Becoming “Local” in Esl

Drawn from a 2.5 year critical ethnography in the ESL program of a Hawai‘i public high school (Tradewinds High), this article examines racializing and racist conduct directed at Micronesian students by a group of old-timer ESL students, primarily of East/Southeast Asian inheritance. Racialization and racism directed at Micronesians positioned them as members of an out-group of FOBs (fresh off the boat) and served as resources for old-timer ESL students to produce identities of distinction as non-FOBs, an in-group glossed as Local ESL. Analysis of classroom interaction demonstrates how the production of Local ESL identity led to the recursive instantiation of a “mainstream/ESL” hierarchy within the ESL program that mapped onto a racist hierarchy of racial identifications in the Tradewinds and wider Hawai‘i contexts. The article concludes with questions for reflection about how TESOL educators and researchers might work to incorporate as topics for instruction matters concerning race, racialization, and racism.