Bilingual and Literacy Studies Faculty Publications

“No les está mixteando”: Mexicano Bilingual Teachers’ and Immigrant Parents’ Constructions of Bilingual Identity in the U.S.

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

8-2025

Abstract

U.S. language policies, influenced by ideologies around the value of English and Spanish, have precluded bilingual language and identity development for generations of Mexicano families. Drawing on literature exploring identity, raciolinguistic perspectives of competency and bilingual identities in practice, we explore understandings of bilingual identity among two education stakeholder groups who play a key role in bilingual advocacy: U.S. Mexicano bilingual teachers (MBTs) and Mexicano immigrant parents (MIPs). Findings suggest that both groups drew on ideas of competence, standardization and parallel monolingualism in understanding bilingual identity, leaving the notion of a “balanced bilingual” as an idealized goal. Yet, MBTs saw pedagogical value in translingual practices that leveraged bilingual identities in the classroom, while parents preferred stronger boundaries between each language for children’s academic benefit and ensuring Spanish language and Mexicano cultural maintenance. This has implications for building authentic home–school relationships that see bilingual development as a shared endeavor.

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© 2025 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.

https://www.tandfonline.com/share/QD9BNSN27IZKXKK4NIIC?target=10.1080/15348458.2025.2539812

Publication Title

Journal of Language, Identity & Education

DOI

10.1080/15348458.2025.2539812

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