Isa Whalen

Professor So
AAS 206
March 15, 2019
Final Paper

Education has proven to be perceived as one major factor for an individual to obtain a

successful future in America. However, American education hasn’t always been equally

distributed, in terms of giving students a better understanding of the lessons in academic

curriculums, to persons of ethnic backgrounds. The root of this problem regards a language

barrier. Family histories of first, second, and third generations that consist of immigrant status

are usually not fluent in the English language. So how could one who is foreign to the English

language learn American education if they can not even process what is being said, written, or

read? This controversy of creating a bilingual education, a curriculum that instructs in both

native and English language, has become a two-sided argument across the United States within

the past century. Based on my own knowledge, discussions in Asian American and Pacific

Islander Studies at the University of Washington, and anthropological texts, I believe that

bilingual education is a subject that must be implemented in our academia in order to improve

the developing knowledgeable youth of America.

Beginning in early 1906 to 1965, the English language was the only language permitted

in American academia, and also the center of immigration and naturalization laws. The

Nationality Act in 1906, required individuals to speak English in order to become naturalized. If

people could not learn to speak English, they could not become American citizens. This shows

us that the American government enforced and pushed the English language to be the sole

communication tool within the United States of America. And because of this American ideal,

education boards of elementary and middle schools only saw it right to make English the

language to utilize for instruction. For example, in 1923, Meyer v. Nebraska, it was ruled that
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education can not and will not be taught in any other language besides English until the student

in school has passed the eighth grade. Schools also had “ESL”, English as a Second Language,

programs for non-native english speakers to reenforce learning and teaching in the English

language. It was not up till 1965, when the “educationally disadvantaged” children who were

forced to learn American education in the English language were recognized. The Elementary

and Secondary Education Act of 1965, was one of the first supportive movements towards a

bilingual academia. Congress had declared that there would be federal funds to establish such a

curriculum that acknowledges native languages. Although this act was set, it was not effective.

There were an inadequate amount of native teachers, lesson plans, and instruction guides to excel

in the bilingual education aspect. Students were still unable to achieve an education suitable to

their needs. And it was not until a six year old boy had fired a movement that changed even more

perspectives on bilingual education: Lau v. Nichols, 1970-1974.

Kinney Kinmon Lau, an immigrant from Hong Kong who then lived in San Francisco

Chinatown, was a student who fought for educational equality for his Chinese community. In his

primary education, majority of the Chinese students were not being taught in their native

languages. Parents of these children reached out to school leads for help, advice, and an

implementation for bilingual services. In all of these small movements, the school had declined

and rejected their efforts. For the future of their children and generations to come, the parents

took the school to court. Unfortunately, Lau had lost in all lower court decisions based on the

fact that bilingual education was not a right, but essentially a privilege. In 1974, the U.S Supreme

Court declared that “There is no equality of treatment merely by providing the students with the

same facilities, textbooks, and curriculum; for students who do not understand English are
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effectively foreclosed from any meaningful education” (Lau Mandate). This meant that schools

had to comply with bilingual educational services. Even though this was a win for Lau, it only

lasted up to the time of 1998, with Ron Unz Proposition 227 that eliminates bilingual education.

This took place in California, Arizona and Colorado. Since these passed propositions in 2001,

the fight for bilingual education still goes on in today’s world.

Bilingual education has been rejected and neglected in America for decades. Professors

argue that a curriculum of this kind would be too expensive to begin and continue to run.

Financial excuses have been the easy way out of this argument. And when the government funds

schools to better the bilingual environment, schools then make a point that there are no native

speakers who are teachers. This is a problem with supply and demand. With as many people

there are in America, there are an even lesser amount of qualified teachers. Applying this to the

smaller community of people who are not of the white race and have ethnic backgrounds, there

are an even lesser number of native teachers who are available to schools. So even if there were

such curriculums for non-english speakers, there are not enough people to teach it properly. But

in defense to the minority peoples, a flaw to the American argument, there are also no efforts to

produce and support qualified native teachers in academia. In fact, there are many racial

roadblocks that limit minorities from flourishing in academics and well off careers. Logically, if

native speakers aren’t given an education fit for their ethnic backgrounds early on in their lives,

then there is a very limited amount of those students who will obtain a degree, and an even

smaller amount of those who would then become a teacher for native students. Another

challenge minorities face is a term known as the “Glass Ceiling”. A metaphorical imagery that

represents the idea of how minorities are unable to climb the social, academic, and economic
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ladder for a more successful and higher mobility. So it shouldn’t be the argument that there are

no native speaking teachers to complete this bilingual education task that creates this unsolvable

inability. The inability is actually, indeed, the fact that native speaking students, teachers, and

persons are restricted from doing so. The this argument of supply and demand is flawed by the

fact that we are limiting ourselves. Evidently, this can be fixed over time.

Another argument that is not in favor of a bilingual education says that this would require

multiculturalism to work. In many locations, schools are beginning to include “multicultural

night” for their diverse student bodies. There are even districts who host Multicultural

Month/Week events open to the communities to learn about the different types of ethnic

backgrounds that fill their neighborhoods. And this movement is growing year by year. More

students are participating in multicultural events at their schools, recreation centers, cultural

centers, and more. Larger schools now have clubs based on ethnic backgrounds that students are

encouraged to engage with. For example, the University of Washington has a Micronesian

Islanders Club for pacific islanders and students interested in learning about their cultures.

