Doctoral Dissertation Research: Educational experiences of youth heritage speakers

A person’s spoken language variety affects many aspects of their life, one of them being the educational experience and school trajectory. The variety a student uses may affect their academic success, especially when the variety is considered non-standard. For example, a student may fail a language test for using non-standard expressions that are generally considered wrong in spite of being valid dialectal variations of their language. Because Puerto Rican Spanish often diverges from normative Spanish, US high school students who use this variety as a heritage language may experience discrimination or be subject to certain ideologies around their language. This doctoral dissertation project examines and describes the language uses and ideologies of teen heritage speakers of Puerto Rican Spanish, in order to understand how these practices are tied to their educational experiences. Gathering linguistic data from sociolinguistic interviews and focus groups, this research project has four overarching goals: 1.) to understand the extent to which teen heritage speakers of Puerto Rican Spanish use well-documented features of this language variety, a stigmatized dialect 2.) to understand their own language ideologies and those of others around their Spanish 3.) to explore the teens’ perceived academic experiences related to Spanish, and 4.) to examine the connections between the use of features, ideologies and perceived academic experiences. The research provides an understanding of how students’ linguistic practices may affect their educational experiences and success as well as providing suggestions for practical applications. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.