Rethinking the Expectations of Knowing in Educational Contexts: African Languages and Literacies

The Moynihan Institute and the Maxwell African Scholars Union present Adeola Agoke, director of African Languages Program at the University of Wisconsin - Madison.

Paper Abstract: 

Existing scholarship in African cultural studies, anthropology, and applied linguistics has explored the role of languages in the expression of knowledge. However, the complex interaction of languages, speakers’ linguistic backgrounds, and the expectations of literacies transcends geographical boundaries and requires a rethinking of what constitutes knowing in educational contexts. This research examines the role of African languages in the ideological processes of meaning-making and how these are entangled with various restrictions and regulations in knowledge production. Drawing on corpus data of language practices across contexts, this study shows how epistemologies rooted in colonial ideologies—sustained by academic institutions and regulatory frameworks—inform language practices and the attendant expectation of knowing. I argue that expressions of literacies, especially in contexts where African languages constitute an important part of language users’ linguistic repertoires, transgress the expectations of knowing embedded in the monolingual perspective of standard English. Rather than viewing such transgressions as deficits, I posit that they are integral to knowledge systems and contribute to ongoing debates on literacies and decolonizing education. This study calls for more inclusive knowledge systems that recognize and incorporate speakers’ linguistic realities.

Adeola Agoke holds a Ph.D. in African cultural studies with a specialization in sociocultural and applied linguistics. Her book manuscript tentatively entitled “Learners Linguistic Creativity: Implications for Language Learning and Pedagogical Practices” draws on ethnographic fieldwork and data analysis to examine the processes by which language learners engage their multilingual repertoire for interactional practice in- and out-of-classroom settings.

Focusing on Yoruba language learners, her research draws theoretical insights from critical applied linguistics and critical discourse analysis to challenge the convention that demarcates language use in formal domains from language use in “the wild,” an older model that constructs language use in specific environments as ethnolinguistic boundedness. She argues that learners’ linguistic creativity constitutes important linguistic resources for developing the standard dialect and effective pedagogical practices within the classroom environment.

With an interest to bring research into African language programing, Agoke currently curates learning resources in African languages to enhance contextualized experience of language learning. Also, as former Fulbright scholar, she is very interested in language internationalization, global citizenship and decolonization of teaching curriculum to enhance multi-representation of voice, bodies, and in fact experiences of African language learners in and outside of classroom settings. Her ongoing research on classroom social dynamics and instructed SLA foregrounds this perspective.