Equity in teaching academic language—an interdisciplinary approach

Some argue that supporting minoritized students’ “academic language” (AL) development fosters equity in education. Others contend that AL is hegemonic, and that attempts to teach it perpetuate inequities across racial, ethnic, social class, immigrant, and related sociocultural and linguistic student differences. In this article, we frame the topic of this special issue—interdisciplinary approaches to equity in teaching AL—and show how authors across positions and analytic methods examine the goals of teaching AL and recommend ways for educators to foster meaningful language awareness for students. Although substantive, unresolved disagreements between positions remain; we identify points of agreement as well, which we present to educators as interdisciplinary principles of equity in teaching. Namely, educators should 1) understand how language is more than just vocabulary; 2) recognize academic features in students’ everyday talk; 3) develop awareness of language and its contexts of use with students, and 4) foster critical language awareness.