of Texas at Austin, a large research institution recently designated as a Hispanic Serving Institution. I am a white Latina who was born in Argentina and raised with many linguistic and cultural practices common to that country. Porque hablaba español en casa, my early schooling in the US encompassed ESL programming, which I recall as me being frequently pulled out of class to sit in a small room while wearing headphones and repeating back English words and phrases. Because my early memories of school involved feelings of being incomplete and othered, I strive to ensure multilingual students receive more humane and meaningful experiences in education. My lines of scholarship center supporting teachers in recognizing the brilliant ways multilingual students use their existing and entire language repertoire for science (González-Howard, Andersen, et al., <span>2024</span>). In particular, I integrate translanguaging theory and praxis in elementary science methods courses to guide monolingual and multilingual preservice teachers in problematizing their language orientations and honoring and supporting multilingual students' language use in science practices (Andersen et al., <span>2022</span>; González-Howard, Méndez Pérez, &amp; Andersen, <span>2024</span>).</p><p>I, Enrique (Henry) Suárez, am an Associate Professor at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, a large Research institution in New England. I am a White Latino, multilingual, heterosexual, cisgender, and nondisabled, and I work to make science learning environments more just through affirming and building on minoritized students' linguistic, epistemic, and cultural resources. My scholarship focuses on how young children use their translanguaging practices to make sense of physical phenomena (e.g., Suárez, <span>2020</span>; Suárez &amp; Otero, <span>2024</span>), as well as how to support mono- and multilingual teachers recognize and build on the brilliance of their students' ideas and languaging. Central to this work is my professional experience as a (Western-trained) astrophysicist, which began in my home country of Venezuela, spanned multiple continents, and was built on collaborating with multilingual colleagues. These experiences have pushed me to name and dismantle narrow definitions of what counts as “language of science” in learning environments, especially when these limiting perceptions construe minoritized students as needing fixing.</p><p>As translanguaging scholars in STEM education, we are committed to describing what we see in multilingual communities beyond normative conceptions of language or their unitary semiotic systems. Within this commitment lies our desire to transform how language-minoritized students and their teachers learn and participate in science and engineering, fully recognizing that the instructional models in most science and engineering classrooms have ignored, misrecognized, or outright excluded the myriad language practices that multilingual students draw upon for figuring out the world and solving meaningful problems. Throughout our careers, we have seen how the listening practices of people in positions of power (e.g., white listening subjects; Flores &amp; Rosa, <span>2015</span>) have led them to miss the beauty, richness, and future outlook in the dexterity of multilinguals to navigate and make sense of the world between languages and cultures. Yet, our research, as well as the work of the Special Issue authors, continue to show that, when listening closely and noticing more expansively, we can better recognize the intelligence and complexity in how multilingual students' use language to engage in engineering design and to understand the natural world around them. The 10 manuscripts included in this Special Issue align with this commitment and desire.</p><p>To further situate these manuscripts, we briefly offer an account of the work that went into developing this Special Issue. After publishing our call for abstracts in Fall 2022 (Pérez et al., <span>2022</span>), we received 40 1000-word extended abstracts from scholars across 10 countries whose work focused on language-minoritized learners in science and engineering education. The authors of 15 of these abstracts were invited to submit their full manuscripts within 6 months. After an extensive and rigorous review process, which entailed multiple rounds of reviews and revisions, 10 manuscripts were accepted in this collection.</p><p>Through a reflective and critical examination of language in science and engineering education contexts, this Special Issue serves as a platform to motivate a broader <i>conversación</i> about the importance and the nuances of engaging in research, practice, and policy to critically address language and/or languaging through the lens of translanguaging theory and pedagogy (García &amp; Li, <span>2014</span>; Li, <span>2018</span>; Otheguy et al., <span>2015</span>). The works presented in this collection highlight the dexterity and brilliance of language-minoritized individuals' communicative resources and practices. They also shed light on the various lenses used by educational researchers who draw upon translanguaging to engage with the language resources and practices of these communities. Though different aspects are sure to stand out to readers as they engage with this Special Issue, here we present three takeaways that are salient to us: (1) languaging in science and engineering education is political, (2) translanguaging uncovers existing power structures within language and languaging, and (3) intersectional identities are critical to addressing language. As we describe each takeaway, we weave in and elevate representative manuscripts from this Special Issue. Though we mention only a few manuscripts per takeaway, we invite readers to consider how these ideas cut across the entire collection.</p><p>This Translanguaging Special Issue intends to capture possible pathways around what it can look like to engage in translanguaging theory and pedagogy in science and engineering education research, rather than to represent a singular final destination. We hope this collection of articles serves as the beginning of a long <i>conversación</i> between scholars from various disciplinary spaces, a <i>conversación</i> that helps us grapple with and crystallize views around what we mean by language and languaging in science and engineering. Moreover, returning to Dr. Ofelia García's remarks from the opening of this commentary, we hope this <i>conversación</i> pushes us to develop and use more critical and expansive framings to better observe, deconstruct, and support the brilliant ways language-minoritized individuals engage with others, for instance, in scientific sensemaking, design processes, and engineering problem-solving.</p><p>With these questions in mind, we now welcome you to engage with this collection of manuscripts. All offer unique examinations of translanguaging across equity-oriented science and engineering education research. ¡Bienvenidos a la conversación!</p>","PeriodicalId":48369,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Research in Science Teaching","volume":"62 1","pages":"3-14"},"PeriodicalIF":3.6000,"publicationDate":"2024-12-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/tea.22010","citationCount":"0","resultStr":"{\"title\":\"Bienvenidos a la conversación: Examinations of translanguaging across science and engineering education research\",\"authors\":\"Greses Pérez,&nbsp;María González-Howard,&nbsp;Enrique Suárez\",\"doi\":\"10.1002/tea.22010\",\"DOIUrl\":null,\"url\":null,\"abstract\":\"<p>In May 2023, the three of us met with Professor Emerita Ofelia García to share our goals for this Special Issue. Given her expertise in translanguaging, we asked if she would contribute a closing commentary. Noting our admiration of her and her colleagues' work over the past decade (García, <span>2011</span>; García &amp; Kleyn, <span>2016</span>; García &amp; Li, <span>2014</span>; Otheguy et al., <span>2015</span>) and the ways it has impacted our thinking and areas of research, Dr. García humbly expressed, “All I have done in my work is to describe what I have seen and observed as a way to deconstruct what others have done before.” Mirroring her seemingly simple, yet powerful statement, our vision for this Special Issue is to foster space for critical conversations within our frequently siloed disciplinary communities, where scholars can share observations they have made as a means to decolonize, and transform perspectives around language and the experiences of language-minoritized individuals in science and engineering education (García et al., <span>2021</span>; Takeuchi et al., <span>2022</span>). Further, in response to the increased interest in and uptake of translanguaging theory and pedagogy in STEM education research (e.g., Jakobsson et al., <span>2021</span>; Pérez et al., <span>2022</span>), this Special Issue was born out of our desire to understand whether there is—or could be and/or should be—consensus around what it means to engage in translanguaging practices, frameworks, and scholarship in science and engineering education.