Culturally Responsive Schooling for Indigenous Mexican Students - (Bilingual Education & Bilingualism) by William Perez & Rafael Vásquez (Paperback)

About the Book

This book uncovers the social and educational experiences of young Indigenous immigrants in the US. Highlighting the multilingual and multicultural diversity of Latin American immigrants, it explores how policymakers and educators can effectively support Indigenous students' multilingualism, ethnic identity development and educational success.

Book Synopsis

This book uncovers the social and educational experiences of young Indigenous immigrants in the US. Highlighting the multilingual and multicultural diversity of Latin American immigrants, it explores how policymakers and educators can effectively support Indigenous students' multilingualism, ethnic identity development and educational success.

Review Quotes

Culturally Responsive Schooling for Indigenous Mexican Students is a valuable contribution to the field of education, and it is a must-read for educators in California and any educator in other contexts involved with Indigenous students. The book can serve as a tool to correct monocultural and monolingual misconceptions about Mexican immigrants. It can also serve as a foundation for understanding transcultural, translingual, and transnational identities [...] It is an essential read for educators, policymakers, and researchers dedicated to advancing diversity and inclusion in education.

'They don't understand us.' This should be a subtitle to this important contribution. This volume is a must read for all present and future educators in California and any educator that is involved with indigenous students throughout the Americas. The qualitative/personal experience divulged by students is enlightening, sometimes educationally embarrassing for our profession, but, at the same time highly informative for any of us who care about educational equity.

In our contemporary and complex socio-political-historical contexts of both hope and contestation, Perez and Vásquez have provided practitioners, scholars and policymakers with profound, rich and authentic translingual, transcultural and transborder perspectives from and about Zapotec, Mixtec, and P'urhépecha youth. This book is certain to become a seminal resource for decades to come.

Perez and Vásquez offer a detailed two-year study that combines quantitative and qualitative data, which will enable readers to gain insights into how these youths cope with the big challenges of immigration, anti-indigeneity and linguicism. Written in a friendly style, the book includes illustrative maps, examples, and a final glossary that complements and enriches the exposition [...] they examine in-depth cases that feature students' voices through compelling narratives of need and struggle, and enumerate some positive experiences from previous studies, which will inspire practitioners and administrators.

The most pertinent issue raised in Perez and Vásquez's book relates to bilingual and ESL teachers' unawareness of Indigenous students' emerging trilingualism as well as not understanding the cognitive shift some Indigenous students face when coming from an oral culture into a written culture. Therefore, this book is highly recommended for study in teacher education programs - especially in bilingual education programs - as well as for Indigenous studies, Latinx studies, and immigration studies programs.

Culturally Responsive Schooling for Indigenous Mexican Students provides important insights into how these youth must navigate not just the typical challenges of (im)migration, but also deep-seated anti-indigeneity and linguicism both in Mexico and in the U.S. This meticulously researched and compellingly written book is a welcome and important contribution to multiple disciplines.

About the Author

William Perez is Professor in the School of Education at Loyola Marymount University, USA. His research is centered in multilingualism and Indigenous studies and he is particularly interested in the experience of undocumented students, Latinx undocumented youth civic engagement and Latinx higher education access.

Rafael Vásquez is Chief Behavioral Scientist at the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health and Vice President of the Board of Directors for the Mixteco Indígena Community Organizing Project. He conducts research on academic persistence, community engagement and development, diversity and social justice and youth identity development.