Department of Spanish & Portuguese PhD candidate Katherine Ward has received a Fulbright-Hays Doctoral Dissertation Research Abroad Fellowship to support her dissertation titled, Intercultural Bilingual Educators’ Perceptions of Non-Standardized Spanish in Ecuador: A Case Study in Combatting Linguistic Discrimination in Schools. Katherine will spend six months in Ecuador working collaboratively with Indigenous and non-Indigenous teachers in the town of Otavalo to explore their stances toward Spanish language features associated with the Indigenous language Kichwa and their inclinations to intervene pedagogically when their bilingual students use them in the classroom. Findings from her research will inform the creation of workshops on eradicating linguistic discrimination at eight participating schools in Otavalo, using teachers’ perceptions of marginalized language features as points of entry to reflect on broader, systemic inequity in schools and society internationally.
Congratulations, Katherine!