Multiculturalism can work. It should not be perceived as something that blockades this

educational progression.

Bilingual education gives the minority population many self benefits. It is argued that the

implementation of bilingual education supports acculturation, which makes students stop

self-hate or family shame and turn to feeling better about themselves. Therefore, the mental

wellness of the large number of minorities will generally increase. This also betters the global

market in terms of emphasizing the importance of utilizing foreign languages. Not only does

bilingual education help mental wellness and economic tactics, but also local social security and
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overall IQ. With a more understandable, fitting education, students are able to score higher and

engage in coursework. When students advance in their education, more opportunities are open

for their future. Finally, when students are able to take part in employment in the future, they are

participating and giving back to the community systems.

I believe bilingual education benefits not only the minority population but everyone as a

whole because of the mass amount of information that can be developed and shared to the world

by non-english curriculums. Every person has their own life experiences and challenges they

face. Every person has the right to share their stories, but people of ethnic backgrounds are

unable to do so because of their inadequate educational skills. Paula Moya’s “Who We Are and

From Where We Speak”, explains her definition of “Identity” to be something changing,

evolving in what he/she and his/her companions identify the single person as. Identities help us

shape how we perceive the world. She argues that identity is formulated by everyday

experiences, in contrast to knowledge which is gained by our race, religion, gender, etc. In this

sense, our identities that formulate our individual, unique stories come from a uniform system of

facing experiences that isn’t influenced by our race. If everyone had the ability to share their

personal findings, we would be learning about different challenges in many perspectives. This

gives us the power to learn about life in numerous ways. However, these stories cannot be fully

told or hold the same value if they are cut down, cleaned up, and manipulated to fit the “white”

eyes. This all begins with the elementary schools implementing bilingual education. If students

are able to learn in their native language, then they are given the tools and confidence to

articulate, demonstrate, and share their unique personal findings to the community in ways that

are currently unheard of.

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Stories are important to our academics because they ask students to take the risk in

expanding others’ minds to open learning. In Maria Gonzalez’s book “Expressions of

Ethnography”, she presented her key points to ethnography to be opportunism, independence of

the researcher, entitlement, and the primacy of rationality. The first ethic, according to Gonzalez,

is accountability. She discussed how majority of people look at the term in meanings of those

who have not followed the rules, and presents how we should define it as the ability to tell

stories. How to tell our own stories and where they derive from based on our own life

experiences. Bilingual education can allow minority students to express their stories to its full

potential and better the knowledge of not only themselves, but the social community around

them. The second ethic, as defined by Gonzalez, is context. Context is the detail and description

of the setting of the story that is being told. Context should be full, in depth, and including all

aspects of the told story. It should not be trimmed and altered to fit Eurocentric editing and

acceptance. The third ethic Gonzalez claims to be is truthfulness. When the full story is being

told, the whole truth is being displayed. The fourth ethic is community. In Gonzalez’s thoughts,

community is not who is around us, but rather those who are listening. A community conquers

separation between those within it. This could unify and solve the multiculturalism blockade that

professors use to argue for English only institutions. A community that offers bilingual education

is open to learning and listening to the different stories that persons of color have to say for the

benefit of everyone’s academic learning and world-wide understanding.

Fyre Graveline’s “Circle as methodology” introduces, explains, and lists the rules to

Eurocentric Editing. The first rule, anonymity/objectivity, requires the wipe out of personal

information from the story. The second rule, categorization, confines data to the identified
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themes. The third rule, brevity, breaks up complex ideas. The fourth rule, readability, makes sure

the story is understandable and told in a professional way. Graveline wants stories to be told in

full- no edits. Similar to ​Frank Chin’s “An Anthropology of Chinese American and Japanese

American Literature”, Chin argues that our cultural traditions, morals, artifacts, texts, and more

should all be preserved with their original values instead of transforming them until they meet

American/white acceptance criteria.

The European spoke in Latin, a language that majority of the modern, ethnic world does

not comprehend fluently. European power utilizes language that only their population of

individuals can understand to impose a sense of superiority- a hierarchy. This is one of the

unspoken truths about American education and students of non-european heritage. We,

minorities, go to school to get an education under the American curriculum to learn how to

present our thoughts through White customs. We forget or abandon our own ways to assimilate

to the White majority in order for our work to even be considered by the ones ruling. However, if

people of non-european descent were given the opportunity to take advantage of higher

education in bilingual curriculums, we could not only overcome the challenges of half-told

stories, but also push against the white supremacy in academia.

Aboriginal, indigenous, and minority peoples have historically been denied academic

tools to speak their own voice. What better to tell a story from a person who has lived the story,

rather than one who has watched from afar. Bilingual education enables students to grow in the

classroom, in their ethnic backgrounds, and in our social communities. For the betterment of our

society, bilingual education should be implemented into our education institutions so each
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individual of America can have the excel in academics, break the glass ceiling, push against

white supremacy in education, and share their truthful, whole stories for the world to learn from.