Language, Culture, and Privilege: Aligning the ABC’s and Identity Texts

Abstract This chapter discusses the theory and practical implementations of two educational approaches that have proven to contribute significantly to the understanding of the self and the other: the ABC’s approach and identity texts. We examine the role each approach plays in developing a deeper appreciation of culturally sustaining models of teaching and learning. The ABC’s approach uses a process of self‑discovery as a precondition to understanding others: “Know thyself and understand others” (Schmidt, 1999). In a similar vein, the process of incorporating identity texts is a cognitively challenging activity in which students depict themselves through a variety of modes, combining the written, spoken, visual, musical, dramatic, or multimodal. We discuss examples of aligning and flexibly combining these two approaches, showing how this combination can be implemented to respond to the needs of a rapidly evolving education system.