Description of Research Expertise

Areas of Expertise

Linguistic anthropology of education
Sociolinguistics
Multilingual language development
Language socialization in multilingual contexts
English language learning and teaching, K-16

Professional Biography

Dr. Howard began her career teaching English as a Second/Foreign Language in Japan, Thailand, and the United States at private language schools in Japan, public grade-school in Thailand, community-based adult education programs in the U.S., and university academic ESL programs. She has trained ESL teachers in graduate-level TESOL programs and has provided in-service training for English teachers in Chiang Mai, Thailand. After receiving a master’s in TESOL and a Ph.D. in Applied Linguistics at the University of California, Los Angeles, she joined the faculty at Penn GSE in 2003. Dr. Howard’s dissertation research in Northern Thailand was funded by grants from Fulbright Thailand and the National Science Foundation, and by doctoral dissertation fellowships from the Spencer Foundation and the University of California Regents.

Dr. Howard currently teaches courses in GSE’s master’s specializations in TESOL and ICC, and the doctoral specialization in Educational Linguistics. Her courses address topics such as discourse analysis, culture and language development, teaching writing to ESL students, educational linguistics, sociolinguistics, and micro-ethnographic research methods. She co-convened the Ethnography in Education Forum from 2004-2006, and directed GSE’s master’s specialization in ICC from 2005-2007. A founding member of Penn’s Intercultural Leadership Program, she continues as its faculty director. She was guest editor of a forthcoming special issue of Linguistics and Education, and serves on the current editing team for Anthropology and Education Quarterly. She is an active member of the American Association for Applied Linguistics, American Educational Research Association, and American Anthropological Association (including the Society for Linguistics Anthropology and the Council on Anthropology and Education).

Research Interests and Current Projects

Dr. Howard is interested in multilingual children’s language socialization across the life course, in formal (e.g., classroom) and informal (e.g., home or play group) educational settings. In particular, she explores how children engage in complex social relationships in these educational contexts through their multilingual linguistic repertoires, how they are socialized into metapragmatic discourses surrounding this repertoire, and how they engage in the registers and genres of the academic content in their schooling. Her research includes long-term ethnographic work with young Muang children in Northern Thailand and with Mexican-origin children and their families in the Northeastern U.S.