Lifting Every Voice
Pedagogy and Politics of Bilingualism

Edited by Zeynep F. Beykont

The essays in Lifting Every Voice illuminate the challenges and joys of educating students from a variety of ethnic, linguistic, and academic backgrounds. The authors -- teachers, community activists, teacher educators, and classroom researchers -- demystify bilingual education by providing concrete examples from their practice and experience in working with bilingual children. Rather than rehashing the tired, old debate on bilingual education, Lifting Every Voice starts with the belief that bilingual education works.

Lifting Every Voice is organized into three parts. Part One focuses on the power and significance of bilingualism for language-minority students from a cultural, pedagogical, and political perspective. In Part Two, authors share their research and practice-based experiences and insights into successful bilingual classrooms. Part Three then discusses the political, organizational, and programmatic supports that are necessary to better serve our language-minority students and to nurture their bilingualism.

The authors in Lifting Every Voice embody a spirit that embraces the linguistic, cultural, and ethnic diversity of all our students and trumpet a belief in the transforming potential of bilingual education.

Lifting Every Voice shows you what's working in Bilingual Education, with practical and concrete examples.

About the Editor:

Zeynep F. Beykont, Editor received a doctoral degree in Human Development and Psychology from the Harvard Graduate School of Education and conducted postdoctoral research as a Community Fellow at MIT's Urban Studies and Planning Department. Her professional interest centers on identifying language policies and programs that support the cultural, linguistic, and academic development of minority youth. Over the past fifteen years, she has worked as a researcher and consultant in school-, museum-, and community-based educational programs in the U.S. and abroad. Her publications include Lifting Every Voice: Pedagogy and Politics of Bilingualism (2000), "Inclusiveness in Higher Education" Equity and Excellence in Education (with C. Daiute 2002), and "Against the Assimilationist Tide" in History Lessons: Transforming Social Relations of Power in the Classroom (with Johnson-Beykont, in print) edited by J. Cummins, D. Dragonas, A. Frangoudaki, and H. Smith. Her forthcoming book, Achieving Linguistic Democracy: The Role of Research, focuses on the role of research in addressing issues of equity, access, and cultural and linguistic democracy in educational institutions.