Gendered Identities and Immigrant Language Learning

Julia Menard-Warwick is an Associate Professor in the Linguistics department at University of California Davis, where she teaches graduate and undergraduate classes in areas such as language pedagogy, second language literacy and technology, and language and gender.  Before beginning doctoral studies in 1999, she taught ESL for ten years at a community college in Washington state (USA), and for one year at a university in Nicaragua. Her on-going research focuses on language pedagogies, bilingual development, cultural identities, and language ideologies in both US and Latin American contexts.

Humorous and irreverent, embarrassed and frustrated, angry and grateful, the participants in Menard-Warwick’s study emerge as real people on the pages of this engaging and compassionate book that privileges immigrants’ voices and experiences. Investigating the complex interplay between gender, class, ethnicity, and immigration status, Menard-Warwick revitalizes the inquiry into the relationship between gender, power, and second language and literacy learning and makes important connections between sociolinguistic theory and adult ESL teaching practice.

• Chapter One: The Social Context of Immigrant Language LearningChapter Two: Second Language Learning as Gendered PracticeChapter Three: Gendered Narratives of Immigrant Language LearnersChapter Four: The Sociohistorical Construction of Parental Involvement in EducationChapter Five: Gendered Positioning in ESL Classroom ActivitiesChapter Six: Changing Gender Ideologies in Local CommunitiesChapter Seven: Gendered Identities and Language Learning: Continuing the DialogueReferencesAppendix A: Discourse transcription conventionsAppendix B: Focal participants’ demographicsAppendix C: Data collected on participants