The Journal of Language and Literacy Education (JoLLE), under the editorship of Cris Barabas and Zihan Lin, recently published its 20th volume, “Multiliteracies as Pedagogy: Connecting, Advocating, Resisting.”
In this volume, Dr. Patriann Smith was honored to share the brief article, “Transnational Raciosemiolingual Normalization and the Schizophrenic Exoticism of Literacies” as part of the section, “Scholars Speak Out.” The piece emerged from Dr. Smith’s reflection on her experience as a transnational scholar-mother-educator, who, along with her daughter, has for over a decade, traversed the central and northern worlds of the Americas commonly known as the Caribbean and the United States.
Revealing what she refers to as transnational exoticism juxtaposed against transnational normalization among Caribbean and American natives, because and regardless of their racialization as white or otherwise, Dr. Smith challenges the field of literacy and language to attend to the ways in which “visitation” to countries such as those of the Caribbean positions American nationals as superior even while a pervasive tendency persists to denigrate “immigrants” and “immigration” in the United States.
Patriann Smith, Ph.D. 