Introduction

Discourses of globalization, centering on global flows of information, people, and resources, have become increasingly prominent in educational literature. These conversations are especially relevant for English language learners (ELLs) who regularly move within and across geopolitical and ideological borders. Many education scholars have begun exploring the role of multimodal communication and digital media in maintaining and extending borders, including possibilities for fostering “critical cosmopolitanism” (Hawkins, 2014), which not only considers global encounters, but, further, addresses ethical, intellectual, and performative aspects of this type of interconnectedness.

Cosmopolitanism is far from a new concept; scholars trace its origin to ancient Greece where, in the 4th century BC, Diogenes deemed himself a “kosmou polites,” or a citizen of the world (Ong, 2009). This idea was reaffirmed during the Enlightenment era and has been taken up across disciplines, largely as a political theory; more recently, cosmopolitanism has extended into the social sphere to consider the implications of increased global interconnectedness (Delanty, 2006). However, scholars such as Hawkins (2014) argue that existing literature on cosmopolitanism has not sufficiently engaged with issues of power and privilege. Bringing the concept to bear on education, she calls for a “critical cosmopolitan education” that explicitly engages with social justice.

At the 2016 TESOL convention, we employed this critical lens to consider how learning environments in classrooms and community-based sites might be designed to expand understandings of learning, literacy, and globalization. We presented findings from three studies that explore how digital technology and communication shapes students’ development of a critical cosmopolitan stance. In the first study, the author examined the use of technology-enhanced learning environments to support literacy and global awareness among adolescent ELLs. In the second, the author shared findings from Global StoryBridges, an afterschool program for preadolescent ELLs that connects students through digital storytelling. In the third, the author explored how digital tools fostered critical reflection for preservice teachers who were teaching abroad. Together, these studies provide a consideration of critical applications of digital technology for ELLs and their teachers.

Literacy, Learning, and Globalization: Technology-Enhanced Learning Environments for Youth

Rachel Manley

The qualitative study I presented examined the affordances and challenges of using technology-enhanced learning environments to support literacy and global awareness among youth in out-of-school contexts. I was particularly interested in finding evidence of critical cosmopolitanism while youth engaged in cross-cultural communication. There were five participants, ages 9–11, all nonnative English speakers. In this 6-week project, they engaged in cross-cultural interactions through the ePals website. They created and exchanged artwork, photos, and videos and participated in online discussion forums with students from Romania and Namibia. My data sources included observations, artifacts (artwork, photos, movies), and student interviews.

I found two main patterns of understanding: making connections and making comparisons. Making connections and comparing cultures were common and consistent ways in which students made sense of transnational communication. For example, the U.S. students viewed a photo tour of a Romanian school. The discussion that followed showed evidence of students making connections and comparisons with their experiences (see Figure 1). Making connections allowed learners to see the broader global context of their interactions, while making comparisons situated students in relation to global others. These ways of understanding are indicators that students are engaged in cosmopolitan practices and working toward more globally conscious selves.

Figure 1. U.S. students’ discussion of Romanian school photo tour

The findings from interviews suggest a shared belief in the importance of cross-cultural communication and global awareness among students and staff at the community center. Some learners expressed their desire for more general knowledge about other cultures, while others argued that global awareness is necessary for successful cross-cultural interactions and relationships. As one student explained, “It is important to learn about how people are the same and different from you, and what their lives are like.”

Digital Stories as Global Bridges: Language, Culture, and Critical Cosmopolitan Education

Rui Li

This study explores how digitally-mediated learning in community-based sites can amplify understandings of language and culture. Global StoryBridges is an afterschool program created by Professor Margaret Hawkins that uses digital storytelling to link global ELLs (ages 11–12) living in poverty. Using iMovie and Flip cameras, youth collaboratively create and share digital stories with global peers. They also post and answer questions (in English) regarding others’ videos posted on the project website. The project aims to provide equal access to digital transnational communication and to foster social justice (Hawkins, 2014). As the project coordinator, I examined how children engaged with digital storytelling and transnational communication reconstruct their cultural and linguistic worlds. Approaching this critically, I explored how project activities illuminate issues of power, status, and privilege.

From my data analysis, I found that the project provided space for learners to explore cosmopolitan identities through conversations about language. For instance, after the Ugandan children posted a video in which they sang hymns in Luganda, their local language, the students from the Chinese site asked, “What language was your song?” and students from the U.S. site (also ELLs) commented, “Do you try to teach your parents English? Sometimes we try to teach English to our parents, but they still talk Spanish.” Language ideologies also emerged in the recent “Winter Solstice” video, created by the Chinese children in written and spoken English (see Figure 2). When U.S. children heard the accented English in the video, they asked, “Can they speak English?” These inquiries have inspired me to rethink language and privilege, prompting new questions. Namely, whose English is legitimized? Whose language is privileged and whose is ignored?