</p><p>The manuscripts in this Special Issue capture the different and robust ways in which translanguaging as theory and as pedagogy have been taken up by science and engineering researchers and educators from around the world who are working across grade levels and learning environments. From high school science classrooms in the Midwestern US (Bonilla &amp; Morales-Doyle, this issue) to out-of-school science programs for refugees in Lebanon (Salloum, Debs, &amp; BouJaoude, this issue) to kindergartners in Luxembourg (Siry, Wilmes, &amp; Sportelli, this issue), these articles invite us to reckon with science and engineering education from a perspective that centers what individuals from language-minoritized backgrounds <i>are</i> capable of doing, figuring out, and understanding when their language-related resources and practices are viewed in expansive ways (González-Howard et al., <span>2023</span>). In particular, the manuscripts highlight the brilliance and experiences of individuals who identify, or are identified, as multilingual because they use multiple named languages (e.g., Spanish, Portuguese, and Mandarin) in addition to English (González-Howard &amp; Suárez, <span>2021</span>), or as multidialectal because they use multiple varieties of the same named language (e.g., African American Vernacular English, Black English, Garifuna, and Caribbean Spanglish) (Baker-Bell, <span>2020</span>; Degraff, <span>2005</span>; García et al., <span>2024</span>; Rickford, <span>2007</span>). Aiming to foster learning between scholars, this Special Issue brings researchers into <i>conversación</i>, encouraging us to consider and reflect upon different conceptualizations of translanguaging and the ways they are being taken up across disciplinary spaces.</p><p>For the sake of clarity around how the three of us enter <i>la conversación</i>, we take a moment to present a definition of translanguaging from its origins within bi/multilingual education that aligns with our definition of this construct, and then share how we think the construct can contribute to realizing equitable science and engineering education. For the purposes of this Special Issue, we broadly define translanguaging as the deployment of a bi/multilingual speaker's full semiotic repertoire—which includes multimodal, multisensory, and multilingual elements—without regard for the socially and politically constructed boundaries of named languages, registers, and/or modalities. From this perspective, translanguaging asks researchers and educators to develop expansive perspectives on how minoritized individuals use language, for instance, to make meaning, interact socially, and achieve goals with others. It also asks us to move away from the idea that a bilingual/bidialectal person is made up of two monolinguals wrapped into one (García, <span>2011</span>; García &amp; Li, <span>2014</span>). Instead, people have <i>one</i> complex semiotic system (i.e., their idiolect) that comprises multilingual, multimodal, and multisensory dimensions from which they draw upon and use different resources to communicate based on the context they are in (Li, <span>2018</span>; Otheguy et al., <span>2015</span>) and their audience (Bell, <span>2002</span>). Moreover, a translanguaging perspective is inherently political as it questions and pushes back upon socially recognized categories, such as named languages or varieties of those that are privileged, which are intrinsically connected to power structures (e.g., Farsi, Spanish, English, high German), as more legitimate than others. Our conceptualization of translanguaging is not what some call “code-switching” because we, like García and Li (<span>2014</span>), reject the premise that there are codes to switch between. Instead, such moments are evidence of individuals fluidly laminating linguistic resources associated with different named languages to accomplish a specific goal (Suárez, <span>2020</span>). In the context of science and engineering education, translanguaging can help us extend research and pedagogy that considers and values the heterogeneous nature of how learners share their ideas and engage with each other's thinking (e.g., Rosebery et al., <span>2010</span>; Warren et al., <span>2020</span>). Specifically, it offers a theoretical construct and an analytical tool to better study and explain how language-minoritized learners engage in meaning-making and/or design, interact with others, and problem-solve.</p><p>In addition to showcasing the different robust approaches to translanguaging, as well as presenting our rationale for why translanguaging is productive for us, we would like to offer some considerations for science and engineering education scholars who are interested in embarking on this kind of work. First, we critically heed caution from our research community about translanguaging theory and pedagogy becoming diluted. And by that, we mean being used as a catch-all phrase with no precise meaning and not being taken up to intentionally disrupt harmful, dominant discourses, ideologies, and practices (García et al., <span>2021</span>; Li, <span>2023</span>). We have seen this occur before with other theories and pedagogies that were originally proposed for accomplishing transformative work; as they gain popularity, many of their foundational principles are lost (e.g., culturally relevant, responsive, or sustaining pedagogy; Ladson-Billings, <span>2021</span>). Proactively addressing this concern, we urged contributing authors of this Special Issue to explicitly define language and languaging (Li, <span>2018</span>) in their work and to articulate whose language and languaging they examined and why. Moreover, we encouraged authors to situate themselves in their research. Who we are, which includes (but is not limited to) the language resources and practices we use across spaces, time, and with different audiences, influences how we experience the world. And for educational researchers, it impacts how we view, relate to, and make sense of others' language and languaging (Boveda &amp; Annamma, <span>2023</span>; Martínez &amp; Mesinas, <span>2019</span>; Ríos &amp; Patel, <span>2023</span>). Implicating ourselves in this process, we next offer some insight into our positionings related to language and languaging and describe how they affect our research and the work we did with this Special Issue. We then share our takeaways from reading this collection of manuscripts and conclude with suggested questions for readers to keep in mind as they engage with the Special Issue.</p><p>As previously noted, it is of utmost importance that we make our positionalities as researchers transparent, especially those of us who work in learning spaces where prevailing power structures minoritize and undervalue/devalue language practices that do not align with those used by white, Western, dominant language-speaking individuals (González-Howard &amp; Suárez, <span>2021</span>; Takeuchi et al., <span>2022</span>). Like the authors whose work comprises this Special Issue, the three of us also represent a swath of intersecting identities, lived experiences, and positions of power (or lack thereof), all of which inform how we see the world, how we navigate the world, and how others view and interact with us in and out of academic spaces. This seemed particularly prescient for us to reflect upon, since all three of us contributed equally to the creation, managing, and finalizing of this Special Issue. For this reason, it is critical to situate ourselves in the work we have done, both as guest co-editors of this Special Issue and as researchers who are committed to making science and engineering education more equitable and just, especially for language-minoritized individuals (Pérez, <span>2022</span>). We do not intend to simply list our identities as markers of so-called “insiders” (Merriam et al., <span>2001</span>), but rather to wrestle with dynamics of power and knowledge production in relation to ourselves in science and engineering as disciplines and education (Boveda &amp; Annamma, <span>2023</span>; Martínez &amp; Mesinas, <span>2019</span>; Ríos &amp; Patel, <span>2023</span>). Moreover, the three of us have known each other for over a decade. We navigated graduate school and entered the early stages of our careers as faculty within institutions of higher education. Thus, our evolving positionings are informed by who we were, who we have become as individuals and as a collective, and our interactions with the US education system.