Bilingual Education in the United States: Historical Development and Current Issues

Abstract Bilingual education in the United States has been contested and reformulated within varying historical, political, social, and economic contexts. Guided by three interrelated research questions on ideology, policy, and politics, this article examines the various interpretations of the historical forces that have determined language policy in the United States by first briefly discussing the permissive, restrictive, opportunist, and dismissive periods and then focusing on the current challenges to bilingual education. The author argues that changing political, social, and economic forces, rather than any consistent ideology, have shaped the nation's responses to language diversity. He concludes that language ideology in the United States has shifted according to changing historical events, and the absence of a consistent U.S. language ideology has enhanced the role of symbolic politics—the resentment of special treatment for minority groups.