Translanguaging in English Medium Instruction Classrooms: A Qualitative Research Synthesis of Perceptions, Practices, and Pathways to Equity, Inclusion, and Epistemic Justice

Recent scholarship on bilingualism calls for an emphasis on translanguaging practices. Understanding these practices is essential to translanguaging pedagogy in an educational context such as English Medium Instruction (EMI). This qualitative research synthesis (QRS) set out to understand translanguaging practices in the EMI context from 2017 to 2024, with a focus on students’ and teachers’ perceptions of translanguaging, the affordances and limitations of translanguaging pedagogy, and translanguaging's ability to address epistemic injustice and educational inequity in EMI classrooms. For this QRS, we adopted Chong, S. W., and L. Plonsky’s (2021. “A Primer on Qualitative Research Synthesis in TESOL.” TESOL Quarterly 55 (3): 1024–1034) methodological framework and Chong’s, S. W. (2025. “Synthesis Methods and Reporting Tool (SMART) for Research Syntheses in Applied Linguistics.” Research Synthesis in Applied Linguistics:1–22) Synthesis Methods and Reporting Tool (SMART) to guide our methodological and reporting practices. We have extracted data from the 22 primary studies. The grounded theory approach was employed to synthesise the raw data and the interpreted findings. Results suggest that students and teachers perceived translanguaging as a transformative, innovative and holistic pedagogy in the EMI context. However, there are some limitations of employing translanguaging in EMI classrooms, such as English-only policy, linguistic inequality, and assessment complexity. Additionally, some studies recognised translanguaging as a pedagogical practice to foster educational equity and promote epistemic justice. Recommendations for future research on translanguaging are provided.