</p><p>Yo, Greses Pérez, am an Assistant Professor of Engineering Education Research at Tufts University, a medium-sized private, Research 1, predominantly white institution in the Northeastern US. My relationship with language and engineering is informed by my experiences as a 1.5-generation Dominican-American, Black Latina, speaker of Caribbean Spanglish, civil engineer, and learning scientist. Most of my STEM professors were male English speakers, who rarely invited the systems of resources and practices of minoritized communities, but throughout my career, I have learned that even within Latinx spaces, the intersectional experiences of Afro and Indigenous Latines are often flattened and invisibilized. Yet, during my time at the University of Puerto Rico in Mayagüez and as a bilingual teacher in Texas, I experienced niche spaces of <i>fogaraté</i>, learning environments where people felt alive through who they were, where their full linguistic and cultural realities were empowered and invited in more than just one language. These rare experiences sparked my curiosity to investigate how people learn engineering in K-16 and how to design inclusive learning environments where people draw on their cultural understandings and language to develop equitable and just engineering solutions (Lemmi &amp; Pérez, <span>2024</span>; Pérez et al., <span>2024</span>; Pérez &amp; Marvez, <span>in press</span>; Secules et al., <span>2023</span>).</p><p>I, María González-Howard, am an Associate Professor of STEM Education at The University of Texas at Austin, a large research institution recently designated as a Hispanic Serving Institution. I am a white Latina who was born in Argentina and raised with many linguistic and cultural practices common to that country. Porque hablaba español en casa, my early schooling in the US encompassed ESL programming, which I recall as me being frequently pulled out of class to sit in a small room while wearing headphones and repeating back English words and phrases. Because my early memories of school involved feelings of being incomplete and othered, I strive to ensure multilingual students receive more humane and meaningful experiences in education. My lines of scholarship center supporting teachers in recognizing the brilliant ways multilingual students use their existing and entire language repertoire for science (González-Howard, Andersen, et al., <span>2024</span>). In particular, I integrate translanguaging theory and praxis in elementary science methods courses to guide monolingual and multilingual preservice teachers in problematizing their language orientations and honoring and supporting multilingual students' language use in science practices (Andersen et al., <span>2022</span>; González-Howard, Méndez Pérez, &amp; Andersen, <span>2024</span>).</p><p>I, Enrique (Henry) Suárez, am an Associate Professor at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, a large Research institution in New England. I am a White Latino, multilingual, heterosexual, cisgender, and nondisabled, and I work to make science learning environments more just through affirming and building on minoritized students' linguistic, epistemic, and cultural resources. My scholarship focuses on how young children use their translanguaging practices to make sense of physical phenomena (e.g., Suárez, <span>2020</span>; Suárez &amp; Otero, <span>2024</span>), as well as how to support mono- and multilingual teachers recognize and build on the brilliance of their students' ideas and languaging. Central to this work is my professional experience as a (Western-trained) astrophysicist, which began in my home country of Venezuela, spanned multiple continents, and was built on collaborating with multilingual colleagues. These experiences have pushed me to name and dismantle narrow definitions of what counts as “language of science” in learning environments, especially when these limiting perceptions construe minoritized students as needing fixing.</p><p>As translanguaging scholars in STEM education, we are committed to describing what we see in multilingual communities beyond normative conceptions of language or their unitary semiotic systems. Within this commitment lies our desire to transform how language-minoritized students and their teachers learn and participate in science and engineering, fully recognizing that the instructional models in most science and engineering classrooms have ignored, misrecognized, or outright excluded the myriad language practices that multilingual students draw upon for figuring out the world and solving meaningful problems. Throughout our careers, we have seen how the listening practices of people in positions of power (e.g., white listening subjects; Flores &amp; Rosa, <span>2015</span>) have led them to miss the beauty, richness, and future outlook in the dexterity of multilinguals to navigate and make sense of the world between languages and cultures. Yet, our research, as well as the work of the Special Issue authors, continue to show that, when listening closely and noticing more expansively, we can better recognize the intelligence and complexity in how multilingual students' use language to engage in engineering design and to understand the natural world around them. The 10 manuscripts included in this Special Issue align with this commitment and desire.</p><p>To further situate these manuscripts, we briefly offer an account of the work that went into developing this Special Issue. After publishing our call for abstracts in Fall 2022 (Pérez et al., <span>2022</span>), we received 40 1000-word extended abstracts from scholars across 10 countries whose work focused on language-minoritized learners in science and engineering education. The authors of 15 of these abstracts were invited to submit their full manuscripts within 6 months. After an extensive and rigorous review process, which entailed multiple rounds of reviews and revisions, 10 manuscripts were accepted in this collection.</p><p>Through a reflective and critical examination of language in science and engineering education contexts, this Special Issue serves as a platform to motivate a broader <i>conversación</i> about the importance and the nuances of engaging in research, practice, and policy to critically address language and/or languaging through the lens of translanguaging theory and pedagogy (García &amp; Li, <span>2014</span>; Li, <span>2018</span>; Otheguy et al., <span>2015</span>). The works presented in this collection highlight the dexterity and brilliance of language-minoritized individuals' communicative resources and practices. They also shed light on the various lenses used by educational researchers who draw upon translanguaging to engage with the language resources and practices of these communities. Though different aspects are sure to stand out to readers as they engage with this Special Issue, here we present three takeaways that are salient to us: (1) languaging in science and engineering education is political, (2) translanguaging uncovers existing power structures within language and languaging, and (3) intersectional identities are critical to addressing language. As we describe each takeaway, we weave in and elevate representative manuscripts from this Special Issue. Though we mention only a few manuscripts per takeaway, we invite readers to consider how these ideas cut across the entire collection.</p><p>This Translanguaging Special Issue intends to capture possible pathways around what it can look like to engage in translanguaging theory and pedagogy in science and engineering education research, rather than to represent a singular final destination. We hope this collection of articles serves as the beginning of a long <i>conversación</i> between scholars from various disciplinary spaces, a <i>conversación</i> that helps us grapple with and crystallize views around what we mean by language and languaging in science and engineering. 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引用次数: 0

