1st Edition
The Routledge Handbook of Language Education and Social Change
What does social change mean? Mapping perspectives for language education
Vander Tavares
Part 1: Theoretical foundations of language education and social change
1. Critical pedagogies in language education for social change: Evolution, application, and prospects
Marika Kunnas and Ryuko Kubota
2. Critical language pedagogies and social change: Key concepts, current challenges and future directions
Leonardo da Silva, Hamilton de Godoy Wielewicki, and Priscila Fabiane Farias
3. Plurilingualism and complexity: A synergy for social change in language education
Enrica Piccardo and Giulia Guadagni
4. Initiating social change: Towards an intersectional critical language pedagogy in the language classroom
Yuzuko Nagashima and Luke Lawrence
5. Is your language classroom political? Do you discuss ‘money’? Embracing disorientation for social change in language and intercultural education
Fred Dervin
Part 2: Language education and social justice movements
6. Silencing the invisibility of immigrant learners: Beyond a single (issue) story for language education and social justice
Patriann Smith, Dianne Wellington, Darlshawn Patterson, Yetunde Alabede, Andrew Hunte, and Taiwo Ogundapo
7. Migrant language education and social justice: A recognition-based approach
David Mallows and Tania Douek
8. Linguistic discrimination and English as an additional language or dialect education: Accentism
Sender Dovchin, Davida Aba Mensima Asante-Nimako, and Nashid Nigar
9. The criticality and the decolonizing space in anti-oppressive language education
Maverick Y. Zhang and Jamie L. Schissel
10. Feminist pedagogy for social change: Where we are now
Reiko Yoshihara
Part 3: Language, identity, and empowerment
11. Empowering multilingual learners in the digital age: The interplay of language, identity, agency, and technology
Guofang Li and Kongji Qin
12. Translanguaging as praxis: Reimagining identity and agency in language education for minoritized communities
Zhongfeng Tian and Luqing Zang
13. Heritage language education and social change: Prioritizing identity and agency for minoritized individuals and communities
Hyesun Cho and Mi Yung Park
14. Language learning among adult refugees: Marginalization, empowerment, and imagined Identities
Marianne Eek
15. Gatekeeper or gateway: Language-in-education policies for equitable multilingual education and social change
Erina Iwasaki, Carol Benson, Kevin M. Wong, and Dak (Lajiadou) Lhagyal
16. Reimagining language teacher education as a site for social change: The intersection of identity, ideology, and capital
Yue Zhang and Kenan Dikilitas
Part 4: Pedagogies for social change
17. Reconceptualizing language education: Critically conscious and culturally responsive pedagogies as catalysts for social transformation
Cristina Alfaro and Arwa Alkhawaja
18. Crip translingualism, language education, and social change
Elanur Sönmez, HyeEun Jung, and Suresh Canagarajah
19. Compassion-based language education for social change
Sarah Mercer
20. Designing learning and learning as design: Pedagogical and social change for the digital age
Fei Victor Lim
21. Artificial intelligence and social change in language education
Yijen Wang and Glenn Stockwell
22. Fostering linguistic and cultural responsiveness: Service-learning in (language) teacher education
Sílvia Melo-Pfeifer, Susana Pinto, and Ricardo Torres
Part 5: Case studies in language education and social change
23. Promoting English language learners’ motivation and social issues engagement through Content and Language Integrated Learning
Chia-Ling Kao and Angel M. Y. Lin
24. Intercultural bilingual education and Indigenous language revitalization in Chile: Early childhood, Mapuzungun, and land-based community practices
Rukmini Becerra-Lubies, Carmen Alfaro Contreras, Dayna Moya Sepúlveda, and Michel Riquelme-Sanderson
25. Language education and social change: The case of the project Inglês Made in Favela in Brazil
Ana Karina de O. Nascimento, Leina C. Viana Jucá, Sílvia Lorenso, and Thiago de Melo Cardoso Santos
26. Indigenizing language education through school-community collaborations: Wayuu People’s resistance to coloniality
Claudia Patricia Gutiérrez
27. Toward a politics of care in language education: A case study of an equity-oriented two-way bilingual education program
Laura Hamman-Ortiz
28. The language of instruction: Prospects and constraints for social change in view of Sustainable Development Goals from a Tanzanian perspective
Mwajuma Vuzo
Part 6: Future directions in language education for social change
29. Transforming language learning: The socioeconomic and pedagogical impact of generative AI
Adam Edmett and Helen Crompton
30. Beyond lingua franca: Navigating critical perspectives on the global spread of English and social change in a transnational world
Ali Fuad Selvi
31. Critical, multidimensional and contextualized didactic planning abilities to engage teachers with plurilingual and pluricultural mindsets and social change when applying “universalized” notions such as diversity and inclusion
Paola Gamboa
32. Black language has no nations: A global call for Black linguistic justice and solidarity in Black language education
Oluwaseun Oyindamola Ogunleye and April Baker-Bell
33. Refiguring the human in applied linguistics: Emerging directions in language education
Xolisa Guzula and Caroline Kerfoot
34. Multilingual education for social change: Perils, prospects, and pathways
Syed Abdul Manan and Anas Hajar
Biography
Vander Tavares is an Associate Professor of Education at the University of Inland Norway. He holds a PhD in linguistics and applied linguistics from York University, Canada. His research interests include critical second language education, teacher education, and the internationalization of higher and language education. He is the editor of Social Justice through Pedagogies of Multiliteracies: Developing and Strengthening L2 Learner Agency and Identity (Routledge).
“This outstanding handbook is bold, timely, and deeply inspiring. It brings language education’s human, ethical, and political stakes into sharp focus and offers rich theoretical conversation, grounded practice, and visionary futures. A landmark volume that will energize scholars, educators, and policymakers committed to justice‑driven, transformative change.”
Bedrettin Yazan, Professor, The University of Texas at San Antonio, USA
“This timely and inclusive handbook shows how language education advances social change by engaging global issues through democracy, equity, and epistemic justice. Human‑centered and activist in spirit, it demonstrates how empowered educators can honor identity, cultivate humanity, and imagine future possibilities for transformative and justice‑oriented pedagogy.”
Gloria Park, Professor, Indiana University of Pennsylvania, USA
“This handbook offers a compelling roadmap for language education researchers engaging with social challenges in a rapidly changing world. Amid accelerating technological change, it affirms the vital role of our scholarly efforts in sustaining humane, equitable, and transformative social change through critical intellectual engagement.”
Xuesong (Andy) Gao, Professor, University of New South Wales Australia
“In a perpetually evolving, fragmented world, integrating social change into language education is indispensable for establishing a society founded on social justice, equity, and harmony. This handbook illustrates that there is no singular or definitive pathway to social transformation. Comprising thirty-four chapters, it offers the essential tools for critical reflection on the orientation, mechanisms, space, and time involved, guiding our thinking in diverse directions, and presenting options for identifying the most effective approaches to social change in language education tailored to our own specific contexts.”
Shaila Sultana, Professor, University of Dhaka, Bangladesh
“The Routledge Handbook of Language Education and Social Change gives pause for thought by delving into how “social change” is conceptualized and pursued within language education. It is the first to offer genuinely deep understandings of social change in language education through a typology composed of three elements: orientations, mechanisms, and scales/temporalities. It will be welcomed by language educators, curriculum specialists, policymakers, administrators, graduate students, researchers, and governments for its insight and perception.”
Othman Z. Barnawi, Professor of Language and Education, Royal Commission for Yanbu Colleges and Institutes, Saudi Arabia
