Praxis: A Writing Center Journal • Vol. 22, No. 1 (2024) 

The Language of Writing Center Antiracist and Linguistic Justice Statements

Sarah Kugler
University of Kansas
sarah_kugler@ku.edu

Faith Thompson
Salisbury Univerity
fsears1@gulls.salisbury.edu

Abstract

Writing center antiracist and linguistic justice statements, like mission statements, articulate the values and beliefs of an organization, and can be powerful tools for social and institutional change. However, they can also be ineffectual or meaningless if their calls are not actualized or they do not have buy-in from writing center staff. This study explores the linguistic features of antiracist and linguistic justice statements posted on the websites of R1 university writing centers in the United States. Grounded in Critical Discourse Analysis, a theoretical and methodological approach which centers the political and powerful impacts of language, we analyzed the pronouns, verbs, and diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) language among these statements. This analysis revealed that such statements use we/our language referring to writing centers and they/them language referring to students/writers; use writing center-relevant action verbs, such as help, develop, and support; and use modal verbs such as will, connoting future, and potentially present, actions. We also observed a discourse orientation towards DEI efforts rather than specifically centering racial justice. Taken together, these findings present a model of the linguistic choices of antiracist and linguistic justice statements which other writing center professionals could consider when writing their own statements; however, we also argue that writing center staff and researchers must be aware of the ways in which their well-intentioned language may inadvertently hedge their commitments to racial justice.

Introduction

Following the police murder of George Floyd and the racial justice protests of 2020, many in higher education, and specifically in writing center studies, began to discuss the roles we play in perpetuating racist systems of oppression (Haltiwanger Morrison and Evans Garriott 1). While similar discussions have been ongoing for decades in writing center scholarship, more writing center scholars and staff members across positionalities and institutions began to take up calls for antiracist writing pedagogy and praxis. For some institutions and writing centers, this took the form of crafting antiracist and linguistic justice statements which articulated their philosophical dedication to equitable and inclusive language practices. Writing centers have the potential to support students in challenging institutional norms (Sabatino 103), and by heeding the call for linguistic justice, writing centers can help break down barriers to academia for students of color and speakers of marginalized languages. Adjusting to standardized English and academic language expectations can create a dissonance for marginalized language users, where they feel their own languaging practices are unwelcome within academia. Linguistic justice seeks to dismantle the hierarchy of standardized English and challenge the linguistic racism that accompanies it. 

In this article, we identify common rhetorical moves and word choices of antiracist and linguistic justice statements issued by the writing centers of R1 universities across the United States. We ask: 

  • What linguistic features constitute linguistic justice and antiracist statements? 

  • What values, beliefs, and assumptions are communicated through the language of these statements? 

  • What, if any, antiracist actions are generated from these statements? 

Aligned with Cirrilo-McCarthy, et al., we believe “examining the ways writing centers position their practices rhetorically for students and other stakeholders has the potential to make evident the narratives with which writing centers identify” (65).  

This study involved continued consultations between the authors to discuss data, coding, findings, and analysis. We began by examining the writing center websites of the R1 universities (146 in total, as per the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education, 2021) across the United States. If the website included a statement featuring a discussion of language diversity, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI), or race and racism, we flagged the statement for further analysis. We arrived at 12 statements from Washington State University, University of Nevada Las Vegas, University of Connecticut, University of Buffalo, Michigan State University, Johns Hopkins University, Indiana University, Emory University, Drexel University, Colorado State University, University of California San Diego, and Columbia University. Then, using the computer program AntConc, we analyzed the language of each statement, looking for patterns among them. Lastly, we applied Kiang and Tsai’s framework to determine which of the statements actually fit the emerging genre of antiracist and linguistic justice statements (116-117). This framework is a criterion of eight elements that antiracist statements should have, including: 

  • explicitly naming racism;

  • terms connoting active support; 

  • reference to negative sequelae resulting from racism; 

  • use of hopeful language; 

  • use of victim’s names; 