摘要

2023年5月,我们三人与奥菲利亚名誉教授García会面,分享了我们本期特刊的目标。鉴于她在翻译语言方面的专业知识,我们问她是否愿意发表结束语。注意到我们对她和她的同事在过去十年中的工作表示钦佩(García, 2011;加西亚,Kleyn, 2016;加西亚,李,2014;other guy et al., 2015)以及它影响我们思维和研究领域的方式,García博士谦虚地表示,“我在工作中所做的一切都是描述我所看到和观察到的,以此来解构其他人之前所做的事情。”反映她看似简单,但有力的声明,我们对这个特刊的愿景是在我们经常孤立的学科社区中培养批判性对话的空间,学者们可以分享他们作为非殖民化手段所做的观察,并改变围绕语言的观点以及科学和工程教育中语言少数群体个人的经验(García等人,2021;Takeuchi et al., 2022)。此外,为了应对STEM教育研究中对译语理论和教学法的兴趣和吸收的增加(例如,Jakobsson等人,2021;psamurez et al., 2022),本期特刊的诞生是出于我们的愿望,即了解在科学和工程教育中从事跨语言实践、框架和学术研究的意义是否存在——或可能存在和/或应该存在——共识。本期特刊的手稿展现了跨年级、跨学习环境的世界各地的科学和工程研究人员和教育工作者将译语作为理论和教学法的不同而有力的方式。来自美国中西部高中的科学教室(Bonilla &amp;莫拉莱斯-多伊尔,本期)到黎巴嫩难民校外科学项目(萨卢姆,德布斯,&;BouJaoude,这期)给卢森堡的幼儿园(Siry, Wilmes, &amp;Sportelli,本期),这些文章邀请我们从一个角度来考虑科学和工程教育,这个角度集中在语言少数背景的个人在以广泛的方式看待他们与语言相关的资源和实践时能够做什么,弄清楚和理解什么(González-Howard等人,2023)。特别是,这些手稿突出了那些被认为或被认为是多语言的人的才华和经历,因为他们除了英语之外还使用多种命名语言(例如西班牙语、葡萄牙语和普通话)(González-Howard &amp;Suárez, 2021),或者多方言,因为他们使用同一种语言的多种变体(例如,非洲裔美国人的白话英语,黑人英语,加利福纳语和加勒比西班牙语)(Baker-Bell, 2020;Degraff, 2005;García等人,2024;Rickford, 2007)。为了促进学者之间的学习,本期特刊将研究人员带入conversación,鼓励我们思考和反思跨学科领域对译语的不同概念及其采用的方式。为了清楚地了解我们三人是如何进入la conversación的,我们花点时间从双语/多语教育的起源提出一个与我们对这个结构的定义相一致的翻译语言的定义,然后分享我们认为这个结构如何有助于实现公平的科学和工程教育。为了本期特刊的目的,我们将翻译广义地定义为双语/多语说话者的全部符号学库的部署,包括多模态、多感官和多语言元素,而不考虑命名语言、语域和/或模态的社会和政治边界。从这个角度来看,跨语言要求研究人员和教育工作者对少数群体如何使用语言,例如,表达意义,社交互动和与他人实现目标,发展广泛的视角。它还要求我们放弃双语/双方言人是由两个单语者合二为一的想法(García, 2011;加西亚,李,2014)。相反,人们有一个复杂的符号系统(即他们的习语),包括多语言、多模态和多感官维度,他们根据自己所处的环境利用和使用不同的资源进行交流(Li, 2018;Otheguy et al., 2015)和他们的受众(Bell, 2002)。此外,跨语言的观点本质上是政治性的,因为它质疑并推翻了社会公认的类别,例如命名语言或那些与权力结构内在联系的特权语言(例如,波斯语,西班牙语,英语,高地德语),因为它们比其他语言更合法。 我们对译语的概念并不是一些人所说的“代码转换”,因为我们,如García和Li(2014),拒绝了存在代码之间转换的前提。相反,这种时刻是个体流畅地整合与不同命名语言相关的语言资源以实现特定目标的证据(Suárez, 2020)。在科学和工程教育的背景下,翻译可以帮助我们扩展研究和教学法,这些研究和教学法考虑并重视学习者如何分享他们的想法和参与彼此的思维的异质性(例如,Rosebery等人,2010;Warren et al., 2020)。具体来说,它提供了一个理论结构和分析工具,以更好地研究和解释语言少数学习者如何参与意义创造和/或设计,与他人互动以及解决问题。除了展示不同的稳健的翻译方法,以及我们为什么翻译语言对我们有益的基本原理之外,我们还想为有兴趣从事这类工作的科学和工程教育学者提供一些考虑。首先,我们谨慎地注意到我们的研究界对译语理论和教学法被淡化的警告。我们的意思是,它被用作一个没有确切含义的笼统短语,而不是被用来故意破坏有害的、占主导地位的话语、意识形态和实践(García等人,2021;李,2023)。我们以前看到过这种情况发生在其他理论和教学法中,这些理论和教学法最初是为了完成变革工作而提出的;随着它们越来越受欢迎,它们的许多基本原则(例如,与文化相关的、响应性的或持续的教学法;Ladson-Billings, 2021)。为了积极解决这一问题,我们敦促本期特刊的撰稿人在他们的工作中明确定义语言和语言(Li, 2018),并阐明他们研究的是谁的语言和语言,以及为什么。此外,我们鼓励作者将自己置于他们的研究中。我们是谁,包括(但不限于)我们跨越空间、时间和不同受众使用的语言资源和实践,影响着我们如何体验世界。对于教育研究人员来说,它影响我们如何看待、联系和理解他人的语言和语言(Boveda &amp;Annamma, 2023;马丁内斯,Mesinas, 2019;里奥斯,帕特尔,2023)。在这一过程中,我们将对我们在语言和语言方面的定位提出一些见解,并描述它们如何影响我们的研究和我们在本期特刊中所做的工作。