B3 Linguistics
Demography and Language Variation
Dr. Guy Bailey is the founding President of The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley. He is also a sociolinguist. He continues to do research on language change and variation. He is the author of over 100 books and articles, and his research has been featured in a front-page article in the New York Times, on National Public Radio, on CNN Headline News, on BBC Radio, in Texas Monthly, and in the San Antonio Express News. Since 1984, Bailey has brought in over $1 million in external funding for his research.
Spring 2024
Teaching Philosophy Classes in Spanish or Bilingually at UTRGV
Roughly 90% of UTRGV students are Hispanic or Latino/a/x and the majority are bilingual. As professional philosophers, we believe that teaching UTRGV students should involve engaging them as the bilingual and bicultural students they are while helping them develop philosophical biliteracy. Our panelists are from different linguistic and cultural backgrounds (native speaker, heritage speaker, L2 speaker) but all of us are bilingual, bicultural, and biliterate faculty who recently won a grant from the American Philosophical Association (APA) to design and teach philosophy courses in Spanish or Bilingually. Each of us has moved toward strong forms of bilingual education, from “a classroom where bilingual [students] are present but bilingualism is not promoted” to “a classroom where formal instruction fosters bilingualism” (Baker and Wright 2021). Moreover, we are developing these courses in ways that are linguistically and culturally sustaining for our local Mexican American community. Our panelists will discuss why and how we are doing this, the impact these classes have had on both us and our students, and the implications for disciplines like Philosophy and Linguistics.
Dr. Alex Stehn is Professor of Philosophy and Interim Director of the Center for Bilingual Studies at UTRGV. His most recent publication on B3 teaching is “Philosophizing in Tongues: Cultivating Bilingualism, Biculturalism, and Biliteracy in an Introduction to Latin American Philosophy Course” (2022).
Dr. Cynthia Paccacerqua is Associate Professor of Philosophy. A Baltimore native who spent her formative years in Rosario Argentina, she earned her MA in Latin American Studies at Stanford and PhD in Philosophy from SUNY Stony Brook. Dr. Paccacerqua specializes in social, political, and cultural philosophy within the traditions of Western, Latina-o, feminist, and Latin American/Decolonial Philosophy. She has published original work and translations in both the English and Spanish languages and is currently teaching a graduate bilingual course on Gloria Anzaldúa's work.
Dr. Danny Marrero’s academic and professional trajectory has been inspired by the fascinating issues that arise at the intersection between Law and Philosophy. As a native from Colombia, his first language is Spanish, but he has taught both English and Spanish in a variety of universities across both North and South America. At UTRGV, his teaching and research include culturally relevant issues such as feminicidio as well as classes in Spanish such as Pensamiento Crítico.
Dr. Christopher Gomez has been a lecturer at UTRGV for the past 6 years where he has taught, in Spanish and bilingually Introducción a la Filosofía, and Filosofía LatinoAmericana. He has published in Spanish on Mexican philosophy, and his current research draws from Gloria Anzaldua’s work.
Dr. Dahlia Guzman is a Lecturer in Philosophy. As a native of Rio Grande Valley, she is proud of the unique heritage of this area and enjoys living and teaching in a place that straddles two cultures, two languages, and two ways of understanding the world.
Title: Assessing Bilingual and Spanish Language Courses at UTRGV
Abstract: This study assesses student success and student perspectives in bilingual and Spanish language courses taught at UTRGV. The study incorporates quantitative analyses of GPA and course evaluations as well as qualitative analyses of student surveys. Findings show higher GPAs and course evaluations in bilingual/Spanish courses. Most current students are extremely satisfied with these courses, would take more courses, would recommend these courses to other students, and think the university should offer more bilingual/Spanish courses. Students also experience strengthened language skills, connection to family, community, and culture, a sense of belonging and affective factors, heightened cultural competency, impact on future career and serving Spanish speaking populations, and pride in bilingualism.
Title: Linguistic Inclusivity in Teaching and Learning across Disciplines: Exploring Linguistic Ideologies and Identities through Student-Faculty Partnerships
Abstract: Institutions of higher education and the education system in general often privilege Standard American English as the language of communication and instruction. We inadvertently stifle multilingual students’ learning, meaning-making, and communicative potential, and we stifle our own abilities to use our linguistic abilities as we learn with our students. We will explore how implicit linguistic bias prevails in educational spaces and how we can challenge them. We can all work collectively to build more just spaces across disciplines, professions, and communities by 1. reflecting on and identifying our own linguistic bias and how we may be contributing to English-only ideologies in education and 2. identifying a concrete action we can take today to center sense of belonging in teaching and learning spaces for all students’ linguistically diverse background, knowledge, and communicative practices.
Ryan McBride is a graduate student pursuing a Master of Arts in English with a concentration in Linguistics. He received his Bachelor of Arts in English with a concentration in Linguistics from UTRGV in Spring 2023. Since Fall 2021, he has been a student partner in the Students as Learners and Teachers at a Hispanic Serving Institution (SaLT HSI) program. As a student partner, Ryan has collaborated with faculty members on revising teaching documents and reconsidering pedagogical practices to improve students’ self-efficacy, sense of belonging, and engagement in their courses. As of Fall 2023, Ryan McBride is now serving as a Graduate Research Assistant and Student Partner Leader for SaLT HSI. His academic interests include translingual writing in classrooms, queer linguistics, improving students’ learning experiences in higher education through culturally sustaining practices, and indigenous language revitalization. He aspires to become a professor upon receiving his graduate degree and is committed to fostering culturally sustainable practices in his future classrooms.