  • reference to Black people; 

  • reference to the police; and 

  • specifying the act (i.e. murder, suffocating) 

The first four elements—explicitly naming racism, terms connoting active support, reference to negative sequelae resulting from racism, use of hopeful language—serve as the foundation for this article’s analysis of what constitutes an antiracist statement and were used in our evaluation of the statements we found by looking at R1 writing centers’ websites. Through this process, we discovered linguistic and lexical patterns among the statements’ use of modal verbs, first and third-person pronouns, and DEI language, looking at both what was said and how it was said within these statements. We argue that these patterns reveal a commitment to future (though perhaps not present) actions toward antiracism; however, some of the statements also demonstrate race-evasiveness, and some lack evidence of implementing their commitments to antiracist pedagogy. We conclude this article with concrete suggestions writing centers could make toward writing and implementing antiracist statements, while acknowledging that hard work may be happening behind the scenes which writing centers cannot publish on their websites in the current educational climate. 

Literature Review

In this section, we draw from varying fields such as business and marketing research to establish what is known about the genres of mission statements, antiracist statements, and linguistic justice statements. We identify linguistic justice statements as more targeted forms of antiracist statements, which are usually made to clarify the existing mission and vision statements of writing centers and related institutions during times of racial unrest and which serve as extensions of mission statements. Linguistic justice statements, which outline an organization’s dedication to not only antiracist practice broadly, but to justice at the level of language, can also be considered as extensions of mission statements.  

Mission Statements

Mission statements are a crucial part of institutions’ public reputations. These often short statements are designed to promote an institution (Appleton-Pine and Moroski-Rigney; Aib and Shehzad 2) by establishing its purpose for existence and how it will achieve that purpose (Condon 23). Mission statements also “serve as means by which an institution or institutional site can hold itself accountable or be held accountable to the constituencies it seeks to serve” (Condon 23). We can turn to studies of higher education institutions and corporations that have developed a genre model for public mission statements. 

In a discourse analysis of 118 company mission statements, Mengqi et al. found that such statements contain mostly commissive sentences conveying promises and assertives establishing institutional “truths” (84).  In terms of grammatical and syntactical features, they also found that mission statements use personification, imperative and parallel sentences, and various combinations of verb-nouns, such as “interrogating.” Aib and Shehzad further developed the genre by analyzing 100 university mission statements (5). They found that mission statements most commonly leverage promotional discourse rhetorical moves such as “'targeting the market,' 'justifying the service,' and 'detailing the service''” (18) and that “headlines” “establishing credentials” and endorsement from scholars and students strengthened such statements (Aib and Shehzad). Ultimately, a mission statement conveys who an organization is and what it can do for people. 

A few scholars have touched on the importance of mission statements within writing center studies as well. Namely, Cirrillo-McCarthy et al. discuss how mission statements can either reproduce or challenge deficit mindsets towards student writers. In particular, they discuss the messages about language and language use that writing center mission statements can send. They identify mission statements and mission statement revision as a starting point for writing centers to disrupt deficit narratives towards marginalized languaging practices from predominantly students of color. As extensions of mission statements, antiracist and linguistic justice statements in particular can be powerful markers of the values and writing pedagogy of a center. 

Antiracist Statements

Occasionally, institutions will provide statements that offer more clarification about their purpose and mission, or that respond to specific circumstances. This is a way to center an organization’s public values (Appleton Pine and Moroski-Rigney).  These statements leverage many of the same strategies as mission statements, conveying promises and asserting  institutional truths. In their article exploring the genre of antiracist statements released by hospitals in the wake of the police killing of George Floyd, Kiang and Tsai developed their criterion of eight elements, including explicitly naming racism, terms connoting active support, reference to negative sequelae resulting from racism, and use of hopeful language (116-117). We focus specifically on these four criteria as the other four specifically address George Floyd’s murder, and we believe statements that take a broader starting point can still qualify as antiracist statements. 