然后,我们分享了我们从阅读这些手稿中得到的收获,并在最后提出了一些建议问题,供读者在阅读特刊时记住。如前所述,最重要的是,我们作为研究人员的立场是透明的,特别是我们这些在学习空间工作的人,在这些学习空间中,主流的权力结构将语言实践视为少数,并低估/贬低与白人,西方,占主导地位的语言个体使用的语言实践不一致(González-Howard &amp;苏亚雷斯,2021;Takeuchi et al., 2022)。就像本期特刊的作者一样,我们三人也代表了一系列相互交叉的身份、生活经历和权力地位(或缺乏权力),所有这些都告诉我们如何看待世界,如何驾驭世界,以及其他人如何看待我们,并在学术空间内外与我们互动。这似乎特别有先见之明,值得我们反思,因为我们三个人对本期特刊的创作、管理和定稿都做出了同样的贡献。出于这个原因,将我们自己置于我们所做的工作中是至关重要的,既作为本期特刊的客座共同编辑,也作为致力于使科学和工程教育更加公平和公正的研究人员,特别是对于语言少数群体(psamurez, 2022)。我们不打算简单地将我们的身份作为所谓的“圈内人”的标记(Merriam等人,2001),而是要与科学和工程学科和教育中与我们相关的权力和知识生产的动态进行斗争(Boveda &amp;Annamma, 2023;马丁内斯,Mesinas, 2019;里奥斯,帕特尔,2023)。此外,我们三个人已经认识了十多年。我们顺利进入研究生院,并作为高等教育机构的教员进入了我们职业生涯的早期阶段。因此,我们不断变化的定位取决于我们曾经是谁,我们作为个人和集体成为谁,以及我们与美国教育体系的互动。我是塔夫茨大学工程教育研究助理教授,塔夫茨大学是美国东北部一所以白人为主的中型私立大学。 作为一名1.5代的多米尼加裔美国人、拉丁裔黑人、说加勒比海西班牙式英语的人、土木工程师和学习科学家,我与语言和工程的关系受到了影响。我的大多数STEM教授都是说英语的男性,他们很少邀请少数族裔社区的资源和实践系统,但在我的职业生涯中,我了解到,即使在拉丁裔空间内,非洲裔和土著拉丁裔的交叉经历也经常被扁平化和不可见。然而,我在波多黎各大学(University of Puerto Rico in mayagez)和德克萨斯州担任双语教师期间,经历了fogarat<s:1>的小众空间,在这种学习环境中,人们通过自己的身份感到活着,在那里,他们的语言和文化现实得到了授权,并被邀请使用多种语言。这些罕见的经历激发了我的好奇心,想要调查人们如何在K-16学习工程,以及如何设计包容性的学习环境,让人们利用自己的文化理解和语言来制定公平公正的工程解决方案(Lemmi &amp;佩雷斯,2024;psamez et al., 2024;佩雷斯和马维斯,记者;Secules et al., 2023)。我,María González-Howard,是德克萨斯大学奥斯汀分校的一名STEM教育副教授,这是一所最近被指定为西班牙裔服务机构的大型研究机构。我是一个出生在阿根廷的拉丁白人,在这个国家的许多语言和文化习俗中长大。Porque hablaba español en casa,我在美国的早期教育包括ESL课程,我记得我经常被带出教室,坐在一个小房间里,戴着耳机背诵英语单词和短语。因为我对学校的早期记忆包含了不完整和他者的感觉,所以我努力确保多语种学生在教育中获得更人性化和有意义的体验。我的奖学金线支持教师认识到多语言学生利用他们现有的和完整的语言库进行科学研究的出色方式(González-Howard, Andersen, et al., 2024)。特别是,我在基础科学方法课程中整合了译语理论和实践,以指导单语和多语职前教师对其语言取向提出问题,并尊重和支持多语学生在科学实践中的语言使用(Andersen et al., 2022;González-Howard, msamendez psamez, &amp;安徒生,2024)。我,恩里克(亨利)Suárez,是马萨诸塞大学阿默斯特分校的副教授,这是一所位于新英格兰的大型研究机构。我是一名白人拉丁裔,会说多种语言,是异性恋者、顺性者,没有残疾。我致力于通过肯定和建立少数族裔学生的语言、认知和文化资源,使科学学习环境更加公正。我的研究重点是幼儿如何使用他们的跨语言实践来理解物理现象(例如,Suárez, 2020;苏亚雷斯,Otero, 2024),以及如何支持单语和多语教师认识到学生的思想和语言的光辉,并以此为基础。这项工作的核心是我作为一名(受过西方培训的)天体物理学家的专业经验,这始于我的祖国委内瑞拉,跨越多个大洲,并建立在与多语种同事合作的基础上。这些经历促使我对学习环境中所谓“科学语言”的狭隘定义进行命名和拆除,特别是当这些限制性的观念将少数民族学生视为需要解决的问题时。作为STEM教育领域的跨语言学者,我们致力于描述我们在多语言社区中看到的超越语言规范概念或其单一符号系统的现象。在这一承诺中,我们希望改变语言少数的学生和他们的老师学习和参与科学和工程的方式,充分认识到大多数科学和工程教室的教学模式已经忽视、错误认识或完全排除了多语言学生用来了解世界和解决有意义的问题的无数语言实践。在我们的职业生涯中,我们已经看到了处于权力地位的人(例如,白人听力受试者;弗洛雷斯,罗莎,2015)导致他们错过了美丽,丰富,和未来的前景在多语言的灵巧导航和理解语言和文化之间的世界。然而,我们的研究,以及特刊作者的工作,继续表明,当仔细倾听和更广泛地观察时,我们可以更好地认识到多语种学生如何使用语言从事工程设计和理解周围自然世界的智能和复杂性。
本文章由计算机程序翻译,如有差异,请以英文原文为准。
Bienvenidos a la conversación: Examinations of translanguaging across science and engineering education research

