The sociocultural contexts of being/becoming Japanese within a Japanese supplementary culture /language school: A practitioner researcher's un/learning of culture and teaching

This dissertation examines the sociocultural contexts in which elementary students of Japanese heritage experience their being/becoming Japanese diasporic subjects. By utilizing a practitioner research approach, the study explores the unique experiences, perspectives, and needs of Japanese elementary students who were being raised in the U.S. I conducted the research in Sakura Japanese School, a Japanese supplementary language/culture school in the U.S. where I worked as a teacher.;My research suggests that Sakura Japanese School functioned as a community of practice with the local goal of affirming Japanese identity. In the school, my students were learning about Japanese language and Japanese curricular contents to recognize what Japanese culture meant. The findings of my research also demonstrate how the students were learning to be/become Japanese subjects who would become successful subjects as legitimate participants in Japanese society. This study reveals that the students were not receiving adequate support and guidance in making sense of their uniquely hybrid experiences and of who they were in the U.S. It points out that the students' bicultural or multicultural identities were not being accounted for in the school.;The study also describes how the process of planning and teaching in culturally relevant ways is complex and full of contradictions. Although I shared a Japanese heritage with my students, this research helped me recognize that our common ethnicity did not necessarily qualify or prepare me to teach in culturally relevant ways. Overall, this research suggests that educators need to acknowledge culture as a complex social phenomenon. It argues that when we utilize a narrow notion of culture in educating students about heritage and identity, we marginalize the multiple ways of being/becoming and knowing.