What I Brought With Me: Bilingualism, Resistance, and Identity in U.S. Doctoral Education

Authors

• Xiao Hu, University Of UtahFollow

Abstract

In U.S. higher education, the bilingualism of international doctoral students is often reduced to a measure of English deficiency rather than recognized as a linguistic and cultural resource. Drawing on Anzaldúa's borderlands theory, this autoethnographic study examines the lived experiences of a female Chinese international doctoral student negotiating bilingual identity in U.S. academia. Using personal journals, written correspondence, field notes, and memories of significant encounters as data, this inquiry explores three dimensions of experience: the ways bilingual identity is misread or appropriated in academic spaces; the relationships that offered recognition and belonging; and the cultural and pedagogical knowledge that bilingualism carries beyond language itself. Rather than framing bilingualism as a deficit to be managed, this study suggests that carrying two languages and two ways of knowing can function as a resource for resistance, connection, and agency within English-dominated doctoral education. This study contributes to autoethnographic literature on international doctoral students by shifting the frame from survival to agency, and to teacher education by attending to what bilingual scholars carry into academic spaces.

Recommended Citation

Hu, Xiao (2026) "What I Brought With Me: Bilingualism, Resistance, and Identity in U.S. Doctoral Education," Journal of Educational Research and Innovation: Vol. 14, Article 3.
Available at: https://digscholarship.unco.edu/jeri/vol14/iss1/3