Kimberly Vinall

Kimberly is passionate about the study of languages and cultures because it is through culture that we know ourselves while coming to know others and it is through language that we express who we are while learning to communicate with others. Therefore, studying another language and culture can help us to explore our own identities, and it can help us to engage with the world and open ourselves to other perspectives and ideas. Becoming multilingual and multicultural is ever more important in an increasingly globalized world where geographic distances are minimalized yet, sometimes, cultural distances and misunderstandings are unfortunately increased.

Kimberly is herself bilingual; she started learning Spanish at an early age, and has had the wonderful opportunity to work in, study in, do research in, and travel to many different countries, including Spain, Mexico, Guatemala, Argentina, Chile, Colombia, and Honduras. These experiences have given her a unique perspective on the variety of Spanishes spoken throughout the world, the different values attached to them, and the variety of cultures of the Spanish-speaking world, all of which she brings into the classroom in her teaching.

Over the years, Kimberly has taught all levels of the Spanish language, Latinx cultures, and literature curricula, including novice and intermediate language courses; advanced grammar, conversation, and writing courses; literature courses; and pedagogy courses for future Spanish instructors. She has also taught at a variety of institutions, including Miracosta College, San Diego State, University of California San Diego, University of California Berkeley, and San Francisco State. In addition to designing and implementing curriculum, she also has extensive experience training and mentoring language teachers, specifically when working as a Spanish course coordinator at the University of Michigan. Engaging with learners with differing backgrounds and experiences in a variety of settings has helped form her as an instructor who strives to identify learners’ needs in order to better support learning.

In order to explore the relationships between languages, cultures, identities, and ideologies Kimberly’s research draws from the fields of second language acquisition theory, applied linguistics, sociolinguistics, and cultural studies. At a broad level she is interested in the following questions: How do learners engage with cultural and linguistic differences? How do teaching materials, pedagogical practices, and instructors’ experiences mediate this engagement? What impact does this engagement have in terms of learners’ own identity constructions? How does this engagement facilitate their learning and the development of intercultural understanding? More specifically, her research and teaching has focused on global critical service-learning, the development of intercultural and symbolic competence, and teaching languages and cultures through a social justice lens.

Education

Ph.D.

University of California, Berkeley

Language, Literacy, and Culture Division of the Graduate School of Education

M.A.

University of Arizona

Hispanic Literature

B.A.

Indiana University

Double major: Spanish and Anthropology

Selected Publications

Selected Invited Talks

  • “Bridging cultures and languages,” Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey, March 2018.
  • “Becoming language activists through foreign/second language education,” University of Massachusetts, Boston, February 2018.
  • “Engaging culture in the language classroom,” presented at USD, January 2017.
  • “Developing symbolic competence through cultural representations,” presented for German Academic Exchange Service, Fall 2015, Fall 2016, UC Berkeley.
  • “Critical reflections on community service-learning (CSL),” presented at SFSU, Spring 2015.

Selected Conference Presentations

  • “Learners’ voices: Exploring understandings of social justice and their relevance in language / culture learning,” AAAL, 2018.
  • “The critical potentials of community service-learning (CSL)?,” presented as part of a panel titled “Integrating service-learning into applied linguistics: Practices, challenges, and results,” American Association of Applied Linguistics (AAAL), 2016.
  • “Developing critical cultural awareness in ELT contexts,” Korea Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages (KOTESOL), co-presented with Jaran Shin, Daegu, Korea, 2014.
  • “Critical reflections on ‘becoming’ researchers in the age of neoliberalism,” American Association for Applied Linguistics (AAAL), co-presented with Emily Hellmich and Jaran Shin as part of a colloquium I organized titled “Neoliberalism and its Impact on Language, Research, and Learning,” 2014.
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