Feeling grammarlessness: developing Critical Language Awareness (CLA) in advanced Spanish grammar and linguistics courses for Latinxs

Abstract

This paper examines the impact of a curriculum designed to develop students’ Critical Language Awareness (CLA) in two postsecondary Spanish advanced grammar courses and a Hispanic Linguistics Master’s course in a public institution of the US Northeast. The study includes a unique population of Latinxs, most of them born and raised outside the US, in the Dominican Republic. Quantitative analyses reveal CLA development in the areas of language variation, linguistic diversity, language ideologies, Spanish in the US, bilingualism, and translanguaging. Qualitative data shows that students approached the course experiencing linguistic insecurity and interrogating their own academic knowledge of grammar, whereas, after taking the course, learners move from feeling “grammarless” (students’ perception of their Spanish as lacking grammar) to understanding linguistic structures, the sociopolitical nature of language, and developing agency as future language teachers.

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