Language and ethnicity research in education is motivated by several concerns. Some sociolinguists are chiefly interested in ethnic minority achievement in the classroom, exploring the role of language in educational success and failure. Others are primarily concerned with ethnic dialects and ethnic minority languages, examining the role of schools in valuing and supporting linguistic varieties with minimal institutional legitimacy. Still others are mainly fascinated by youth interactional practices, using educational sites to witness the constant doing and undoing of ethnic groups and boundaries through language use. Oftentimes these various concerns overlap, providing complex accounts of how linguistic, ethnic and educational issues are elaborately intertwined. In this chapter, I discuss definitions of ethnicity, sociolinguistic research methods in language and ethnicity, and language and ethnicity research by ethnic group and by educational site. I end with suggestions for future research as well as implications for language educators.

Definitions of Ethnicity

The concept of ethnicity can be quite vexing. What is frustrating about ethnicity and associated concepts (like race and culture) is that they refer to nothing, that is, no thing, making these terms essentially – and existentially – indefinable. Unlike words like ‘apple’ that more straightforwardly index objects, ethnicity is something you just can’t grab and bite into. This intangible quality provides much variability in how ethnicity is understood, valued and applied. Even though scientists generally agree that there is no biological evidence to support their importance, ethnicity and race are still commonly perceived as primordial and natural categories. Since it is people – not genetics or nature – that insist on the significance of these categories in the classification of human beings (Le Page & Tabouret-Keller, 1985), several scholars argue that ethnicity and race are social constructs with great political significance.