Not a First Language but One Repertoire

Translanguaging as a Decolonizing Project

Bibliographic Data

ID23330899
AuthorsLi Wei (0000-0002-2015-7262, UCL Institute of Education, University College London, UK, corresponding author), Oreto García (0000-0002-1405-9965, The Graduate Center, CUNY), Ofelia García (The Graduate Center, City University of New York, New York, New York, USA)
Year2022
Volume53
Issue2
Pages313-324
Publication date2022-08-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueRELC Journal (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0033-6882 • E-ISSN: 1745-526X
PublisherSAGE Publications (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/00336882221092841
OpenAlexW4223995740
LanguageEN
Citations received215
References cited24

Translanguaging has opened up spaces to recognize the dynamic multilingualism of students in classrooms taught in dominant languages, and problematized concepts such as ‘additive bilingualism’. This article aims to further explore two issues that remain little understood. First, translanguaging is often seen as simply the acknowledgement or use of multilingual students’ ‘first language’. This article clarifies that this is a misunderstanding, for the trans- in translanguaging connotes the transcendence of named languages, the going beyond named languages as have been socially constructed. Second, in going beyond named languages, translanguaging is also intended as a decolonizing project, revealing how bilinguals inhabit a world with different knowledge bases and linguistic/cultural practices. We use two bilingual students, in London and New York City respectively, to show how they are viewed and listened to by their teachers as bilinguals with two ‘incomplete’ linguistic systems because each element in their language/semiotic repertoire is seen as a separate entity. We then weave all the elements together to provide a fuller picture of these students. In doing so, we reject raciolinguistic ideologies that have enregistered them as deficient and instead regard them through a translanguaging lens. The article emphasizes the importance of understanding translanguaging as a unitary repertoire, as well as its decolonial potential in education as teachers abandon the focus on named standardized languages and engage fully with their students’ full repertoire of features and meanings.

Linguistics · Literature · Multilingualism · Neuroscience of multilingualism · Pedagogy · Repertoire · Sociology · Translanguaging · EFL/ESL Teaching and Learning · Multilingual Education and Policy · Philosophy · Second Language Learning and Teaching

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