In 1970, Andersson and Boyer (Reference Andersson and Boyer1970) began their two-volume set on Bilingual Schooling in the United States by describing varieties of bilingual schooling in United States history and around the world. They then asked:
Is bilingualism a good thing for the community, for the nation? … Should it be supported through instruction in the schools? How do languages relate to social roles? … What determines community attitude toward a given language, toward bilingualism, toward bilingual schooling? How should majority and minority language groups interact? … How much do language problems and inter-group tensions result from ignorance—of the nature of language; the process of language learning; the inter-relationship of language, culture, and society, etc.? (p. 34)
Almost 40 years later, García and Baker address similar questions. How new are the answers?
Not surprisingly, the authors of both volumes believe that bilingualism is good and should be supported through some type of bilingual instruction. Many of the types of bilingual instruction covered in the first section of García and Baker's volume are the same as those in the 1970s: immersion, dual-language programs (of the type that used to be called maintenance), and transitional programs. Two new developments in the United States, although not new elsewhere, are indigenous language revitalization (McCarty) and dual-language programs that include and are even designed for native speakers of the majority language (contrary to the strict language equity definition of dual language programs; Torres-Guzmán).
The second and fourth sections of the reader, on history/policy and issues, respectively, introduce the newest information pertaining to laws and concerns of the last 40 years, such as California's proposition 227 (Cummins; Skutnabb-Kangas; Crawford) and an intriguing Hebrew-Arabic dual-language program in an Israeli-Palestinian community (Feuerverger).
What is missing most now, as then, are clear measures of success of bilingual education. This is in large part because the goals of the different types of programs are themselves different. The third section of the reader is largely devoted to discussions of literacies (Hornberger; Gibbons; Kelly, Gregory, & Williams). The fourth section includes pedagogical models and experiences (Dong; Ortiz). There is little or no solid generalizable comparison of language proficiency and literacy in the different types of programs, nor is there information about how well the programs meet their own goals. Abedi's extensive chapter on language and No Child Left Behind examines test scores of English monolinguals, nonnative but fluent English speakers, and limited English students, but it does not identify the products of bilingual programs within those numbers. Thus, 40 years later (through no fault of the current editors), the critical data to address community attitudes and to argue among various bilingual or pull-out English-only programs are still woefully inadequate.
García and Baker provide a comprehensive reader designed as a course book, with comprehension questions, student activities, and further readings. Because of the transience of Web sites, some useful ones are listed in the introduction, but not in each chapter. The activities emphasize critical thinking, reflection, and observation through “introspection, generalization, and personalization”; however, critical thinking skills are somewhat blurred when the editors wish to “extend reading by generalization to the student's locality” (p. vii)—that is, analogy to a specific and personal example not generalization to overarching principles. Still, the reader and its activities make a worthwhile if not definitive contribution to the literature on bilingual education.
