Momentos de Cambio: Cultivating Bilingual Students’ Epistemic Privilege through Memoir and Testimonio

Abstract

In this article, we describe how students were invited to write and publicly read their momentos de cambio (moments of change) stories—memoirs in which they recount moments of significant change, both joyful and traumatic, in their lives. Drawing from elements of Latino critical theory, we conceptualize these stories in part as testimonios—opportunities for the students to voice their own truths and experiences in the world. We describe how the concept of momentos de cambio served as a rhetorical resource for claiming epistemic privilege and interpretive authority across the school year.