In May 2023, the three of us met with Professor Emerita Ofelia García to share our goals for this Special Issue. Given her expertise in translanguaging, we asked if she would contribute a closing commentary. Noting our admiration of her and her colleagues' work over the past decade (García, 2011; García & Kleyn, 2016; García & Li, 2014; Otheguy et al., 2015) and the ways it has impacted our thinking and areas of research, Dr. García humbly expressed, “All I have done in my work is to describe what I have seen and observed as a way to deconstruct what others have done before.” Mirroring her seemingly simple, yet powerful statement, our vision for this Special Issue is to foster space for critical conversations within our frequently siloed disciplinary communities, where scholars can share observations they have made as a means to decolonize, and transform perspectives around language and the experiences of language-minoritized individuals in science and engineering education (García et al., 2021; Takeuchi et al., 2022). Further, in response to the increased interest in and uptake of translanguaging theory and pedagogy in STEM education research (e.g., Jakobsson et al., 2021; Pérez et al., 2022), this Special Issue was born out of our desire to understand whether there is—or could be and/or should be—consensus around what it means to engage in translanguaging practices, frameworks, and scholarship in science and engineering education.

The manuscripts in this Special Issue capture the different and robust ways in which translanguaging as theory and as pedagogy have been taken up by science and engineering researchers and educators from around the world who are working across grade levels and learning environments. From high school science classrooms in the Midwestern US (Bonilla & Morales-Doyle, this issue) to out-of-school science programs for refugees in Lebanon (Salloum, Debs, & BouJaoude, this issue) to kindergartners in Luxembourg (Siry, Wilmes, & Sportelli, this issue), these articles invite us to reckon with science and engineering education from a perspective that centers what individuals from language-minoritized backgrounds are capable of doing, figuring out, and understanding when their language-related resources and practices are viewed in expansive ways (González-Howard et al., 2023). In particular, the manuscripts highlight the brilliance and experiences of individuals who identify, or are identified, as multilingual because they use multiple named languages (e.g., Spanish, Portuguese, and Mandarin) in addition to English (González-Howard & Suárez, 2021), or as multidialectal because they use multiple varieties of the same named language (e.g., African American Vernacular English, Black English, Garifuna, and Caribbean Spanglish) (Baker-Bell, 2020; Degraff, 2005; García et al., 2024; Rickford, 2007). Aiming to foster learning between scholars, this Special Issue brings researchers into conversación, encouraging us to consider and reflect upon different conceptualizations of translanguaging and the ways they are being taken up across disciplinary spaces.