While antiracist statements can assert an institution’s commitment to social justice, they can also run the risk of being viewed as meaningless (Fields 178). Kiang and Tsai also found that most hospital antiracist statements only included two of their features: terms connoting active support and the use of hopeful language (117). Similarly, Casellas-Connors and McCoy found that the antiracist statements issued by universities tended to be color-evasive, failed to address systematic racism, and rarely, if at all, named specific races (602-603). After conducting a critical discourse analysis, they concluded that such statements served only to advance the institutions’ image but not genuine, systematic change. Brown et al. further found in a critical discourse analysis of 45 statements from academic medical institutions that such statements not only ignore race but minimized institutional responsibility (867). Lastly, Rockhill et al. found in their study of “the mission, vision, and diversity, equity, and inclusion statements of Power 5 athletic departments” that, while these statements speak to seeking racial equity, the actions of an organization, especially their hiring practices, do not necessarily or even often reflect these convictions (398). Ultimately, such statements are, in fact, not neutral and/or meaningless, and do more harm than good (Coley and Holly 2) if they reproduce the status quo (Brown et al. 867) by masking and evading discussion of systematic racism. In conclusion, scholarship in multiple disciplines, including sports communication (Rockhill et al.), epidemiology (Kiang and Tsai), and engineering (Coley and Holly) shows that antiracist statements have been found to only project a reputation for social justice advocacy for rather than promote action. Writing center statements are not immune to this; as Fields notes, antiracist statements often do not place enough focus on how writing centers themselves can address racism (187).

Linguistic Justice Statements

Around the time of George Floyd’s murder, April Baker-Bell’s book Linguistic Justice: Black Language, Literacy, Identity, and Pedagogy was published, guiding writing centers and the discipline of rhetoric and composition more broadly to understand the ways writing and language instruction contributes to systemic racism. Baker-Bell defines linguistic justice as “an antiracist approach to language and literacy education. It is about dismantling Anti Black Linguistic Racism and white linguistic hegemony and supremacy in classrooms and in the world” (7).  Baker-Bell’s call, and more particularly the term linguistic justice, has been enthusiastically taken up in rhetoric and composition. Notably, linguistic justice was at the center of the 2020 CCCC Special Committee on Composing a CCCC Statement on Anti-Black Racism and Black Linguistic Justice, Or, Why We Cain’t Breathe! call to action “This Ain’t Another Statement! This is a DEMAND for Black Linguistic Justice!”. The authors enumerate demands such as ceasing to teach Black students to code-switch from African American English outside of school to standard English exclusively in school and, instead, teaching them about white linguistic supremacy, and calling on teachers to “stop using academic language and standard English as the accepted communicative norm, which reflects White Mainstream English!” (Baker-Bell et al.). Additionally, program chair Perryman-Clark’s call for proposals for CCCC 2022, “The Promises and Perils of Higher Education: Our Discipline’s Commitment to Diversity, Equity, and Linguistic Justice,” draws specifically on Baker-Bell’s definition of linguistic justice and resulted in numerous presentations centering linguistic justice at that convention.

Writing center studies, however, has not taken up the term linguistic justice to the same degree, despite it playing an important role in the writing development of students. Based on a search of the conference program, only three sessions at the 2022 International Writing Center Association Annual Conference (IWCA) engage the term “linguistic justice” in their titles (International Writing Center Association, 2022). Additionally, based on our search of past issues in 2023, no articles in The Writing Center Journal or Praxis: A Writing Center Journal have used the phrase in their title. However, a few individual articles in Praxis and Axis: The Praxis Blog have centered on linguistic justice, including a special issue of Axis on Imagining the Decolonizing Writing Center (Fall/Winter 2021), which mentions linguistic justice in its call for proposals. Two articles in that series – “Shifting Theory and Practice: Professional Development on Linguistic Antiracism” by Kern and Raynor and “Training Writing Tutors about Language and Identity” by Daut and Rebe–discuss linguistic justice. Relatedly, Thompson centers the idea of linguistic justice as antiracist practice in writing center tutoring. The Peer Review has featured articles that address linguistic justice directly, such as Aguilar-Smith et al.’s article, “Departing for a Better Writing Center: Advancing Language Justice Through Staff Professional Development”,  presenting a history of the concept in writing center studies (i.e. Grimm; Boquet; Greenfield and Rowan) to foreground their argument for focusing on linguistic justice in writing center staff professional development. Further, The Peer Review released a special issue on linguistic justice in 2024. The edited collection Linguistic Justice on Campus: Pedagogy and Advocacy for Multilingual Students specifically addresses “Advocacy in the Writing Center,” with four chapters by Krishnamurthy et al., Basta, Brooks-Gillies, and Perry and Rawlins, which 

