Ideologies of Language and Identity in U.S.Children's Literature

Language learning, bilingualism, and immigration have become more prevalent topics in children's literature. The manner in which these subjects are taken up and engaged across texts, however, is hardly uniform. This article examines the range and variation of how multilingualism is represented in U.S. children's literature. We bring together an array of texts that reflect a continuum of ideological stances and language formats to argue that issues of language must be situated within social, cultural, and political contexts.