Call for papers, no. 1: Harvard Educational Review special edition: Diverse experiences of immigrant children and youth in education

The US-based Harvard Educational Review (HER) has issued a call for papers for a special issue on “Diverse Experiences of Immigrant Children and Youth In Education”.

Diverse Experiences of Immigrant Children and Youth in Education is seeking to publish an issue on experiences of immigrant children and youth in the formal educational arena. From the call (Source: nameorg.org listerv):

“In order to extend and reframe the dialogue on immigration issues in the United States by bringing multiple voices and perspectives of researchers, practitioners, families, and students in conversation. We envision a vigorous generation of unconventional intellectual exchange that will illuminate rich portraits of diverse immigrant children?
“In PreK-12 pipeline, who are too often characterized as “disadvantaged” and even culturally deprived. We further hope that a collection of these voices will celebrate the strengths, resilience, contributions, and humanity of a population often characterized as a threatening nuisance in U.S. society.
“While the topic of immigration is always relevant, the recent enactment of new immigration laws in Arizona and the surrounding protests, debates, and legal battles, have once again thrust this ongoing theme into the forefront of our collective consciousness. Unfortunately, the discourses surrounding this and other immigration-related news stories tend towards simplified understandings of immigration and the immigrant experience, and often portray immigrants and their children as a national crisis, or burden that must be managed, rather than as a complex, rich, and growing part of our national fabric. Contrary to such ideological approaches, we as the editorial board of HER summon other immigrant stories left untold, and at times, silenced.
“As the tenth anniversary of our 2001 special issue on immigration and education, the scope of this new issue will encompass the complexities of navigation pathways and social processes within and across multiple linguistic and cultural contexts that shape the lived experiences of immigrant children and adolescents. Within this framework, we aim to explore multiple contexts of immigrant childhood and adolescence, parents, families, schools, neighborhoods, ethnic community centers, weekend language schools, churches, and civic institutions that collectively present support and challenges and how these students draw upon their experiences in these complex environments to thrive in the current education system.
“We encourage authors to consider, when relevant, cross-cultural perspectives across immigrant groups and highlight processes and mechanisms by which different authors to consider, when relevant, cross-cultural perspectives across immigrant groups and highlight processes and mechanisms by which different immigrant groups build bridges across cultural contexts. In particular, we encourage proposals for manuscript that address one or more of these following contextual themes”:

1. Children in Immigrant Homes (e.g., family dynamic, parenting role, documentation status, family literacy practice, concept of home, role of siblings)
2. Children in Ethnic Communities or Immigrant Neighborhoods (e.g., language schools, cultural education centers, informal childcare, relative support, housing, playground, park)
3. Children of Immigrants in Schools, Community-Based, Religious, and/or Civic Institutions (e.g., youth culture, peer relationships, ESL tracking, faith-based institutions and community organizing institutions serving immigrant groups, health care centers, workplace).

“HER invites authors to submit proposals for manuscripts that address the educational experiences of immigrant children and youth, from early childhood through late adolescence, Pre-K through 12th grade.
“HER has historically defined “education” broadly, as education takes place in many locations other than schools.We are looking for three types of manuscripts:

1. Scholarly articles from researchers including, but not limited to, original research, theoretical manuscripts, and essays.
2. Reflective essays and narratives from practitioners (teachers, teacher educators, school leaders, program directors, community organizers, religious leaders, coaches, etc.).
3. Stories from children, and youth who are growing up in immigrant homes and communities. (We have a separate process for this type of manuscript. If you know young people who might be interested, please contact us).

For information about the types of manuscripts accepted by HER, please visit the Guidelines for Authors page or contact 617-495-3432.
Proposals due by Sept 15, 2010 to the following email address: her_si_submissions@gse.harvard.edu