as a whole, show that changing from assimilation, difference-as-deficit perspectives (i.e. ‘improving’ student writing to meet a ‘standard’) to antiracist, decolonial approaches require writing centers to do work across various institutional contexts such as engaging with campus stakeholders, centering reflexive, critical approaches in consultant training and providing support for writing instructors. (Lee et al. 10)

Despite this growing area of scholarship, we could not find any research on linguistic justice statements in particular–a gap that this article seeks to address. Overall, scholarship on mission, antiracist, and linguistic justice statements demonstrates the strengths and challenges of these documents; they have the potential to outline institutional beliefs and values, but they can also deflect responsibility and do not necessarily connote real-world actions. 

Methodology

Positionalities

It is our hope that articulating our positionalities allow us to both be transparent with our readers about the viewpoints from which we write, and to allow us to be self-reflective and critical of ourselves as scholars. The authors of this article are both white women scholars and, at the time of writing, graduate students at predominantly white R1 institutions examining the role of race and racism in writing program administration. We both serve as instructors of record for freshman composition courses at our individual institutions and are involved with campus writing centers. We acknowledge the privilege that our positionalities, particularly our race and gender, grant us, especially because of the historic and current prevalence of white women working in and publishing about writing centers (Condon “Dear Sister”; Faison and Treviño; Haltiwanger Morrison and Nanton 8; Lockett). We hope that this article contributes to the growing body of work critiquing the white gaze in writing center studies (Faison and Treviño; Barron and Grimm 72) and helps other writing center practitioners, particularly white women writing or considering writing antiracist statements, to critically reflect on their own positionalities. 

Additionally, our positionalities shape our data collection and analysis methods. As graduate students, instructors of record, and writing center employees at large state universities at the time, we found collecting data on antiracist statements at those institutions to be a natural place to start this project. However, this framing is a limitation of this study because it excludes the incisive work being done at other institutions such as community colleges, R2s, and small liberal arts colleges (SLACs), as well as work being done in other countries. Furthermore, this project has been shaped by the tools and analysis methods we have learned from coursework in graduate school, such as AntConc and Critical Discourse Analysis. 

Critical Discourse Analysis

Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) is a methodological and theoretical approach which focuses on the ways in which discrimination, power, authority, and social structures are mediated and perpetuated through language. While there are many approaches to CDA, overall, “CDA approaches are characterized by the common interests in deconstructing ideologies and power through the systematic and retroductable investigation of semiotic data (written, spoken, or visual)” (Wodak and Meyer 4). Because CDA seeks to expose and solve social problems, practitioners emphasize the importance of interdisciplinary approaches which utilize multiple methodological or theoretical frameworks in order to triangulate data. Additionally, “researchers also attempt to make their own positionings and interests explicit while retaining their respective scientific methodologies and remaining self-reflective about their own research process” (Wodak and Meyer 4). 

There have been multiple calls for expanding the role of CDA research in rhetoric and composition and writing center studies (Babcock and Thonus; Huckin et al.; Mackiewicz and Babcock), but there are still few examples of published scholarship employing CDA methodology. The most detailed and nuanced examples are from unpublished doctoral dissertations (Levin; Ritter) as well as two articles (Pigliacelli; Bazaldua et al.) and one book (Monty). In part, this study seeks to join the conversation about CDA in writing center studies and rhetoric and composition, and to demonstrate the importance and applicability of this methodology for writing scholars. 

