Usree Bhattacharya

Biography

Usree Bhattacharya is Associate Professor in the Language and Literacy Education Department, College of Education, UGA. She received her PhD in Education from the University of California, Berkeley in 2013. She has a Master’s degree in Teaching International Languages from California State University, Chico (2006); an MA in English Literature from Lakehead University (2001); and she received a BA in English from LSR College, Delhi University (1998). Her research is inspired by questions of diversity, equity, and access in multilingual educational contexts. A primary aim of her work is to illuminate the role of discourses, ideologies, and everyday practices in the production and reproduction of hierarchical relations within educational systems. Motivated by her daughter Kalika’s diagnosis of Rett Syndrome in 2018, she has been investigating language and literacy socialization within this severe, complex, and multi-disability context. She directs the Bhattacharya Rett Lab at UGA, which focuses on researching communication in Rett syndrome.

Areas of Expertise

  • Language and literacy socialization
  • Language ideology
  • Educational equity
  • Globalization
  • Multilingualism
  • Language policy
  • Rett Syndrome
  • Disability studies

Education

  •  PhD in Education, 2013
    University of California, Berkeley
  •  MA in Teaching International Languages, 2006
    CSU Chico
  •  MA in English Literature, 2001
    Lakehead University
  •  BA (Hons.) in English, 1998
    Delhi University

Concentrations

Contact

 Aderhold Hall, 309W
 @usreeb
 https://rettcenterll.com/

Research Summary

BOOKS CO-EDITED:

Adinolfi, L., Bhattacharya, U., & Phyak, P. (2022). Multilingual Education in South Asia: At the Intersection between Policy and Practice. Routledge.

ARTICLES

Bhattacharya, U. & Pradana, W. (2022). Exploring literacy engagement in a significant disability context. Journal of Early Childhood Literacy.

Bhattacharya, U. (2022). A mother’s argument for patient self-advocacy in Rett Syndrome using an eye-tracking communication device. American Journal of Nursing, published on AJN blog (peer-reviewed).
https://ajnoffthecharts.com/a-mothers-argument-for-patient-self-advocacy-in-rett-syndrome-using-an-eye-tracking-communication-device/

Bhattacharya, U. (2022) “I am a Parrot”: Literacy Ideologies and Rote Learning. Journal of Literacy Research.

Bhattacharya, U., Pradana, W.A., Wei, X., Tarquinio, D.C., Datta, O, Anderson, K., Patel, D., & Cruz-Díaz, N. (2022) “I want to discuss”: Rett syndrome and medical communication using an eye-tracking AAC device. E-JournALL (EuroAmerican Journal of Applied Linguistics. Bhattacharya, U. & Pradana, W. Exploring literacy engagement in a significant disability context. Journal of Early Childhood Literacy.

Bhattacharya, U. & McGovern, K. (2020). Schools, sexual violence, and safety: Adolescent girls and writing resistance at an afterschool program in suburban Mumbai. Writing & Pedagogy, 11(3), 329-350.

Hou, W., Bhattacharya, U., Pradana., W. A., & Tarquinio, D. C. (2020). Assessment of a clinical trial metric for Rett Syndrome: Critical analysis of the Rett Syndrome Behavioral Questionnaire. Pediatric neurology, 107, 48-56.

Bhattacharya, U. (2019). “My school is a big school”: Imagined communities, inclusion, and ideology in Indian textbooks. Journal of Curriculum Studies. 51(5), 664-677.

Bhattacharya, U., Jiang, L., & Canagarajah, S. (2019). “Race, Representation, and Diversity in the American Association for Applied Linguistics.” Applied Linguistics.

Bhattacharya, U. & Jiang, L. (2018). The Right to Education Act (2009): Instructional medium and discitizenship. International Journal of the Sociology of Language, 2018(253), 149-168.

Bhattacharya, U. (2017). Resisting English: Excavating English ideologies of young boys through chutkule at an Indian orphanage. Journal of Language, Identity & Education, 16(6), 1-16.

Bhattacharya, U. (2017). Colonization and English ideologies in India: A language policy perspective. Language Policy, 16(1), pp. 1-21.

Bhattacharya, U. (2016). The politics of participation: Dis-citizenship through English in a suburban Indian village school. The Journal of English as an International Language, 11(1), 71-85.

Bhattacharya, U. (2013). Mediating inequalities: exploring English-medium instruction in a suburban Indian village school. Current Issues in Language Planning, 14(1), 164-184.

Sterponi, L., & Bhattacharya, U. (2012). Dans les traces de Hymes et au-delà: les études de la socialisation langagière [In the footsteps of Hymes and beyond: the language socialisation studies]. Langage et Société, 139, 67-82.

Bhattacharya, U. (2011). The “West” in Literacy Studies. Berkeley Review of Education, 2(2), 179-198.

BOOK CHAPTERS

Bhattacharya, U. & Mohanty, A. K. (accepted). Ideological plurality: English in policy and practice in India. In R. Rubdy & R. Tupas (Eds.), World Englishes: Ideologies. Bloomsbury.

Bhattacharya, U. & Sterponi, L. (2020). The morning assembly: Constructing subjecthood, authority, and knowledge through classroom discourse in an Indian school. In M. J Burdelski & K. M. Howard (Eds.), Language Socialization in Classrooms (pp. 181-199). Cambridge University Press: Cambridge, UK.

Bhattacharya, U. (2014). Mediating inequalities: exploring English-medium instruction in a suburban Indian village school. In M. O. Hamid, H. T.M. Nguyen, and R. B. Baldauf (Eds.), Language Planning for Medium of Instruction in Asia (164-184). Routledge: London & New York.

ENCYCLOPEDIA ENTRY:

Bhattacharya, U. (2022). The Teaching of English in India. Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Education.