Sara I. Ramirez received her honours BA in Spanish and minor in English from York University, an MA in Foreign Languages with a concentration in Bilingual/Multicultural Spanish Education from George Mason University, and an MS in Spanish Linguistics from Georgetown University.
Before entering the Ph.D. program at Georgetown, she worked as a Spanish Instructor in both public and private education settings. She experienced first-hand the growing number of heritage language learners inside university second language classrooms, which developed her interests in second and heritage language curriculum development, language ideologies surrounding heritage speakers’ varieties, students’ internalization of such ideologies, and demotivation resulting from factors both inside and outside the classroom.
Her research interests include critical language analysis as a pedagogical application in the Spanish heritage language classroom, impacting speakers’ perceptions and attitudes towards their heritage language and influencing learners’ linguistic insecurities. She is also interested in heritage speakers’ agency and how critical language awareness contributes to the development of critical language selves as heritage speakers learn to question and challenge linguistic ideologies and the status quo. Sara hopes to contribute with further research on how teachers in the heritage classroom impact learners’ attitudes, identity, and language maintenance.
In her free time, Sara enjoys going out for brunch, doing yoga, traveling with her husband, Joe, and spending time with her grumpy cat, Luna.