We’re proud to highlight the recent presentation of one of our brilliant PhD candidates, Tina Randall, at the 2025 American Association for Applied Linguistics (AAAL) Conference in Denver!

Her talk, titled “Tu situación es diferente a la mía”: Relational Accountability in Heritage Language Research, shared critical insights from her dissertation study, which seeks to advance both social and linguistic justice through equitable research practices with Spanish heritage language (SHL) speakers by raising consciousness about the right to HL education in areas of low concentrations of Spanish speakers. Centering around the concept of relational accountability (Wilson, 2008; Smith, 2013), she discussed ways in which researchers and participants (first generation Spanish-speaking immigrants to the United States and second generation SHL learners) position themselves as multilingual speakers and negotiate their identities in interaction. The study suggests ways in which researchers can better position themselves as partners in heritage language research and provides a better understanding of how interview practices with minoritized populations may be improved by applying relational accountability principles.

Congratulations Tina on this presentation and the meaningful contributions you are making!