Intercultural service learning in disadvantaged contexts in Argentina: An opportunity to enact English language education with a social justice basis.

MELINA PORTO

Conferencia; 16th Annual LITASA Conference (Literacy Association of South Africa).; 2021

16th Annual LITASA Conference 2020Connecting the dots: Literacy and home, school, community, the world.3 ? 4 September 2021Intercultural service learning in disadvantaged contexts in Argentina: An opportunity to enact English language education with a social justice basisMelina PortoUniversidad Nacional de La Plata and National Research Council, ArgentinaIn this keynote I will describe a service learning experience carried out by volunteer university student teachers of English and volunteer university students of tourism during 2017-2018 in two contexts in Argentina: a non-governmental organisation and a rural multi-grade primary school. The aim was to challenge and improve the conditions of possibility for the children involved. In collaboration with their university teachers, the volunteers taught workshops using intercultural literature in English for underserved children aged 6-14. In one of the locations, the volunteers also designed and delivered two guided tours of natural and cultural heritage sites in the area. Theoretically, the project is grounded on a conceptualisation of social justice language education beyond distribution, with a focus on recognition and inclusive language ideologies and practices that value diversity. It also draws on the combination of outdoor learning experiences and multiliteracies, multimodal and translingual perspectives on meaning making including the arts. Findings indicate that the children engaged in multilingual, multimodal, creative and embodied forms of expression and communication as they combined their affective and semiotic resources through literature, music, movement and embodiment, the creative arts (drawing, painting, decorating, macramé) and outdoor learning experiences. These resources became means for initiating transformation of their selves and of their social milieu with a focus on the local environment. I will outline some implications for language education in multilingual contexts.