Chapter 14: Integrating Social Justice Themes into the Lower-Level Spanish Curriculum

Teachers’ awareness of current trends in teaching culture to promote social justice profoundly impacts students’ lives. Furthermore, an approach that fosters teaching culture in conjunction with the target language holds the promise of advancing the abilities that support global competence development (awareness, empathy, respect) (American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages, 2014). Drawing from theoretical and applied works that explore approaches to teaching for social justice, diversity, and inclusivity (Banks, 2004; Gay, 2002, 2010; Glynn et al., 2018; van Olphen & Ríos, 2004), this chapter addresses practical applications of how world language educators can explore critical topics and make the connections to current events while teaching culture in postsecondary lower-level Spanish courses. To this end, this chapter introduces readers to an implementation plan for teaching through the lenses of social justice, provides some guiding principles, discusses teaching ideas to consider when teaching complex topics such as the intersection between sports and politics, and proposes some final thoughts.