We find CDA to be an appropriate and useful methodological and theoretical framework for this project for four reasons. First, we took a critical orientation to power from the outset of the project, seeking to analyze how institutional statements resist and perpetuate hegemonic power. Second, this project is multidisciplinary, bringing together theories and literature from our backgrounds in writing center studies, rhetoric and composition, education, and applied linguistics; additionally, we employ both quantitative and qualitative methods to analyze our data. Third, we framed our own identities and positionalities from the outset of the project, articulating how those identities shape our research as part of our efforts to employ CDA. Finally, this project seeks not only to reveal discourse patterns among linguistic justice and antiracist statements, but to articulate actionable steps writing centers can take to write such statements; we aim to not only learn about language, but to formulate a theory of how writing center practitioners can use language to seek linguistic justice.

Methods of Analysis

We searched 146 R1 university writing centers’ websites for antiracist or linguistic justice statements. We identified 12 results as antiracist or linguistic statements. The universities whose statements we reviewed are: 

  • Washington State University 

  • University of Nevada Las Vegas

  • University of Connecticut

  • University of Buffalo

  • Michigan State University

  • Johns Hopkins University

  • Indiana University

  • Emory University

  • Drexel University

  • Colorado State University

  • University of California San Diego 

  • Columbia University

Once we had our final data set, we engaged in both quantitative and qualitative analysis methods. For our quantitative data, we entered the statements into AntConc software, collecting data on the number of times specific keywords such as “antiracist,” “Black,” “white,” “English,” “oppression,” “culture,” “translingual,” and “justice” appeared. Having qualitatively observed various action verbs, we quantitatively searched via AntConc for such words as “plan,” “read,” “work,” “talk,” and “hope.” Simultaneously, we each analyzed the statements qualitatively for patterns, rhetorical moves, actions, values, beliefs, and assumptions. We met regularly to compare and norm our notes for interrater reliability before quantitatively coding through AntConc again based on our qualitative findings (e.g. we looked for pronouns such as “our” and “we” after noticing the community building efforts present in these statements). 

We also analyzed the statements according to a modified version of Kiang and Tsai’s criteria for antiracist statements. We looked for ways that the statements explicitly named racism, used terms connoting active support of racial minorities, referenced negative sequelae resulting from racism, and used hopeful language. This analysis provided insight into whether these linguistic justice and diversity statements actually serve as antiracist statements as well. We chose not to include Kiang and Tsai’s other four criteria–uses victim’s names; reference to Black people; reference to the police; specifies the act (i.e. murder, suffocating)–because none of the statements included those features, except for the University of Buffalo, which specifically named the murder of George Floyd. Perhaps this is because some of the statements were crafted before 2020; however, as shown in the table below, most of the statements were released post-2020. 

Linguistic Features

Personal Pronouns

In this study, we found that we and our, referring to the writing center, were the personal pronouns that occurred with greatest frequency, followed by they, them, and their, referring to writers and students. Eleven out of the 12 linguistic justice statements (Washington State University, University of Nevada Las Vegas, Colorado State University, Indiana University at Bloomington, Emory University, UC San Diego, Johns Hopkins University, Drexel University, University of Connecticut, Michigan State University, and University of Buffalo) begin by introducing or explicitly naming the organization writing the statement. For example, the Colorado State University Writing Center writes: “At the CSU Writing Center, we work with students not only from all disciplines and fields of study, but from diverse backgrounds.” This is a key linguistic move because the statements go on to express the centrality of linguistic justice to their writing center work–by defining who they are, writing centers can then dive more deeply into their beliefs and perspectives.

