EMPOWERING THE FILIPINO LANGUAGE CLASSROOM: TOWARDS CRITICAL PEDAGOGY AND CURRICULUM A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE GRADUATE DIVISION OF THE UNIVERSITY OF HAWAIʻI AT MĀNOA IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN SECOND LANGUAGE STUDIES August 2018 By Jayson Parba Committee: Graham V. Crookes, Chairperson Pia Arboleda Christina Higgins John Mayer Patricia Halagao Keywords: critical language pedagogy, curriculum negotiation, dialogic pedagogy, Filipino, heritage language, translanguaging ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I have met so many amazing people while pursuing doctoral studies at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa. These people have made studying and life abroad less daunting and scary. Indeed, they have made my stay in Honolulu memorable, meaningful, and, yes, fun, too! To them, my sincerest gratitude and appreciation. First, I would like to thank Graham, my advisor and strong ally, for believing in me and my work. There were moments when I felt that the strong weight of teaching and research was too much to handle, but his words of wisdom and motivation kept me going. Graham, I think you’re the best graduate mentor one could ask for, and I sincerely thank you for being so generous with your expertise, time, care, and encouragement. I also thank my committee members Pia Arboleda, Patricia Halagao, Christina Higgins, and John Mayer for their insights, suggestions, and expertise that greatly helped me think and rethink about my work. I thank Pia for being the most supportive, generous, and kind teaching assistant supervisor, coordinator, ate, and friend; John Mayer for being one of the individuals who supported me from the very beginning and for believing in my teaching skills and research potentials; Christina for being an excellent sociolinguistics professor and for inspiring me to also pursue sociolinguistics research in my own work; and Patricia for sharing with me her passion for equity and multicultural education. Being a Student Affiliate at the East-West Center (EWC) Education Program has afforded me with opportunities to meet and engage with some of the brilliant young scholars from all over the world. Through EWC, I met new friends and a best friend with whom I have shared many stories of challenges and victories over good conversations, foods, and coffee (or beer sometimes!). I thank my best friend Tomoaki Morikawa for being my writing, food, and adventure buddy and for motivating and challenging me intellectually to become more reflective and critical in my work. I also thank good friends Richard Zhen Cao, Thearith Makara, Maruf Sulario, Towhid Khan, Mae Thiwari, Anna Soh and Andrew Soh, Elaine Tupas, Pacha and Josh Monthei, Jennifer Monje, Jen Nicolas, Nozomi Tanaka, Jacy Miller, Charlene Ledesma, Yuki Asahina, Sharon Bulalang, Ivan Bondoc, JP Alonzo, Nisa, Leah Pappas, Thuy Doan, Pao, Arum, O, and the UH Pinoy group for the support and all the fun memories we shared together. My deep appreciation also goes to my brilliant SLS professors: Richard Day, Thom Hudson, Sandra Lee McKay, Kathryn Davis, Gabriel Kasper, John Norris, JD Brown, Betsy Gilliland, and Nicole Ziegler, and to my friends in the Department of Second Language Studies and my critical pedagogy/critical applied linguistics discussion group. I would like to specially mention Prem Phyak, Bal Sharma, Anna Mendoza, Jennifer Holdway, Angela Häusler, Priscila Leal, Chris Hunter, Priscila Farias, Samuel Aguirre, Savio Siqueira, Gordon West, Peggy Kang, Wonguk Cho, Emily Gazda, Hye Young Jung, Mitsuko Suzuki, Jiamin Ruan, Jiaxin Ruan, Jing Zhou, Kin Abdullah, and Hyun-Jung An. Thank you all for the thought-provoking discussions that have made me more introspective of L2 teaching and learning. The same deepest appreciation goes to the Filipino Program, my colleagues Ate Irma, Ate Ime, Ate Letty, Precious, Raju Desai, Darren, TonTon, Clem, Ms K, and my students for i their willingness to participate in the study. I’ve learned so much from all of you over the last five years. Moreover, I am deeply grateful to the members of the Achievers Club who have been my best friends (Karen, Tim, Mine, John Mark, Weng, Mayang, Dexter, and Tish [deceased]) through the years, and friends and colleagues in Capitol University, Xavier University-Ateneo de Cagayan, and International School in the Philippines for the gift of friendship. Last but not least, I thank my parents (Carlos and Eleanor), siblings (Jay, Julie Ann, Joeffy, and John Carlo), nephews (Dhejay, Grant, Gerald Merck and Karl Jay), and nieces (Dianne and Kharla) for being my source of strength and inspiration, and for fully supporting me in my pursuit of a doctoral degree abroad even if it means being away from them for quite a while. Thank you all for always sending