Cover not available
Part of
Innovative Qualitative Methodologies in Multilingual Literacy Development Research: Amplifying voices from immigrant, transnational, and refugee communities
Edited by Amanda K. Kibler and Fares J. Karam
[Research Methods in Applied Linguistics 11] 2025
► pp. 125–148

Chapter 7
Bridging language and STEM

Using an Anzalduan framework to center Latinx Elementary and Middle School students’ understanding of robotics

 | The University of Nevada, Reno
 | The University of Texas at Austin
This chapter illustrates how combining an Anzalduan framework with critical ethnography and social semiotics provides a unique approach centering Latinx students’ STEM knowledge, language, and literacy use as legitimate ways of conocimiento and communicating. Using longitudinal data, authors examine how Latinx middle-grade students use their linguistic repertoires through multimodal representations to bridge their un­der­stand­ing of a real-world STEM FIRST LEGO League (FLL) challenge and their community, conceptualized through Anzaldúa’s (Moraga & Anzaldúa, 1983) work on mestizaje and imagery of the mestiza body as a bridge. The chapter further documents how to rethink Anzalduan theory through overlaying Deleuze and Guattari’s (1980/1987) characteristics of a minor literature as an additional lens to deterritorialize language and promote equitable research centering Latinx ways of languaging, knowing, and being.
Keywords: Anzalduan Theory, robotics, STEM, multilingual learners, thinking with theory
Article outline
  • Introduction
  • Overview of the study and its findings
    • Traditional and critical ethnography in education
    • Multimodal literacies
    • Aims of the study
    • Research context and participants
    • Findings
    • The mestiza(o) body as a bridge
    • Bridging identity, language, and lived experiences
    • Bridging farm workers toil to fork through multilingual and multimodal literacy practices
  • Methodological discussion: Rethinking theory for more equitable research
    • Our mestizaje
    • Thinking with theory
    • Deterritorializing language through enacting the brown body as bridge
    • Deterritorializing language through multimodal literacies
    • Deterritorializing language through translanguaging
    • Political immediacy and collective assemblage
    • Connecting to Nepantla
  • Implications for qualitative research on multilingual literacy development
    • Thoughts on ethical reflexivity
    • Reconceptualizing qualitative research
  • References
This content is being prepared for publication; it may be subject to changes.
References (42)
References
Alcaraz, L. (2021). Human infrastructure. Digital image.Google Scholar
Anzaldúa, G. (1987/1999). Borderlands/La frontera: The new mestiza (5th ed.). Aunt Lute Foundation Books.Google Scholar
(1990). Making face, making soul: Haciendo caras: Creative and critical perspectives by feminists of color (1st ed.). Aunt Lute Foundation Books.Google Scholar
(1993). Chicana artists: Exploring nepantla, el lugar de la frontera. NACLA Report on the Americas, 27(1), 37–45. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2002). Preface: (Un)natural bridges, (un)safe spaces. In G. Anzaldúa, & A. Keating (Eds.), This bridge we call home: Radical visions for transformation (pp. 1–5) Routledge.Google Scholar
Anzaldúa, G., & Keating, A. (2002). This bridge we call home: Radical visions for transformation. Routledge.Google Scholar
Beltran, C. (2004). Patrolling borders: Hybrids, hierarchies and the challenge of mestizaje. Political Research Quarterly, 57(4), 595–607. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Bloome, D., & Green, J. (2018). Ethnography. In B. Frey (Ed.), The Sage encyclopedia of educational research, measurement, and evaluation (pp. 618–623). Sage.Google Scholar
Bogue, R (2011). The minor. In C. Stivale (Ed.), Gilles Deleuze: Key concepts (pp. 131–141). Routledge.Google Scholar
Bruner, J. (1986). Actual minds, possible worlds. Harvard University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Burke, A., Okrent, A., & Hale, K. (2022). The state of U.S. science and engineering 2022: Executive summary. National Science Board. Retrieved on 17 November 2024 from [URL]Google Scholar
Calderón, D., Bernal, D. D., Huber, L. P., Malagón, M. C., & Vélez, V. N. (2012). A chicana feminist epistemology revisited: Cultivating ideas a generation later. Harvard Educational Review, 82(4), 513–539. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Center for the Advancement of Informal Science Education (CAISE). (2018). Broadening participation task force: February 2018 update. Retrieved on 17 November 2024 from [URL]
Change the Equation (2017). Ending the double disadvantage: Ensuring STEM opportunities in our poorest schools. Retrieved on 17 November 2024 from [URL]
