Language Ideologies, Identity Construction, and Educational Barriers: Teaching and Being Students From Refugee Backgrounds in Arizona

In this three-article dissertation study, I examine the educational experiences of students from refugee backgrounds (SRBs) and the teachers that serve them in an urban high school in Arizona. Through a year-long ethnographic study, I attempt to contribute to the existing literature by exploring three salient issues that mediate experiences for participating teachers (n = 3) and SRBs (n = 32) in three classrooms. The participating SRBs came from a wide variety of home countries and spoke a combined 15 different home languages. In the United States, where the instruction of SRBs is generally framed by language policies, English as a second language (ESL) teachers play an crucial role in SRBs’ schooling. In the first article, I examined how teachers’ language ideologies shaped their implementation of structured English immersion (SEI), the authorized language policy in the state of Arizona. Findings describe how the teachers enacted agency to appropriate authorized language policy and create new, unauthorized policies that met the perceived needs of SRBs in their classrooms. I also examined the identity construction of SRBs in figured worlds of resettlement. Once resettled, SRBs are legally tied to their status as refugees, which may operate as a mechanism of oppression in the host country. These individuals are often stripped of all identities but one—that of being a refugee—which essentializes their vulnerability and perpetuates deficit-oriented perspectives that may limit learning opportunities for SRBs. Findings describe how participating teachers constructed SRBs’ identities and how SRBs constructed refugee-ness for themselves, highlighting the strength and resiliency of this student population. Finally, I used phenomenology as a methodological frame from which to interpret SRBs’ experiences with SEI and the policy-related barriers they described as negatively impacting their education. As refugees flee their countries of origin, educational systems in their countries of resettlement have struggled to provide quality education to their children. Themes summarizing participants’ collective experiences highlighted specific challenges related to SEI policy mandates, including SRBs’ isolation, limited opportunities to interact with English-speaking peers, and low graduation rates.