Alyssa G. Cavazos is an Associate Professor in the Department of Writing and Language Studies where she teaches undergraduate and graduate coursework in writing studies. Her teaching and research interests center on language difference in the teaching of writing, translingual writing across communities, students' learning experiences and professional development in higher education. She also serves as the Director for the Center for Teaching Excellence, overseeing many professional development activities and partnerships. She also co-leads and directs the Students as Learners and Teachers at a Hispanic Serving Institution (SaLT HSI) program where students and faculty members collaborate to create meaningful and engaging teaching and learning experiences centered on student voices and success. Alyssa is also a fellow in the UT System Academy of Distinguished Teachers. She is committed to designing linguistically and culturally inclusive educational spaces, which can lead to students’ sense of belonging and academic success across academic disciplines in higher education and beyond.
Fall 2023
“Hablo pocha, ¿no?”: Countering hegemonic language ideologies in the classroom and the community
In the U.S.-Mexico borderlands, language ideologies of linguistic purism have resulted in derogatory labels for Mexican American language varieties including pocho and mocho. More recently there have been a few examples of ‘reclaiming’ these terms through semantic inversion. While these terms are frequently referenced in research on language in the U.S. Southwest, to date there has been no in-depth study of how these terms are used and understood by Spanish-English bilinguals along the U.S.-Mexico border. This study analyzes the use of the terms pocho and mocho in two sociolinguistic corpora in South Texas (Corpus Bilingüe del Valle, Bessett & Christoffersen, 2019-) and Southern Arizona (Corpus de Español en el Sur de Arizona, Carvalho, 2012-). The study reveals both historically perjorative monoglossic ideologies of pocho/mocho and more positive instances of heteroglossic ideologies of pocho/mocho. Monoglossic ideological stances position pocho/mocho as 1) not speaking a language well, 2) not correct or imperfect, 3) ugly, and 4) harming, damaging or ruining Spanish. For instance, Tania states, "They don't speak it. They assassinate it." On the other hand, heteroglossic ideological stances represent pocho/mocho as 5) a marker of solidarity and instrumental, 6) bilingual competence and ability, 7) identity and language pride, 8) meaningful, and 9) cultured, cool, and unique. In one excerpt, Eduardo states powerfully, "It's our pocho dialect y nos entendemos” ('…and we understand each other'). This discourse analysis demonstrates how language ideologies of pocho/mocho are enacted but also contested by bilinguals in the U.S.-Mexico borderlands, and by extension, how such ideologies reflect power asymmetries.
For the purpose of this talk at UTRGV’s Linguistic Seminar Series, I will further detail the CoBiVa corpus and its incorporation into various B3 courses with the ‘culturally sustaining pedagogy’ designation as well as the newly developed B3 Scholar Seal. I also describe findings from another study on student perspectives in working with the corpus in these community engaged scholarship classes. Finally, I discuss how this study, the corpus, and the classes contribute to a B3 linguistics at UTRGV, as this is the first talk in the new sub-series of ‘B3 Linguistics’ marking a collaboration between the Writing & Language Studies Department’s linguistics faculty and the B3 Institute.
Katherine Christoffersen is an Associate Professor of Applied Linguistics in the Department of Writing & Language Studies at UTRGV. She is also the Associate Director of the B3 Institute and an affiliate in the Mexican American Studies program. Dr. Christoffersen holds a PhD in Second Language Acquisition & Teaching from the University of Arizona and a masters in English Language/Linguistics from the University of Arizona. Her research interests include sociolinguistics, bilingualism, and language learning. She has experience teaching a variety of courses related to sociolinguistics, including topics such as border languages, sociolinguistics, language and culture, and discourse analysis.
Translating with AI: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
Since artificial intelligence emerged on the global scene some months ago, the hype around ChatGPT has reached fever pitch. Some people see AI-based tools as promising game changers with the potential to revolutionize the way we teach, study and work. Others caution that their flaws may still outweigh their potential benefits. For us in the Translation Studies, this is not a new conversation.
In our field, we have been facing a similar situation since machine translation (e.g. Google Translate, DeepL and so on) was made available to the general public. Since the early 2000s, computers have been doing translation work that had traditionally been performed by humans and, in recent years, machine translation has reached unprecedented quality levels. But what exactly does this mean? How well do machines translate? Can we trust Google Translate or ChatGPT to translate for us? In this presentation I will tackle these questions. I will first explain what happens in the backstage when we ask our devices for a translation. Then, through several examples, I will discuss the main strengths and weaknesses of automated translation, its reliability and I will also address the elephant in the room: in a scenario in which machine translation, artificial intelligence and deep learning technologies evolve at a steady pace, is there a future for human translators and linguists?
Dr. Nazaret Fresno is an Associate Professor of Spanish Translation and Interpreting and the Associate Chair of the department of Writing & Language Studies at UTRGV. She holds an MA in Literary Translation, an MA in Audiovisual Translation and a PhD in Translation Studies. She teaches a variety of undergraduate and graduate courses including Translation Theory, Healthcare Translation and Interpreting, Audiovisual Translation, and Translation Technologies. Her research interests include website localization, audiovisual translation (translation for dubbing and subtitling) and media accessibility (especially, live closed captioning).