The titles of the organizations are rarely repeated throughout these statements; rather, the authors assert their presence through the use of pronouns. We is the most common pronoun by far in this data set, presenting in 295 instances, followed by our with 198 instances. This high number of plural personal pronouns suggests introspection and reflection; as we explore later in the section on modal and base lexical verbs, the we in these statements are calling both themselves and others to action (whether or not those actions are actualized in the statements is also explored below). By referring frequently to their writing centers using we and our, these writing centers situate themselves not only as speakers, but as primary, empowered actors within their broader university and academic communities.  However, this genre strikes a delicate balance between positioning writing centers themselves as authorities and not representing their ideal as characteristic of their entire universities, as we address next.

Explicitly defining authorship at the beginning of linguistic justice statements also situates who is not speaking. Framing their statements from an explicitly writing center perspective, these statements do not assert endorsement from their universities. As the process of writing these statements is not available to outside observers such as these researchers, it is unclear whether the linguistic justice statements went through an approval process at the university level. The statement of authorship at the beginning of the statements also tacitly suggests that these statements, then, speak only for the writing centers; they do not necessarily represent policies of other departments, student services, or the university as a whole. For example, the Michigan State University Writing Center articulates that: “The Writing Center at MSU operates with a broad vision of collaboration in the MSU community; peer-to-peer consultations with students, faculty, and the community allow us to expand ideas of literacy and composing beyond traditional models and geographic boundaries.” This is a powerful and nuanced rhetorical and linguistic move: by defining only the writing center as the we and our, and not representing the policies of the university as a whole, writing centers might be able to publish statements that might otherwise be rejected by the administration. Linguistic justice and antiracist statements, then, are one interstitial way of pushing back against the hegemonic policies of the institution and other areas of academia. 

The third most common personal pronoun in this corpus is their (95 instances) followed by they and them (24 and 22 instances respectively). In 112 out of the total 141 instances (79%), they, them, and their refer to writers or students. The most common nouns that their modifies are language (10) and writing (9); however, examining they, them, and their in context reveals that in 72 out of 112 instances (64%), these words are associated with the students/writers doing some sort of communication or languageing. For example, Indiana University Bloomington emphasizes students using “their own plurilingual resources” and the University of Buffalo notes that all writers have “their individual journeys into academic discourse.”  In these statements, then, they are not silent observers but active audiences. Students and writers are characterized as having voices, languages, and actions. But do students actually see themselves as acting in these ways–as having the license to write in their own language and with their own voices? Further, do students actually constitute the audience of these statements? While outside the scope of this discourse analysis, this could be a fruitful avenue of future study.

Recent writing center scholarship addresses the propensity of writing centers using we and they language; notably, Marvin (2023) investigates inclusive and exclusive we language in writing centers. Marvin’s essay mentions the role of we positionality in their center’s mission statement and  explains that we language can serve oppressive functions: excluding individuals who may not see themselves as members of the writing center community, and creating tension for tutors who feel pressured to choose between their status as a tutor and their personal identity (for instance, an international tutor who does not identify with the writing center we used during a tutor training on working with multilingual writers). Marvin writes, “When ‘we’ language is used to describe the subjective experience of writing center members in contrast with an objective ‘them,’ the ‘them’ group implicitly seems lesser than the ‘we’ group because they are not afforded the same subjectivity of the ‘we.’” This useful insight supports our study’s analysis of we and they language; in these linguistic justice and antiracist statements, students and writers are also separated from the we of the writing center. Is there a way to write writing center linguistic justice and antiracist statements that invites students to see themselves as members of, rather than outsiders to, the writing center community? 

Base Lexical and Modal Verbs

What does action, or lack of action, look like in the genre of linguistic justice and antiracist statements? After be (43 instances), the most frequent base lexical verbs in this corpus are support (33), help (25), develop (25), create (23), and find (13). Continue has 30 instances, but 25 of those come from the Emory statement. These verbs reflect many core tenets of writing center pedagogy: a dedication to aiding writers in honing their own voices and to crafting a space where writers are encouraged and challenged. These verbs not only represent what writing centers do, but who they are. Writing center professionals seeking to develop their own linguistic justice and antiracist statements should consider which lexical verbs best represent their practice and center their values.  

