XIX to XXI: Bringing Spanish language in California to the forefront

Álvaro González Alba
Department of Hispanic Studies
UC Riverside

Evelyn Gámez
Department of Spanish and Portuguese
UC Davis

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Participants

This project will be focused on the study of Hispanic/Latinx populations in California in the XIX century, and how these historical accounts affect contemporary notions of Spanish in California. To this end, each member of the group will participate in researching the sociocultural, linguistic, political and socioeconomic aspects that XIX century Californios experienced. In conjunction with a faculty PI and the Spanish California Lab (SOCALab), the group will explore the ways in which this content can be taught across grade-level curriculums. In order to gather this data, the group will put into practice humanities methodological skills with the goal of achieving the following: generate future interdisciplinary publications in the field of humanities, elaborate a series of critical pedagogical activities focused on the XIXth century Spanish history of California, and most importantly raise awareness of post racial society issues that are still present today. The project’s long-term goal is to implement these activities in bilingual immersion elementary and secondary programs, and with the California School for the Deaf with the support of the Bilingualism Matters Club (BM@UCR). Four PhD students from UCR, UCD, UC-Merced and UCLA will collaborate on this project.