Kim Potowski (Ph.D., University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign)
Associate Professor of Spanish
Director, Spanish for heritage speakers
(312) 996-8524
kimpotow@uic.edu
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Courses taught at UIC
Undergraduate:
Introduction to Hispanic Linguistics (Span 300)
Introduction to Spanish composition (Span 201)
Graduate:
Bilingualism and second language acquisition (Span 507)
Language policy and cultural identity (Span/Latino Studies 427)
Sociolinguistic field methods (Span 551)
Spanish in the United States (Span 436)
Teaching Spanish to native speakers (Span 436)
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Research Interests
My general area of interest is Spanish in the United States from perspectives that have been called sociology of language and also language policy. This includes questions such as these: Who uses Spanish in the U.S.? With whom, how often, and for what purposes? In what ways does Spanish contribute to an identity as a U.S. Latino? Is Spanish being transmitted intergenerationally? If so, what changes does it undergo?
Since schools are a primary site of language socialization, I have explored some of these questions in a Spanish-English dual immersion school. My next book-length project examines identity configurations of mixed ethnicity Latinos who refer to themselves as “MexiRicans”.
I have also carried out quantitative projects examining aspects of the structure of U.S. Spanish, including the use of codeswitching and discourse markers.
Such language use patterns and attitudes have implications for heritage language learning, for best practices in heritage language teaching, and in the professional development of heritage language teachers. In addition to publishing about Spanish as a heritage language, I am editing a book of the top 11 non-English languages spoken in the U.S. with an eye toward understanding how minority languages can be preserved (Exploring language diversity in the United States, forthcoming with Cambridge University Press).
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PUBLICATIONS
Books
Potowski, K. (2007). Language and identity in a dual immersion school. Clevedon, UK: Multilingual Matters.
Potowski, K. (2005).Fundamentos de la enseñanza del español a los hablantes nativos en los Estados Unidos (Foundations in teaching Spanish to native speakers in the United States). Madrid, Spain: Arco/Libros.
Edited volumes
Potowski, K. & Cameron, R. (2007). Spanish in Contact: Educational, Linguistic, and Social Inquiries. Selected proceedings from the 20th Conference on Spanish in the United States and the 5th Conference on Spanish in Contact with Other Languages. New York: John Benjamins.
Articles in refereed journals
Torres, L. & Potowski, K. (Forthcoming). Bilingual discourse markers in Mexican and Puerto Rican Spanish in the United States. International Journal of Bilingualism.
Potowski, K., Jegerski, J. & Morgan-Short, K. (Forthcoming). The effects of instruction on subjunctive development among Spanish heritage language speakers. Language Learning.
Potowski, K., Berne, J., Clark, A. and Hammerand, A. (2008). Spanish for K-8 Heritage Speakers: A Standards-Based Curriculum Project. Hispania, 91 (1), 25-41.
Potowski, K. and Matts, J. (2008). Interethnic language and identity: MexiRicans in Chicago. Journal of Language, Identity and Education, 6 (3).
Montrul, S. & Potowski, K. (2007). Command of gender agreement in school-age Spanish-English Bilingual Children. International Journal of Bilingualism, 11 (3), 301-328.
Potowski, K. (2007). Characteristics of the Spanish proficiency of dual immersion graduates. Spanish in Context, 4 (2), 187–216.
Potowski, K. (2005). Tense and aspect in the oral and written narratives of dual immersion students. Refereed proceedings of the Seventh Hispanic Linguistics Symposium (123-136). Somerville, MA: Cascadilla.
Potowski, K. & Carreira, M. (2004). Towards teacher development and national standards for Spanish as a heritage language. Foreign Language Annals 37 (3), 421-431.
Potowski, K. (2004). Spanish language shift in Chicago. Southwest Journal of Linguistics, 23 (1), 87-116.
Potowski, K. (2004). Student Spanish use and investment in a dual immersion classroom: Implications for second language acquisition and heritage language maintenance. Modern Language Journal, 88 (1), 75-101.
Potowski, K. (2003). Chicago's Heritage Language Teacher Corps: A model for improving Spanish teacher development. Hispania, 86 (2), 302-311.
Potowski, K. (2002). Experiences of Spanish heritage speakers in university foreign language courses and implications for teacher training. ADFL Bulletin, 33 (3), 35-42.
Chapters in books
Potowski, K. (Forthcoming) ¿Por qué ofrecen una clase para hispanohablantes? In Jennifer Ewald & Anne Edstrom (Eds.), Perspectivas: El español a la luz de la lingüística. Somerville, MA: Cascadilla.
Potowsk, K. (2008). “I was raised talking like my mom”: The influence of mothers in the development of MexiRicans’ phonological and lexical features. In J. Rothman & M. Niño-Murcia (Eds.), Linguistic Identity and Bilingualism in Different Hispanic Contexts. New York: John Benjamins (201-220).
Potowski, K. (2005). Latino children's classroom language use: The role of identity investments. In Marcia Farr (Ed.), Ethnolinguistic Chicago, Volume II: Latino Language and Literacy (157-185). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Potowski, K. (2005). Spanish language maintenance education in Chicago, IL, U.S.A. In Witte, E., Van Mensel, L., Pierrard, M., Mettewie, L., Housen, A. & De Groof, R. (Eds.), Language, Attitudes & Education in Multilingual Cities, Wetteren: Universa Press.
Books, articles and chapters under review and in progress
Potowski, K. Editor. (In progress). Exploring language diversity in the United States. Cambridge University Press.
Potowski, K. and Gorman, L. (In progress). Quinceañeras: Hybridized tradition, language use, and identity in the U.S.
Potowski. K. & Rothman, J. (Eds.) (In progress). Child Spanish speakers in English-speaking societies.
Potowski, K. (In progress). “Spanglish” greeting cards as linguistic and cultural performance.
Textbook
Dawson, L., Potowski, K. & Sobral, S. (Nov. 2007). Dicho y hecho, 8th edition. John Wiley & Sons.
Reviews
Potowski, K. (Forthcoming). Latino Crossings: Mexicans, Puerto Ricans, and the Politics of Race and Citizenship. Nicholas De Genova & Ana Ramos-Zayas 2003, Routledge. Reviewed for Latino Studies.
Potowski, K. (2006). Situational Context of Education: A Window Into the World of Bilingual Learners by Brisk, Burgos & Hamerla. Reviewed for International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism, 9 (2).
Potowski, K. (2001). Identity and language learning: Gender, ethnicity and educational change, by B. Norton. Reviewed for Bilingual Research Journal, 25 (1 & 2).