Ciechanowski, K., Bottoms, S., Fonseca, A. L., & St. Clair, T. (2015). Should Rey Mysterio drink gatorade? Cultural competence in afterschool STEM programming. Afterschool Matters, 21, 29–37.Google Scholar
Creswell, J., & Poth, C. N. (2018). Qualitative inquiry & research design: Choosing among five approaches (4th ed.). Sage.Google Scholar
Deleuze, G. & Guattari, F. (1987). A thousand plateaus: Capitalism and schizophrenia. University of Minnesota Press. [Originally published as Mille plateaux: Capitalisme et schizophrénie II. Paris: Minuit, 1980.]Google Scholar
Delgado Bernal, D. (1998). Using a Chicana feminist epistemology in educational research. Harvard Educational Review, 68(4), 555–582. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Djonko-Moore, C. M., Leonard, J., Holifield, Q., Bailey, E. B., & Almughyirah, S. M. (2017). Using culturally relevant experiential education to enhance urban children’s knowledge and engagement in science. Journal of Experiential Education, 41(2), 137–153. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Fitzpatrick, K., & May, S. (2022). Critical ethnography and education: Theory, methodology, and ethics. Routledge. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
García, O., & Li, W. (2014). Translanguaging: Language, bilingualism and education. Palgrave Macmillan. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Garza, N. E., Rodriguez, S. L., & Espino, M. L. (2023). Nepantla aquí, Nepantla allá: The borderlands of identity from Mexican-origin women in STEM. Journal of Hispanic Higher Education, 22(2), 130–145. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Hurtado, A. (2020). Intersectional Chicana feminisms: Sitios y lenguas. The University of Arizona Press.Google Scholar
Jewitt, C., & Kress, G. (2003). Multimodal literacy. Peter Lang.Google Scholar
Kress, G. (2000). Design and transformation: New theories of meaning. In B. Cope, & M. Kalantzis (Eds.), Multiliteracies: Literacy learning and the design of social futures (pp. 153–161). Routledge.Google Scholar
Kress, G., & van Leeuwen, T. (1996). Reading images: The grammar of visual design. Routledge.Google Scholar
Lather, P. A. (2007). Getting lost: Feminist efforts toward a double(d) science. State University of New York Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
May, S. (2023). Critical ethnography, language, race/ism and inequity in education: Charting the field. In S. May & B. Caldas (Eds.), Critical ethnography, language, race/ism and education (pp. 31–52). Multilingual Matters. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Mazzei. (2017). Following the contour of concepts toward a minor inquiry. Qualitative Inquiry, 23(9), 675–685. DOI logo
Mazzei, L. A. (2021). Postqualitative inquiry: Or the necessity of theory. Qualitative Inquiry, 27(2), 198–200. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
McGee, E. O., & Robinson, W. H. (2020). Diversifying STEM: Multidisciplinary perspectives on race and gender. Rutgers University Press.Google Scholar
McWhirter, E. H., & Cinamon, R. G. (2021). Old problem, new perspectives: Applying Anzaldúan concepts to underrepresentation in STEM. Journal of Career Development, 48(6), 877–892. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Mikhaeli, C. A., & Baskerville, R. L. (2019). Using semiotics to analyze representational complexity in social media. Information and Organization, 29, 1–19.Google Scholar
Moraga, & Anzaldúa, G. (1983). This bridge called my back: Writings by radical women of color (2nd ed.). Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press.Google Scholar
Morrison, T. (1993, December 7). Nobel lecture. Retrieved on 17 November 2024 from [URL]Google Scholar
Palmer, D., & Caldas, B. (2016). Critical ethnography. In K. King, Y. Lai, & S. May (Eds.), Research methods in language and education (pp. 1–12). Springer. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Pérez-Torres, R. (2006). Mestizaje: Critical uses of race in Chicano culture. University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
St. Pierre, E. S. (2014). A brief and personal history of post qualitative research: Toward “post inquiry.” Journal of Curriculum Theorizing, 30(2), 2–19.Google Scholar
Street, B. V. (1995). Social literacies: Critical approaches to literacy in development, ethnography, and education. Longman.Google Scholar
Thomas, J. (2021). Doing critical ethnography (1st ed.). Sage.Google Scholar
Ung, L., Labadin, J., & Mohamad, F. S. (2022). Computational thinking for teachers: Development of a localised E-learning system. Computers and Education, 177, 104379. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Unrau, N. J., Alvermann, D. E., & Sailors, M. (2019). Literacies and their investigation through theories and models in D. E. Alvermann, N. J. Unrau, M. Sailors, & R. B. Ruddell (Eds.), Theoretical models and processes of literacy (pp. 3–34). Routledge.Google Scholar