May 2018 Talking Points 11 [ Teaching Literacy as a Tool for Social Action ] Bobbie Kabuto Becoming a Bilingual Reader as Linguistic and Identity Enactments B ecoming biliterate is a journey, and journeys take time. While biliteracy involves the development of metacognitive understandings and the negotiation of the linguistic aspects of two or more languages, it is also defined as a process in which individuals use language to construct identities and gain memberships into multiple social worlds (Hornberger & Link, 2012). As Compton-Lilly (2011) argues, language is the “maker of self” and the “maker of affiliation” (p. 242). To examine the process of becoming a bilingual reader as linguistic and identity enactments, the research described in this paper examines the dialogic relationships between social context, reader identities, and the develop- ment of proficient bilingual reading behaviors. More specifi- cally, this study builds on the literature that contends that translanguaging practices are necessary for demonstrating bilingual reading competence (García & Wei, 2014; Kwon & Schallert, 2016). Translanguaging is defined as “multiple discursive practices in which bilinguals engage in order to make sense of their bilingual worlds” (García & Wei, 2014, p. 45). The practice of translanguaging places the dynamic nature of language at the forefront and counters the addi- tive approach to bilingualism and biliteracy that positions languages as separate autonomous systems (e.g., a Spanish language or an English language). In this paper, I present and discuss a longitudinal case study of Jenny, a Spanish- and English-speaking child (all names are pseudonyms). I will present data and findings to (a) illustrate how Jenny evolved from a novice bilingual reader to an independent second-grade bilingual reader, as seen through her translanguaging practices; and (b) compare Jenny’s language autobiography over two time frames of the study. Finally, I will explore how Jenny’s interpretation of becoming a bilingual reader shifted over time and how she explained these shifts as a reflection of the language context of her schooling experiences. Theoretical Approaches Drawing from a socio-psycholinguistic theory of reading (Goodman, Flurkey, & Goodman, 2007), I use the term novice beginning readers to describe young readers, roughly between the ages of 3 and 7, who engage in legitimate peripheral participation (Lave & Wenger, 1991) as they par- ticipate in literacy practices and events with more expert readers. Through the practice of translanguaging, novice bilingual readers, consequently, draw upon diverse linguistic resources that transcend language boundaries when trying to make sense of and comprehend written texts, but are not independently integrating reading strategies with linguistic cues, defined as syntactic, semantic, and graphophonic cues (Goodman et al., 2007). Within bilingual educational programs, an increas- ing amount of attention has been paid to translanguaging as a pedagogical practice at the elementary (Esquinca et al., 2014), middle, and secondary levels (Daniel & Pacheco, 2015; Stewart & Hansen-Thomas, 2016). Examining the role of translation in supporting comprehension and connecting their findings to the practice of translanguaging, Jiménez et al. (2015), for instance, found that bilingual readers were able to develop understandings about English text at the lexical, syntactic, and semantic levels when they were not restricted in their language usages. Focusing on the role of translanguaging in increasing comprehension of English texts, Hopewell (2013) argued that when fourth-grade Spanish and English bilingual students drew from their linguistic resources, translanguaging aided in the students’ abilities to communicate their understandings of what they