Professor Dina López was born in Guatemala and raised in Providence, Rhode Island. After receiving her BA in Community Health from Brown University, she worked with community-based organizations in Providence around issues of adult literacy, language education, and immigrant rights. Professor López moved to the New York area to pursue an MS in Adult Education (with a focus on literacy) at Fordham University. She received her Doctorate of Education in International Educational Development from Teachers College, Columbia University. Her dissertation research was an ethnographic study of an English Literacy and Civics Education program in New York City—examining how federal policy was enacted by local policy actors.

Ed.D.  Teachers College, Columbia University, International Educational  Development
M.S.    Fordham University, Adult Education (Concentration in Literacy)
B.A.    Brown University, Community Health

Dissertation:
Identity, Agency, and Language Learning: An Ethnographic Study of an English Literacy and Civics Education Program in New York City
 

Dina López's research is located at the intersection of sociocultural approaches to language and literacy, the anthropology of education, and immigration and education.  Through her work, she examines the situated nature of educational practices, particularly as they relate to processes of social identification and student agency.  Her research is motivated by a desire to understand how language learners are positioned and position themselves in school and community discourses—attending to how global and transnational processes are manifested at the local level. 

Morrell, Z. & López, D. (2021). Translanguaging and emergent literacy in early childhood education. In City University of New York – New York State Initiative on Emergent Bilinguals (Eds.), Translanguaging and Transformative Teaching for Emergent Bilingual Students: Lessons from the CUNY-NYSIEB Project (pp-149-165). New York: Routledge. 

Kleyn, T. & López, D. (2021). Teaching current immigration issues to secondary immigrant and U.S.-born students: Interdisciplinary dialogic learning for critical understandings. In Amanda Kibler, Guadalupe Valdés, & Aída Walqui (Eds.), Reconceptualizing the Role of Critical Dialogue in American Classrooms: Promoting Equity through Dialogic Education (pp. 132-156). New York: Routledge.

López, D. & García, O. (2020). Translanguaging: Challenges and opportunities for school leaders. In Crawford, E. & Dorner, L. (Eds.), Educational Leadership of Immigrants: Case Studies in Times of Change (pp.37-47). New York: Routledge

López, D. (2019). Reflections on language and identity: Ofelia García’s impact on one Latina’s academic trajectory and scholarship. Journal of Multilingual Education Research, 9(3), p.127-135.

López, D. (2019). Jugando y explorando together: Translanguaging and guided play in a bilingual kindergarten classroom in NYC. Journal of Bilingual Education Research and Instruction, 21(1), p.1-16.

Souto-Manning, M., Falk, B., López, D., Cruz, L., Bradt, N., Cardwell, N. McGowan, N., Perez, A., Rabadi-Raol, A., Rollins, E., (2019). A transdisciplinary approach to equitable teaching in early childhood education. Review of Research in Education, 43, 249-276.

Valdiviezo, L. & López, D. (2018). The education and development of Peruvian youth: Opportunities, challenges, and possibilities In Makkula, M. & Sneider-Munoz, A. (Eds.), Adolescent Psychology in Today's World: Global Perspectives on Risks, Relationships, and Development. Westport, CT: Praeger. 

López, D. (2015). Neoliberal discourses and the local policy implementation of an English literacy and civics education program. L2 Journal, 7(3), 97-122.

López, D. (2015). Higher Education Consortium (HEC) Strand. The NYSABE Bilingual Times.

López, D., & Makar, M. (2015). The Common Core and the bilingual classroom: Findings from a New York City case study. The Professional Journal of the New York Academy of Public Education, Issue 4, 7-13.

Kleyn, T., López, D., & Makar, M. (2015). What about bilingualism? A critical reflection on the edTPA with teachers of emergent bilinguals. Bilingual Research Journal, 38(1), 88-106.

López, D. & Bartlett, L. (2014). Language and identities In Leung, C. and Street, B. (Eds.) Routledge Companion to English Studies. New York: Routledge.

López, D. (2012)*. Immigrant identities in transnational contexts: The figured world of a New York City English Literacy and Civics Education classroom. In Urias, D. (Ed). The immigration & education nexus: A focus on the context & consequences of schooling (pp. 189-209). Boston, MA: Sense Publishing.

*Republished in 2015, Y. Medina, N.D. Macaya, & A.D. Macaya (Eds.), Latinas/os on the East Coast: A Critical Reader (pp. 167-181).

Bartlett, L., López, D., Mein, E., & Valdiviezo, L. (2011). Adolescent literacies in Latin America. Review of Research in Education, 35(1), 174-207.

Bartlett, L., López, D., Vasudevan L., & Warriner, D. (2011). The Anthropology of Literacy. In Levinson, B. and Pollock, M. (Eds), A Companion to the Anthropology of Education (pp.154-176).  Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell.

García, O., López, D., & Makar, C. (2010). Latin America. In Fishman, J. and Garcia, O. (Eds.), Handbook of Language and Ethnic Identity, Second Edition (pp. 353-373). New York: Oxford University Press.

López, D. (2010). [Review of the books Hidden Literacies: Ethnographic Studies of Literacy and Numeracy Practices and Everyday Literacies in Africa: Ethnographic Studies of Literacy and Numeracy Practices in Ethiopia]. Anthropology and Education Quarterly, 41(4), 392-394.

López, D., & Valdez Young, A. (2004). VozMujer: querer es poder: uniting language and leadership development for Latina immigrants. The Change Agent. 19, pp. 61-62.