me your love and support. To all of you, I offer this humble work. ii ABSTRACT This dissertation is situated in critical applied linguistics, critical language pedagogy, and heritage and second language (L2) education, within which Filipino language teaching in the U.S. context has remained almost invisible. Drawing on the work of Freire and other critical practitioners, this dissertation analyzes how critical language pedagogy (CLP) works in two upper intermediate Filipino language courses at a University in Hawaiʻi. Most of the existing literature of CLP reports ESL and EFL settings and examines specific aspects of critical language teaching. The field of heritage language (HL) education, however, has drawn on CLP only recently and work of this kind in the HL literature mostly comes from the Spanish language education context only. The dissertation addresses this gap in the literature and directly responds to appeals for tangible guidance and concrete examples coming from teachers of languages other than English (LOTEs). Using Critical Teacher Research (CTR), I analyze the process of curriculum negotiation in my language classes where students took an active role in generating critical themes, making assessment more democratic, and using thematic codes that are drawn from their lived experiences. I also examine the Freirean notion of dialogue as a framework to foster critical consciousness which allows students to identify, challenge, and reframe status quo discourses and ideologies. Drawing on the notion of translanguaging, I analyze how a classroom language policy, which is anchored on the heteroglossic view of languages and the dynamic language practices of multilinguals, can make language learning more meaningful, empowering, and participatory. The findings reveal that creating spaces for curriculum negotiation and critical dialogue provides students with opportunities to transform status quo discourses of schooling and HL iii education. It also allows for new ways of seeing oppressive ideologies and practices to emerge in order to resist social inequalities. The findings further show that curriculum negotiation in Filipino language classrooms where students have diverse linguistic starting points is possible through adopting critical perspectives of multilingualism, language teaching, and teaching philosophy. This study illustrates that politicizing one’s teaching praxis in HL and L2 classrooms necessitates a rethinking of language teaching and HL education. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgements ……………………………………………………………………………….i Abstract …………………………………………………………………………………………..iii List of Tables ……………………………………………………………………………………..x List of Figures ……………………………………………………………………………………xi CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION 1.1 Introduction ……………………………………………………………………………….1 1.2 Filipinos in the Diaspora and the Filipino Language in the U.S. …………………………2 1.3 The Filipino Program at UH Mānoa ……………………………………………..……….5 1.4 Understanding Heritage Language and Heritage Language Learners….…………………9 1.5 Problematizing the Filipino Label……………………………………………………….15 1.6 Motivation for the Current Study ………………………………………………………..19 1.7 Research Questions ……………………………………………………………………...24 1.8 Preview of the Dissertation ……………………………………………………………...28 CHAPTER 2. CRITICAL PEDAGOGY AND CRITICALLY-ORIENTED CURRICULUM 2.1 Introduction ……………………………………………………………….......................32 2.2 Key Features of Critical Pedagogy ……………………………………………………...33 2.2.1 CP is grounded on the belief that education is inherently political ……………..34 2.2.2 CP is grounded on a vision of social and educational transformation ……...…...37 2.2.3 CP is committed to the mitigation of human suffering ………………………….39 2.3 Developing a Critically-Oriented Language Curriculum …………………………………...43 v 2.3.1 Purpose and Objectives ………………………………………………………….43 2.3.2 Content Definition and Learning Objectives ……………………………………45 2.3.3 Learning Materials ………………………………………………………………46 2.3.4 Planning ………………………………………………………………………....49 2.3.5 Teacher’s and Students’ Roles …………………………………………………..50 2.3.6 Negotiation in the CLP Class ……………………………………………………52 2.3.7 Assessment ………………………………………………………………………58 CHAPTER 3. METHODOLOGY 3.1 Introduction ……………………………………………………………………………...62 3.2 Critical Teacher Research………………………………………………………………..62 3.2.1 (Critical) Ethnographic Concepts ……………………………………………….73 3.3 The Participants of the Study ……………………………………………………………79 3.4 The Filipino 301 and 302 Courses ………………………………………………………87 3.5 Data Collection ………………………………………………………………………….90 3.6 Data Analysis and Interpretation ………………………………………………………..94 3.7 Researcher Positionality …………………………………………………………………97 CHAPTER 4. “IT’S NOT THAT WE HAVE THE FINAL SAY, BUT IT FEELS GOOD TO HAVE A VOICE”: NEGOTIATING POWER IN THE FILIPINO LANGUAGE CLASSROOM 4.1