| To meet the academic and social-emotional needs of recently-arrived immigrant youth, Newcomer high schools have been created in many urban areas. In New York City, these schools are often comprised mostly of Spanish-speaking students (ranging from 80-95%) with a small, yet diverse and growing minority of speakers of lesser-used languages who are also a religious minority. While schools often have Spanish-bilingual staff and resources for the dominant Latino population, educators are often left asking, "But what about the other kids?" the Muslim speakers of Bengali, Arabic, Fulani, Wolof, Kotokoli, and even more languages, who share no home languages with school adults.;In order to help schools and teachers meet the academic, linguistic, and social-emotional needs of these "other kids," this study explores the school experiences and meaning-making of recently-arrived Muslim immigrant youth in a majority-Spanish-speaking Newcomer high school in the Bronx. Using arts-based pedagogical research, data is drawn from one year of after-school sessions where youth took photography, created social maps, collages, books, and graphic arts pieces to shape and expand on interviews, whole-group discussions, peer interviews, and participant observation.;Major findings reveal how youth translanguage (García, 2009) throughout the school day, using self-regulated, and self-initiated learning, while also expressing value in multilingual learning, but acknowledging that bilingual education is not a privilege afforded to them. While allowed the space for home language learning, these youth are simultaneously experiencing multiple racisms - personal and pedagogical oppression based on differences in language, homeland, and religion. This duality, and ways of making meaning of it, shape youth's complex educational linguistic identities, or their perceptions of how languages should be used in learning.;The voices of these youth speak to the needs of educators and schools working with diverse linguistic and religious populations. The ways in which these youth translanguage in their learning, and conceptualize messages articulated by the school, provide new understandings of effective strategies, school structures, and pedagogical practices for teaching emergent bilinguals, recently-arrived immigrants, and religious minority youth. Lessons are also learned from the methodology of this study itself, as an empowering tool for representation, and a way to expand youth's linguistic repertoires and sharing of ideas through art and creative expressions. |
