Envisioning TESOL through a Translanguaging Lens

To respond to the multilingual turn in language education, this volume constitutes a challenge to the traditional, monolingual, and native speakerism paradigm in the field of Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) through a translanguaging lens. The chapters offer complex global perspectives – with contributions from five continents – to open critical conversations on how to conceptualize and implement translanguaging in teacher education and classrooms of various contexts. The researchers exhibit a shared commitment to transforming TESOL profession that values teachers’ and learners’ full linguistic repertoires. This volume should prove a valuable resource for students, teachers, and researchers interested in English teaching and learning, applied linguistics, second language acquisition, and social justice.                         

Zhongfeng Tian is an Assistant Professor of TESL Teacher Education/Applied Linguistics at the University of Texas at San Antonio, USA. His research interests include bi/multilingualism, bilingual education, translanguaging, TESOL, teacher education, and critical pedagogies. He was a former English teacher in China, Cambodia, and the U.S. He has co-edited a special issue entitled "Positive Synergies: Translanguaging and Critical Theories in Education" with Holly Link for the Translation and Translanguaging in Multilingual Contexts (TTMC) journal.Laila Aghai is an Assistant Professor of TESOL/ELL Education and the Director of the Indigenous Language Education Program at the University of North Dakota, USA. As a language educator, she has taught English as a second and foreign language in the U.S. and overseas. Her research is focused on TESOL, translanguaging, applied linguistics, multilingual education, and language ideologies. She serves on the editorial board of the Journal of Language, Identity and Education. Peter Sayer is an Associate Professor of Language Education Studies at the Ohio State University, USA. His work in the U.S. and Mexico focuses on TESOL, bilingual education, sociolinguistics, and language education policy. He is the author of Tensions and Ambiguities in English Language Teaching (2012, Routledge). He is a former Fulbright Scholar to Mexico where he was a lead consultant to the Mexican Ministry of Education for the National English Program in Primary Schools. He is currently the editor of the TESOL Journal.Jamie L. Schissel is Associate Professor, TESOL at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, USA. Jamie’s research centers on equity in relation to educational policies and assessments in participatory action research projects with linguistically and culturally diverse communities in the United States, Mexico, and Peru. Her book Social Consequences of Testing for Language-minoritized Bilinguals in the United States (Multilingual Matters) was published in 2019. She has served as a co-editor of the special issue “The Construct of Multilingualism in Language Testing” for Language Assessment Quarterly (December, 2019).