Description
Scholars have considered the representation of Black, Spanish-speaking cultures in Spanish classrooms for more more than 45 years, but only recently have studies begun to point to a growing awareness and knowledge of this diversity among students. Little is known however, about the extent to which students are aware of the global breadth of Black, Spanish-speaking populations. The present study follows the work of Abreu to measure the awareness of the geographical locations and general knowledge of Afro-Latinx peoples in the Americas among students and teachers of Spanish. The research is based on a survey consisting of a racial demographic filling-in task and an open-ended knowledge task where respondents wrote anything and everything that they knew about Afro-Latinx peoples. This was followed by a series of questions on participants’ linguistic and cultural backgrounds and their experiences with Spanish outside the classroom. Results indicate that this knowledge is still quite limited and that cross-curricular (social studies, music, etc.) culture instruction may help students develop a more nuanced and thorough understanding of diversity within target cultures. Keywords: second culture acquisition, culturally responsive education, interdisciplinary instruction
