Migrating while Multilingual and Black: Literate Experiences of Invisible Youth

Bidialectalism , the systematic use of two different dialects (i.e., standardized and non-

standardized variations) of the same language, is an underrecognized and unappreciated 

phenomenon in education across the globe. An extensive body of research has explored 

bidialectalism,  yet   there remains a deeply entrenched resistance to speakers of non-standardized 

languages and to the  dialects  that they speak in and beyond the educational arena. Despite the 

extensive body of research regarding standardized and non-standardized languages, racialized

speakers of non-standardized languages (i.e., often perceived as  dialects  and as  inferior ) are often 

regarded as illegitimate. The prescribed illegitimacy ascribed by the  White subject  and the equally 

and inadvertently accepted inferiority on the part of the racialized  object  in dialectal production 

largely fails to be associated with White speakers, many of whom are applauded for their 

simultaneous leveraging of standardized and non-standardized languages alike .  Meanwhile, the 

personhood of racialized speakers who leverage non-standardized languages (i.e.,  dialects ) 

remains delegitimized. In the conceptual essay that constitutes this chapter, we challenge the use 

of terms such as  dialect ,  bidialectal ,  bidialectalism  in the labelling of non-standardized and other 

languages that has persisted in delegitimizing individuals as racialized objects. We argue that 

such speakers be allowed to enjoy the privilege afforded to  bilingualism ,  multilingualism , 

trilingualism  as natural language categories, all of which are associated with, and ascribed 

privilege when deployed by the supposedly adept White subject. To make this argument, we 

draw from positioning theory, (trans)languaging and (trans)raciolinguistics, all illustrating how a 

Black Caribbean English-speaking immigrant youth described his own use of English  dialects  as 

languages. We then explain how ascribing the label  dialectal  to the Englishes leveraged by this 

youth reifies raciolinguistic ideologies at both the individual and contextual ( i.e., societal or 

global ) levels. We invite the field to instead use the label,  translanguaging with Englishes (TWE)

as a term for specifying how languaging functions for speakers of multiple Englishes, and TWE 

while Black to reflect the agency embedded in the   language   practices of (racialized) youth who 

speak these Englishes. Implications for research, theory, policy and practice are provided.