This edited volume combines theoretical insight with ethnographic examples to investigate how schools in multilingual and multicultural settings develop strategies for successful pedagogy and development. The book addresses this issue from various standpoints: language policies, classroom practices, and theories of learning and socialization. The volume provides a broad overview of how schools incorporate multiple languages into their curricula and educational practices, illustrated with several chapters that present detailed case studies. The volume's editors unite the book around the idea that multilingualism is a beneficial and desired yet difficult and fraught component of education.
The book addresses “Pedagogies, values and schools” with an overview of multilingual pedagogies in culturally specific contexts. Jim Cummins introduces the concept of “identity investment,” stressing that students must be exposed to multilingual texts that portray their cultural identities in an affirming manner. The remaining chapters in this section present three case studies: the introduction of a class on world languages and cultures in a diverse French elementary school, language shift among Native American high school students, and the effects of educational promotion of minority languages in an autonomous Basque region. Each chapter describes how a successful school policy engendered an appreciation for non-majority languages in the school and community.
The following section, “Extending formal instructional spaces,” describes how educators can promote the values and benefits of multilingualism outside the classroom, with parents and in the school's community. One chapter describes a campaign in Wales that successfully promoted the pedagogical, cultural, and economic advantages of second language acquisition to a community that eschewed Welsh language learning in favor of English. The other chapter addresses how schools in Chiapas, Mexico relegated indigenous languages to a subordinate position within schools. In response, the community formed grassroots movements and autonomous schools that teach their languages and promote the acquisition of indigenous languages across Mexico.
In “Tensions between multiple realities,” the authors highlight frequent difficulties and setbacks in the quest to make schools more welcoming to the presence and instruction of multiple languages. One chapter explores how the pervasive ideology of monolingual nation-states stigmatizes the presence of nonstandard languages in schools worldwide. Another chapter focuses on how assessment testing in the United States further condemns nonnative English speakers by falsely blaming their supposed lack of English skills for low test scores. The final chapter illustrates that the lack of political will hindered the distribution of resources necessary to create bilingual schools in newly independent Botswana.
“Negotiating policies of implementation” includes an assessment of how well American schools truly serve students whose first language is not English. Another chapter addresses multilingual educational policies in Latin America, particularly as they pertain to indigenous communities. The book's final chapter contends that India's educational system has not adequately responded to the country's very multilingual population without marginalizing certain languages. Like the other chapters in the volume, this article effectively demonstrates that competent and culturally sensitive multilingual education is beneficial for students and nations alike.
