In this article, the author offers the example of a collegelevel writing course exploring Mexican foodways in the United States as a way to consider the "funds of knowledge" Latinx students, and all students, can use to explore communities. He argues that in a globally connected and multilingual world, the influence of foodways across…

The dismissal of students' backgrounds by the educational system has a deep effect on communities of color, perpetuating a system that sets them up for academic failure. Maori scholar Linda Tuhiwai Smith (2012) created terminology for the process of systematic fragmentation, which she describes as an act of dismissal on a macro-level. This article…

Initial research has documented the ill treatment suffered by Mexican indigenous students in U.S. schools. Using a framework of transnational teacher education, we examined the impact of field practice in an indigenous area of Mexico on teacher candidates. Candidates showed growth in new understandings, such as their role as bilingual teachers in…

In response to the banning of Mexican American Studies in Tucson, students in the newly formed Chican@ Literature, Art, and Social Studies program displayed their resiliency in the face of the oppressive actions of the Tucson Unified School District and the state of Arizona. This article serves as a platform for the voices of these dedicated youth…

To demonstrate the significance of cultural crossings in Texas and how cultural exchanges can inform teachers and students in the areas of history, fine arts, geography, and social studies, the author constructed a Summer 2013 teacher workshop for Texas K-12 teachers through the Smithsonian Affiliated Institute of Texan Cultures. The author…

Public school curriculum battles offer great examples for illustrating how politics saturates education policy, particularly in the State of Texas. However, Arizona has emerged as another peculiar contender in contemporary battles to control high school curricula. Curriculum battles have deep historical roots in Arizona and elsewhere that go…

In this article the authors draw from culturally responsive teaching and multicultural education to describe performance poetry as an effective strategy for validating secondary aged Latino youths' lived experiences. Supported by teacher modeling and the incorporation of community poets, students created and shared their own powerful poems that…

In March 2009, the author accompanied 19 university students to El Paso, Texas, for an alternative spring break (ASB). The author and the students traveled to the urban zip code with the lowest per capita income in the country to study U.S.-Mexico border issues. In the ASB program's language, they sought to gain "new perspectives on social…

This paper represents a series of reflections on collective and individual efforts of diverse women scholars to reconcile alternative views of scholarship within the academy. We document our collective experience with embedding the concept of the "scholarship of engagement" in our practice of research, teaching, and service through a process of…

Across all fields of psychology within the United States, many mental health and educational professionals involved in the assessment of school-age children are not members of a minority population. As a result, these professionals are unfamiliar with the diverse cultural and linguistic characteristics of the individuals that they serve. This…

A bilingual/bicultural education program at P.S. 72 in New York City's Spanish Harlem teaches students to read and write in Spanish first; no written English is introduced until the spring semester of second grade. (Author/MLF)

Discusses the way that the concept of biculturalism was conveyed in a Title VII elementary school classroom with Mexican American and Anglo students. Holds that the concept of culture was oversimplified, emphasizing regalia (flags, posters, etc.), and obscuring social processes such as racial discrimination. (GC)

Describes the holiday celebration of Dia de los Muertos at Pacific Oaks Children's School in Los Angeles. Considers the decision to celebrate the holiday, preparation for the celebration, its place in the curriculum, its relationship to Halloween, adult conflicts related to personal religious values, children's misunderstanding of the rituals, and…

This anthology of contemporary fiction and poetry by Hispanic American women writers contains material ranging from national award winners to emerging talents. Noting that until recently 20th-century academic literary criticism described ethnic American literature as parochial and politically driven, the anthology's introduction discusses how the…

This booklet integrates 9 stories from the multicultural southwestern United States, 90 photographs of a storyteller telling the stories, and running sidebars where the storyteller gives hints and secrets to parents, educators, and would-be storytellers. The photographs in the booklet capture the storyteller in the remarkable poses that make him…