For the sake of clarity around how the three of us enter la conversación, we take a moment to present a definition of translanguaging from its origins within bi/multilingual education that aligns with our definition of this construct, and then share how we think the construct can contribute to realizing equitable science and engineering education. For the purposes of this Special Issue, we broadly define translanguaging as the deployment of a bi/multilingual speaker's full semiotic repertoire—which includes multimodal, multisensory, and multilingual elements—without regard for the socially and politically constructed boundaries of named languages, registers, and/or modalities. From this perspective, translanguaging asks researchers and educators to develop expansive perspectives on how minoritized individuals use language, for instance, to make meaning, interact socially, and achieve goals with others. It also asks us to move away from the idea that a bilingual/bidialectal person is made up of two monolinguals wrapped into one (García, 2011; García & Li, 2014). Instead, people have one complex semiotic system (i.e., their idiolect) that comprises multilingual, multimodal, and multisensory dimensions from which they draw upon and use different resources to communicate based on the context they are in (Li, 2018; Otheguy et al., 2015) and their audience (Bell, 2002). Moreover, a translanguaging perspective is inherently political as it questions and pushes back upon socially recognized categories, such as named languages or varieties of those that are privileged, which are intrinsically connected to power structures (e.g., Farsi, Spanish, English, high German), as more legitimate than others. Our conceptualization of translanguaging is not what some call “code-switching” because we, like García and Li (2014), reject the premise that there are codes to switch between. Instead, such moments are evidence of individuals fluidly laminating linguistic resources associated with different named languages to accomplish a specific goal (Suárez, 2020). In the context of science and engineering education, translanguaging can help us extend research and pedagogy that considers and values the heterogeneous nature of how learners share their ideas and engage with each other's thinking (e.g., Rosebery et al., 2010; Warren et al., 2020). Specifically, it offers a theoretical construct and an analytical tool to better study and explain how language-minoritized learners engage in meaning-making and/or design, interact with others, and problem-solve.

In addition to showcasing the different robust approaches to translanguaging, as well as presenting our rationale for why translanguaging is productive for us, we would like to offer some considerations for science and engineering education scholars who are interested in embarking on this kind of work. First, we critically heed caution from our research community about translanguaging theory and pedagogy becoming diluted. And by that, we mean being used as a catch-all phrase with no precise meaning and not being taken up to intentionally disrupt harmful, dominant discourses, ideologies, and practices (García et al., 2021; Li, 2023). We have seen this occur before with other theories and pedagogies that were originally proposed for accomplishing transformative work; as they gain popularity, many of their foundational principles are lost (e.g., culturally relevant, responsive, or sustaining pedagogy; Ladson-Billings, 2021). Proactively addressing this concern, we urged contributing authors of this Special Issue to explicitly define language and languaging (Li, 2018) in their work and to articulate whose language and languaging they examined and why. Moreover, we encouraged authors to situate themselves in their research. Who we are, which includes (but is not limited to) the language resources and practices we use across spaces, time, and with different audiences, influences how we experience the world. And for educational researchers, it impacts how we view, relate to, and make sense of others' language and languaging (Boveda & Annamma, 2023; Martínez & Mesinas, 2019; Ríos & Patel, 2023). Implicating ourselves in this process, we next offer some insight into our positionings related to language and languaging and describe how they affect our research and the work we did with this Special Issue. We then share our takeaways from reading this collection of manuscripts and conclude with suggested questions for readers to keep in mind as they engage with the Special Issue.

As previously noted, it is of utmost importance that we make our positionalities as researchers transparent, especially those of us who work in learning spaces where prevailing power structures minoritize and undervalue/devalue language practices that do not align with those used by white, Western, dominant language-speaking individuals (González-Howard & Suárez, 2021; Takeuchi et al., 2022). Like the authors whose work comprises this Special Issue, the three of us also represent a swath of intersecting identities, lived experiences, and positions of power (or lack thereof), all of which inform how we see the world, how we navigate the world, and how others view and interact with us in and out of academic spaces. This seemed particularly prescient for us to reflect upon, since all three of us contributed equally to the creation, managing, and finalizing of this Special Issue. For this reason, it is critical to situate ourselves in the work we have done, both as guest co-editors of this Special Issue and as researchers who are committed to making science and engineering education more equitable and just, especially for language-minoritized individuals (Pérez, 2022). We do not intend to simply list our identities as markers of so-called “insiders” (Merriam et al., 2001), but rather to wrestle with dynamics of power and knowledge production in relation to ourselves in science and engineering as disciplines and education (Boveda & Annamma, 2023; Martínez & Mesinas, 2019; Ríos & Patel, 2023). Moreover, the three of us have known each other for over a decade. We navigated graduate school and entered the early stages of our careers as faculty within institutions of higher education. Thus, our evolving positionings are informed by who we were, who we have become as individuals and as a collective, and our interactions with the US education system.

Yo, Greses Pérez, am an Assistant Professor of Engineering Education Research at Tufts University, a medium-sized private, Research 1, predominantly white institution in the Northeastern US. My relationship with language and engineering is informed by my experiences as a 1.5-generation Dominican-American, Black Latina, speaker of Caribbean Spanglish, civil engineer, and learning scientist. Most of my STEM professors were male English speakers, who rarely invited the systems of resources and practices of minoritized communities, but throughout my career, I have learned that even within Latinx spaces, the intersectional experiences of Afro and Indigenous Latines are often flattened and invisibilized. Yet, during my time at the University of Puerto Rico in Mayagüez and as a bilingual teacher in Texas, I experienced niche spaces of fogaraté, learning environments where people felt alive through who they were, where their full linguistic and cultural realities were empowered and invited in more than just one language. These rare experiences sparked my curiosity to investigate how people learn engineering in K-16 and how to design inclusive learning environments where people draw on their cultural understandings and language to develop equitable and just engineering solutions (Lemmi & Pérez, 2024; Pérez et al., 2024; Pérez & Marvez, in press; Secules et al., 2023).

