Applied Linguistics Department

Dr. Jennifer Sclafani has received a Policy Across Disciplines Award from the John W. McCormack School for Policy and Global Studies and the College of Liberal Arts at UMass Boston to engage in interdisciplinary research with colleague Dr. Peter Federman, Assistant Professor of Public Policy and Public Affairs. The $10,000 grant will fund their research project, “Investigating Policy Discourse and Dialogue: Housing Insecurity and Substance Abuse at the (Literal) Intersection of Mass and Cass.”In this project, Sclafani and Federman will incorporate critical sociolinguistic and public policy perspectives to examine how public discourse informs policy implementation and outcomes related to Boston’s housing and public health crises, with an eye toward illuminating effective ways to strategically communicate urban policy initiatives in response to these problems. The ultimate goal of their project is to improve policy making practices not only in local government, but in cities across the US with populations undergoing similar hardships related to mental health, substance use, and lack of housing. 

The Department of Applied Linguistics is proud to announce that Rosiane de Oliveira successfully defended her dissertation “Heritage Language Maintenance, Language Socialization, and Family Language Policy: An Ethnographic Case Study of a Trilingual Family” on Tuesday, March 26th. Being an amazing storyteller, Rosiane beautifully presented her study that involved the ethnographic approach of a trilingual family.

Dissertation Committee: Jennifer Sclafani (chair), Avary Carhill-Poza, Shulamit Kopeliovich

Abstract: Today, about 350 languages are spoken and signed in the United States, many of which are heritage languages (HL). A HL is a language to which a speaker has an ethnic, historical, or sentimental connection. This dissertation reports on an ethnographic case study on the language and literacy socialization practices of one trilingual family (English, Spanish, Portuguese) in their efforts to maintain Portuguese as their HL. The analysis of data focuses on three themes: (1) HLM activities during their religious practices; (2) the emotions connected to HLM; and (3) the family’s HLM practices when they travel to Brazil. Through a qualitative analysis of participant observation fieldnotes, interviews, and video recorded interactions as the family engages in heritage language socialization practices at home, in their community, and during travel to visit extended family in Brazil, I examine specific discourse strategies employed by the family in their maintenance efforts, giving attention to the linguistic, cultural, and religious ideologies that influence their communicative strategies. The findings expand knowledge and increase awareness on the topic of language socialization, cultural assimilation, and family language policy (FLP) in connection with HLM since family language negotiation strategies exert an undeniable impact on the outcome of HLM. Finally, this contribution also highlights the need for HL families, and all involved in HLM to recognize the emotions, attitudes, and language ideologies of heritage language speakers to fully harness their knowledge and aspirations. 

Dr. Gounari and Ph.D. candidate Minh Nghia Nguyen, from the Applied Linguistics Department, delivered a presentation titled “The Discourse of Necropolitics: A Critical Multimodal Discourse Analysis of Vietnam War Commemoration” at AAAL in Houston on March 18th. Their presentation involved an analysis of historical photographs featured in U.S.-published magazines, employing multimodal critical discourse analysis to examine how the Vietnam War (or the Second Indochina War or American War in Vietnam) was depicted in the United States. These images portrayed themes of life and death, celebration and despair, and the named and unnamed, clearly contrasting Vietnam with the U.S. The discussion revolved around how these contrasting images were produced and how they guided public perception.

Iuliia Fakhrutdinova, a Ph.D. candidate in the Applied Linguistics Department, presented her topic at the Highlighted Session: Higher and adult education in the context of global migration hosted by the Comparative and International Education Society on Tuesday, March 12th. The presentation was titled Critical Ecological Perspective on the Negotiated Identities of a Refugee-background Woman during Resettlement.

For specific information, including conference details, program information, and her abstract, please refer to the link provided.

UMass Applied Linguistics is going to AERA 2024 to present a range of cutting-edge and justice-oriented research on working with immigrant multilingual learners, pedagogy of storytelling literacy, subtractive language policies, and multilingual education policy. Please, find our mini program for AERA 2024 below, and see you in sunny Philadelphia!

