Two Latina bilingual teacher candidates' perceptions of language proficiency and language choice options: Ideological encounters with listening and speaking others

In this interview-based study, we examine two Latina bilingual teacher candidates' accounts of their experiences as Spanish-dominant, Mexican-national bilingual speakers in social and institutional spaces. We analyze their accounts of grappling with circulating language ideologies from a raciolinguistic perspective, using tenets of critical discourse analysis. Our analysis illuminates the ways these Latina bilingual teacher candidates' encounters with an array of interlocutors-listening and speaking others-have shaped their experiences as racialized bilinguals. Findings suggest that these ideologically laden encounters, characterized by power imbalances, play a hefty and often unexamined role in shaping bilingual teacher candidates' perceptions of their language proficiency and institutionally sanctioned language choice options.