I, María González-Howard, am an Associate Professor of STEM Education at The University of Texas at Austin, a large research institution recently designated as a Hispanic Serving Institution. I am a white Latina who was born in Argentina and raised with many linguistic and cultural practices common to that country. Porque hablaba español en casa, my early schooling in the US encompassed ESL programming, which I recall as me being frequently pulled out of class to sit in a small room while wearing headphones and repeating back English words and phrases. Because my early memories of school involved feelings of being incomplete and othered, I strive to ensure multilingual students receive more humane and meaningful experiences in education. My lines of scholarship center supporting teachers in recognizing the brilliant ways multilingual students use their existing and entire language repertoire for science (González-Howard, Andersen, et al., 2024). In particular, I integrate translanguaging theory and praxis in elementary science methods courses to guide monolingual and multilingual preservice teachers in problematizing their language orientations and honoring and supporting multilingual students' language use in science practices (Andersen et al., 2022; González-Howard, Méndez Pérez, & Andersen, 2024).

I, Enrique (Henry) Suárez, am an Associate Professor at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, a large Research institution in New England. I am a White Latino, multilingual, heterosexual, cisgender, and nondisabled, and I work to make science learning environments more just through affirming and building on minoritized students' linguistic, epistemic, and cultural resources. My scholarship focuses on how young children use their translanguaging practices to make sense of physical phenomena (e.g., Suárez, 2020; Suárez & Otero, 2024), as well as how to support mono- and multilingual teachers recognize and build on the brilliance of their students' ideas and languaging. Central to this work is my professional experience as a (Western-trained) astrophysicist, which began in my home country of Venezuela, spanned multiple continents, and was built on collaborating with multilingual colleagues. These experiences have pushed me to name and dismantle narrow definitions of what counts as “language of science” in learning environments, especially when these limiting perceptions construe minoritized students as needing fixing.

As translanguaging scholars in STEM education, we are committed to describing what we see in multilingual communities beyond normative conceptions of language or their unitary semiotic systems. Within this commitment lies our desire to transform how language-minoritized students and their teachers learn and participate in science and engineering, fully recognizing that the instructional models in most science and engineering classrooms have ignored, misrecognized, or outright excluded the myriad language practices that multilingual students draw upon for figuring out the world and solving meaningful problems. Throughout our careers, we have seen how the listening practices of people in positions of power (e.g., white listening subjects; Flores & Rosa, 2015) have led them to miss the beauty, richness, and future outlook in the dexterity of multilinguals to navigate and make sense of the world between languages and cultures. Yet, our research, as well as the work of the Special Issue authors, continue to show that, when listening closely and noticing more expansively, we can better recognize the intelligence and complexity in how multilingual students' use language to engage in engineering design and to understand the natural world around them. The 10 manuscripts included in this Special Issue align with this commitment and desire.

To further situate these manuscripts, we briefly offer an account of the work that went into developing this Special Issue. After publishing our call for abstracts in Fall 2022 (Pérez et al., 2022), we received 40 1000-word extended abstracts from scholars across 10 countries whose work focused on language-minoritized learners in science and engineering education. The authors of 15 of these abstracts were invited to submit their full manuscripts within 6 months. After an extensive and rigorous review process, which entailed multiple rounds of reviews and revisions, 10 manuscripts were accepted in this collection.

Through a reflective and critical examination of language in science and engineering education contexts, this Special Issue serves as a platform to motivate a broader conversación about the importance and the nuances of engaging in research, practice, and policy to critically address language and/or languaging through the lens of translanguaging theory and pedagogy (García & Li, 2014; Li, 2018; Otheguy et al., 2015). The works presented in this collection highlight the dexterity and brilliance of language-minoritized individuals' communicative resources and practices. They also shed light on the various lenses used by educational researchers who draw upon translanguaging to engage with the language resources and practices of these communities. Though different aspects are sure to stand out to readers as they engage with this Special Issue, here we present three takeaways that are salient to us: (1) languaging in science and engineering education is political, (2) translanguaging uncovers existing power structures within language and languaging, and (3) intersectional identities are critical to addressing language. As we describe each takeaway, we weave in and elevate representative manuscripts from this Special Issue. Though we mention only a few manuscripts per takeaway, we invite readers to consider how these ideas cut across the entire collection.

This Translanguaging Special Issue intends to capture possible pathways around what it can look like to engage in translanguaging theory and pedagogy in science and engineering education research, rather than to represent a singular final destination. We hope this collection of articles serves as the beginning of a long conversación between scholars from various disciplinary spaces, a conversación that helps us grapple with and crystallize views around what we mean by language and languaging in science and engineering. Moreover, returning to Dr. Ofelia García's remarks from the opening of this commentary, we hope this conversación pushes us to develop and use more critical and expansive framings to better observe, deconstruct, and support the brilliant ways language-minoritized individuals engage with others, for instance, in scientific sensemaking, design processes, and engineering problem-solving.

With these questions in mind, we now welcome you to engage with this collection of manuscripts. All offer unique examinations of translanguaging across equity-oriented science and engineering education research. ¡Bienvenidos a la conversación!

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来源期刊
Journal of Research in Science Teaching
Journal of Research in Science Teaching EDUCATION & EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH-
CiteScore
8.80
自引率
19.60%
发文量
96
期刊介绍: Journal of Research in Science Teaching, the official journal of NARST: A Worldwide Organization for Improving Science Teaching and Learning Through Research, publishes reports for science education researchers and practitioners on issues of science teaching and learning and science education policy. Scholarly manuscripts within the domain of the Journal of Research in Science Teaching include, but are not limited to, investigations employing qualitative, ethnographic, historical, survey, philosophical, case study research, quantitative, experimental, quasi-experimental, data mining, and data analytics approaches; position papers; policy perspectives; critical reviews of the literature; and comments and criticism.
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