Understanding interactional ethnography as a languaculture with a bilanguacultural guide

In this chapter we conceptualize Interactional Ethnography (IE) as a languaculture (LC) and introduce the idea and role of a bilanguacultural guide as a key informant who helps a researcher new to IE learn the ways of being, thinking, and acting as interactional ethnographers. We demonstrate how, why, and in what ways a bilanguacultural can mediate the languacultural connections through translanguaging, dialogue, access, and sharing of resources. Utilizing the interactional ethnographic “litany” of questions, we share the kinds of questions a learner/ethnographer may need to ask and the bilanguacultural guide answer to foster the novice's deepening understanding of IE. We show how collaborations with a bilanguacultural guide around conceptual and methodological understandings can lead to developing new IE-informed research projects.