On March 1, 2024, Vannessa Quintana Sarria and Iuliia Fakhrutdinova, who are doctoral doctorates in the Applied Linguistics Department, presented their JLAP project at the 37th National Convention of Alpha Mu Gamma. The event, titled Creating Connections Through Languages in the 21st Century, was hosted by the Nu Alpha Chapter at the College of DuPage. The JLAP project was created by Dr. Jennifer Sclafani and brought to life by Dr. Jennifer Sclafani, Dr. Panagiota Gounari, Vannessa, and Iuliia.

Their presentation centered on the Justice Language Action Project (JLAP), a project aimed at professional and curricular development. JLAP’s mission is to foster critical language awareness among elementary, middle, and high school students in the Boston area. This is achieved through collaborations with teachers who have completed coursework in the UMass Boston graduate program in Applied Linguistics, as part of their training for the Massachusetts ESL licensure.

Also, there were other significant presentations and interactions involving both current and former APLING students. Brian Kapustka, a student in the MA program, not only moderated the talk given by Iuliia and Vannessa but also gave his own presentation on Neurodiversifying Language Instruction, alongside his colleague from College of DuPage, Learning Technologist Lara Tompkins. Naomi Rockenbaugh, who recently earned her MA from UMB APLING, gave a presentation on Translanguaging as an Approach to FL learning.

Iuliia Fakhrutdinova, a doctoral candidate in the Applied Linguistics Department, recently published an article, Towards Critical Dialogue with Refugee-Background Students, in the latest volume of MATSOL Currents. Utilizing Critical Pedagogy and Critical Race Theory as the primary theoretical foundation in her classroom, she detailed her shift towards an asset-oriented approach when working with refugee-background and immigrant multilingual students. Specifically, she shared a unit plan that incorporates media texts, books, art, and stories created by refugee-background students, providing adaptable resources for teachers in various contexts.

To access the recent MATSOL Currents, please click here. Additionally, you can find her course materials shared on Padlet by checking here.

MATSOL (Massachusetts Association of Teachers of Speakers of Other Languages) represents a professional community of educators working with multilingual learners in Massachusetts. For more information on membership, conferences, and Special Interest Groups, please visit this link for relevant details.

UMass Applied Linguistics is proudly represented at AAAL 2024 by sixteen emergent and senior scholars with over 20 presentations on a wide range of issues across several strands. Attached please find our mini program for AAAL 2024. We will also be hosting our alumni recruitment event on Sunday at 7 PM following the plenary talk. Please, join us for conversation and community in a celebratory gathering. Fill out the form by scanning a QR code if you are interested in joining us in Houston, TX. Looking forward to seeing you all in superdiverse Houston!

Jacqueline S. Campo, a second-year Ph.D. student in Applied Linguistics, presented her topic at the Indigenous Learning Forum hosted by the American Philosophical Society on February 15. The presentation was titled “From the Andes to Lima: Narratives of Indigenous Quechua Migrants and Their Internal Migration Trajectory.”

From this talk, she discussed the internal migration patterns of Quechua indigenous people from the Peruvian Andes to Lima, Peru’s capital, in search of improved access to social, educational, and economic resources—a common mobility pattern in the country. The focus is on the Leticia community, where a sizable Quechua population faces systematic discrimination based on their origins and the geographical location of their neighborhood in Lima.

By presenting the geographical features and the cultural artifacts of indigenous groups, she underscored the significance of comprehending how the Quechua population, having migrated to Lima, interprets their experiences and indigeneity. This pertains to their construction of narratives about migration to Lima and involves an examination of how their internal migration trajectory influences their sense of self and cultural practices.

Dr. Jennifer Sclafani has received a College of Liberal Arts Pedagogical Innovation Award for the new course she is offering this spring, APLING 697: Sociolinguistic Research Methods. The course provides students with practical experience in data collection and analytic techniques used to explore connections between language, diversity, and place, as they collaborate in conducting original sociolinguistic research in the communities of Greater Boston.

The grant will be used to fund students’ research activities as they conduct ethnographic fieldwork, document linguistic landscapes, and conduct interviews with Boston residents. Questions they are exploring include: How does the multilingual linguistic landscape of Boston today reflect the social and immigration history of the city? What are the myths and realities of the “Boston accent”? How has the Boston dialect changed over time? What are Bostonians’ understandings of and attitudes about the languages spoken in their communities and schools?

The class will create educational materials to share their findings with the public at the end of the semester, including a poster for Healey Library and a video for the Applied Linguistics Department website.