On July 19, I presented at the 20th World Congress of Applied Linguistics (AILA 2023) held at École Normale Supérieure in Lyon, France. My talk, titled “Teaching to the Strengths: Language and Culture Inclusive Pedagogies for California Latinx Students,” was part of a daylong “Diversity, Inclusion, and Pedagogic Practices in Culturally Different Educational Systems” symposium, which attracted 60-some participants. The symposium talks and Q&A were conducted in French, English, and Spanish without translation.
In this talk, I summarized my study of culturally responsive pedagogies in the English composition courses taught at Los Angeles City College and proposed a 3-part model for the inclusion of majority minority students in English courses:
- Redesigning language teaching curriculum
- Refocusing cultural context in the classroom
- Reintroducing linguistic diversity in student writing
The purpose of these pedagogies is both to validate and honor student identities, but also to improve the quality of student writing, something that I’ve written about previously. My study is included as a book chapter in a new volume on decolonizing language pedagogy and research (Routledge, 2023), where it is supported by classroom examples and relevant scholarship. I will be sharing these pedagogies again at an upcoming faculty training symposium at my college in August.
I am grateful for the support from LACC Foundation, which helped me to attend and present at the congress.
For a pre-recorded video of my presenation, taped for the remote participants in advance of the live talk, please contact me at laneigoudin@gmail.com.
Photos: With the symposium organizer Paola Gamboa of Sorbonne University, Paris, and during the talk.
Lane Igoudin | Author, Professor, Dad 
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