Figure 2. Chinese students’ video “Winter Solstice”

My broader findings show that ELLs can become critical knowledge designers, producers, and transformers through collaborative digitally-mediated, transnational communication. By integrating texts, images, audio and other multimodal resources, students developed critical understandings of their imagined worlds (Hull & Katz, 2006). Thus, I argue for critical multimodal cosmopolitan education for ELLs, one that redefines “knowledge” and “learning” in the digital era to value children’s multiple repertoires beyond language and that reconceptualizes equitable human relationships.

Fostering Critical Reflection With Preservice Teachers

Laura Hamman

In my study, I explored how digital tools shape preservice ESL teachers’ reflections and foster critical cosmopolitanism. I was particularly interested in the experiences of undergraduates who were student teaching in low-income communities in Mexico and Uganda. This project developed out of my own interest as their elementary ESL methods instructor. There were seven participants in the study, all of whom were women and most of whom were White. The digital artifacts included students’ weekly blog posts, course discussion posts, and summative digital stories. Participants were interviewed twice in focus groups.

After analyzing interview data, three themes emerged as contributing to critical reflection: authenticity, autonomy, and audience. Authenticity was an important element of the digital stories, which were, in the words of one participant, “a good format for just authentic talking about what people are feeling and thinking.” Through digital stories, dispositions of critical cosmopolitanism emerged, which included viewing all students as capable, engaging in critical self-reflection, and developing caring toward global others.

Autonomy was salient in students’ discussion of their individual blogs, a space to freely grapple with issues—unlike the more structured discussion prompts. One participant, Rebecca, explained that her blog was about “more than just those random experiences…like safaris…I wanted it to actually reflect what I was thinking about my experiences…” In one entry, she critically reflected upon constructions of race and identity, interrogating the ways her Ugandan students understood “being American”:

These moments have just made me think of the “single” stories that I would say some of my students, if not all, have seen, experienced, and heard about Whiteness. How many teachers from Canada, Australia, and America have they had come to them? How many were White? How many were of African descent? What about the tourists they have seen? What were they like? What did they look like? What about the media? Granted my student’s [sic] favorite musicians are majority Black-American, but how else have they been inundated with a single story of what it means to be American. From what I’ve heard from my students it seems pretty white washed. (Rebecca, 2015, October 3)

Finally, students described the importance of having a meaningful audience. Jamie shared her blog with family and friends, “putting it in a way that was relevant or understandable for people who are outside of the education field.” Another participant played her digital story at her graduation party. Because the digital story and blog embodied the “3 A’s” (authenticity, autonomy, and audience), they transcended the classroom and provided students with a platform for engaging with critical cosmopolitanism perspectives in a way that the structured discussion board did not. Thus, I believe that digital technologies aimed at fostering critical cosmopolitanism should be designed to provide authentic and autonomous spaces for reflection, with a format that facilitates sharing emerging understandings.

Conclusion

These brief summaries reveal different ways to engage with digital technologies to foster critical cosmopolitanism. Manley’s project showed how making connections and comparisons with global others is an important first step in achieving critical cosmopolitanism. Li demonstrated how language ideologies emerge through digital storytelling, providing a platform for critical conversations. Finally, Hamman revealed that certain conditions should be met for critical reflection to emerge from digital technology; namely, the tool itself must promote authenticity, provide autonomy, and have a meaningful audience. We argue that each of these projects demonstrates how students are approaching critical cosmopolitanism and that further research is needed to explore how digital technology can be leveraged to deepen students’ understanding of the world and foster socially just attitudes and actions toward global others.

References

Delanty, G. (2006). Cosmopolitan imagination: Critical cosmopolitanism and social theory. Journal of Sociology, 57(1), 25–47.

Hawkins, M. R. (2014). Ontologies of place, creative meaning making and critical cosmopolitan education. Curriculum Inquiry, 44(1), 90–112.

Hull, G. A., & Katz, M.-L. (2006). Crafting an agentive self: Case studies of digital storytelling. NCTE, 41(1), 43–81.

Ong, J. C. (2009). The cosmopolitan continuum: Locating cosmopolitanism in media and cultural studies. Media, Culture & Society, 31(3), 449–466.

Laura Hamman is a PhD candidate at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her dissertation research explores the role of translanguaging practices and pedagogies in dual language immersion classrooms. Laura teaches courses in ESL methods, SLA, and educational linguistics, and she supervises teachers obtaining ESL certification.

Rui Li is a PhD candidate at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her research focuses on global youth engagement with multilingual and multimodal learning and identity formation through transnational media.

Rachel Manley taught for 8 years and now works as a project coordinator for iEARN-USA. She completed her MEd at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her professional interests include understanding how technology-enhanced environments can improve literacy and understanding of global others.