Only English? Impact Outcomes
Only English?
As the English Only law awaits legislative review once again in Arizona, students in the Only English? Lab joined faculty from the School of International Letters and Cultures and Mary Lou Fulton Teachers College to use these key questions for framing their investigation of language use, pedagogy, politics and policy in different cultural contexts.
Only English? students met with an unprecedented EIGHTEEN thought partners across the span of the semester, including a Regional English Language officer from the State Department (currently deployed in Africa), the Director of the cultural department of the Pima Maricopa Indian Community, lawyers, filmmakers, digital mapping specialists and linguistic professors from ASU, the University of Georgia and the University of California, Berkeley (view full list below).
Impact outcomes derived from the team’s multitude of research and collaborations ranged from a series of mini documentaries (developed throughout the semester) to fact sheets and letters written and shared with local legislators. In preparation for meetings with experts, students researched each collaborator, prepared questions and then engaged in robust hour-long question / answer dialogues. Scroll down to learn more about these projects and more.
Docu-Short Film Screening
Students culminated their semester long investigation in a public docu-short film screening via Zoom featuring films and podcasts on heritage languages, language and identity, culture and communication, and language loss. All have been compiled in a YouTube playlist and are viewable here.
Fact Sheets & Letters
Students wrote letters and created fact sheets regarding Only English legislation to share with their legislators in Arizona.
Click here to view all of the fact sheets.
Student Testimonials
In a way, it makes sense for all of us to defend or praise our own native language(s) because it is part of who we are; it is the connection to our families, our closest friends, our cultural traditions and practices, our heritage, our first memories, and ultimately to our moral values. And if not all languages can achieve the luxury of becoming a lingua franca, this does not mean that we should not fight for all languages to be taught in school or simply accepted in our society.
—
Gina Scarpete Walters
ASU Fall 2020 second year Ph.D. student in Comparative Culture and Language with an emphasis on cross-cultural semantics
I highly recommend taking a Humanities Lab! Although the lab was unrelated to my major, it has been my favorite experience this [Fall 2020] semester.
—
Angeli Sirilan
ASU Fall 2020 Sophomore in Biomedical Sciences
Thought Partners
- Antonia Schleicher: Indiana University, NRC for African Languages, director and past president of various national organizations
- David Bong: Avant Assessment, CEO & Co-Founder
- Linda Egnatz: Global Seal of Biliteracy, Executive Director
- Rick Rosenberg: English Language Officer, State Department
- Howard Stephenson: former Utah senator
- Luis Barragan: Cultural Department of the Pima Maricopa Indian Community, Linguist
- Kelly Washington: Cultural Department of the Pima Maricopa Indian Community, Director
- Amanda Weaver: lawyer and Ph.D. in linguistics
- Steven Beschloss: ASU Narrative Center, Journalist and Director
- Nina Berman: ASU SILC, Director
- Andres Torres: ASU LA, Film Maker and Professor
- Annie Hale: Digital Technology Specialist at ASU
- Aya Matsuda: ASU English, Professor of Linguistics
- Sara Beaudrie: ASU SILC, Professor of Linguistics
- Matthew Toro: Digital Mapping Specialist at ASU
- Usree Bhattacharya: University of Georgia, Assistant Professor of Language and Literacy Education
- Claire Kramsch: Berkeley, Professor Emerita of Linguistics
- Brendan O’Connor: ASU Education, Professor of Linguistics
- Christopher Gwin: Executive Director, National Federation of Modern Language Teachers Associations (NFMLTA)
