Manka Varghese is a Professor in Language, Literacy, and Culture and Chair in Teaching, Learning, and Curriculum at the University of Washington’s College of Education. She is also currently the first Vice President of the American Association of Applied Linguistics (AAAL) and starting March, 2026, will move to the President role for one year. Her research, teaching, and mentoring revolve around developing anti-oppressive frameworks and pedagogies in language teacher education, especially for teachers of multilingual students, which integrate teacher and student intersectional subjectivities and identities, theoretically and practically. Manka has published widely on examining these intersections in journals such as Educational Researcher, Teachers College Record,  and TESOL Quarterly, as well as chapters in edited books and has co-edited a number of edited books. 

Having worked on several projects with this emphasis, she is currently engaged with a research grant as a co-P.I. that examines the development of novice teachers’ asset-based and transformative literacy and scientific discourses and practices. Moreover, through a federally funded teacher preparation grant, she has been a faculty lead for a bilingual teacher education program within the college’s elementary teacher education program which centers bilingualism/multilingualism to prepare all teachers while challenging dominant identities, pedagogies, and structures in teacher education. She is currently working on a book with graduate students and other faculty that showcases this program.

Manka believes strongly in collaborative work with other colleagues and students; in this vein, she has co-authored publications with them and was awarded the university-wide award which recognized her mentoring capacity and abilities in 2020, which has included serving as the chair on the committees for 25 doctoral graduates.