As noted previously, we is the most common pronoun by far in this data set, presenting in 295 instances, followed by our with 198 instances. We is most commonly followed by the modal verb will, with 61 instances. In second place is are in 19 instances. There is a four-way tie for third place, with believe, can, have, and must each with 8 instances. This a fascinating linguistic pattern because will and must suggest commitment or intention to act but do not necessarily connote concrete actions. In contrast, the University of Buffalo, Washington State, University of Nevada Las Vegas, University of Connecticut, Emory University, Drexel University, and UC San Diego linguistic justice and antiracist statements clearly articulate the material steps that the writing centers have taken toward accomplishing the goals set out in their statements. Additionally, will and must act as a form of hedging, suggesting that writing centers are committed to the claims they make in these statements but are for some reason, at least linguistically, stepping back from those assertions. For instance, the University of Buffalo writes that: “We will strive to remove the narrative of remediation from our practices.” We argue that, while will suggests an ongoing action, it also hedges strive–making striving something that happens in the future, perhaps, rather than something that happens right now. 

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Focused Language

Although we have positioned these linguistic justice statements as antiracist statements, “race” was not actually said or addressed in most statements. References to specific races were absent, with “white” only being referenced in four statements, and “Black” only mentioned in three statements, mostly in reference to Black language (University of Buffalo and Emory University) or to a resource center on campus (University of California San Diego).

As seen in the above N-Gram, or measurement of a sequence of words or letters in particular order, racism and racist were also not consistently used words, as they were only stated in seven of the statements. This N-Gram was created using AntConc. Here, you can see how often a word showed up across all 12 statements (Freq), how many statements it was included in (Range), and in general how often the word was used compared to how often other terms were used (Rank). Antiracism was used in three statements and antiracist in six statements. It is important to note that the data inputted for this N-gram included the titles, and for several statements such as Columbia University, only the title included the word “race” or other words formed from it such as “racism” or “racist.” 

As such, these statements were often race-evasive. One way that these statements seemed to talk around race and racism was by focusing on multilingual learners. While issues of linguistic justice certainly pertain to multilingual writers, the emphasis on Black language and racialized discrimination that Baker-Bell places in her conceptualization of linguistic justice cannot be conflated with the experiences of second language writing. Other statements expanded linguistic justice to include oppressive gender exclusive pronouns and other gendered language practices as well. The University of Buffalo, however, posits that linguistic justice has four pillars: antiracism, translanguaging, gender inclusivity, and disability justice. While such an intersectional perspective may be beneficial, it also results in the hedging or diminishing of race within a specifically antiracist statement. This also shifts away from Baker-Bell’s conceptualization of linguistic justice, in which race and racism play a central role. 

This lack of actual emphasis on race and racialized language use is representative of an orientation towards diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts rather than specifically racial justice. Race-evasiveness is also evident in the titles, as some universities such as Indiana University Bloomington shy away from the language of linguistic justice or antiracism, naming their statements "inclusive language statements" or using other broad, general terms. This mirrors a past phenomenon when, after Villianueva’s 2006 speech on racism at writing centers, writing centers failed to “sustain critical and difficult discussions about race,” (Greenfield and Rowan 2). Instead, writing centers’ antiracist theorizing became part of broader equity and anti-oppression efforts, which were often race-neutral (Condon “Beyond the Known”; Inoue). Such dilution is problematic if statements are marketing themselves as explicitly antiracist. In fact, as discussed previously, this does more harm than good because it can perpetuate race-evasiveness and lack of action (see Brown et al.; Coley and Holly; Johnson). 

Kiang and Tsai’s Framework

When analyzed for the components of an antiracist statement as outlined by Kiang and Tsai (2020), only four out of the twelve statements actually meet the criteria: University of Connecticut, Washington State University, University of California San Diego, and University of Buffalo. Colorado State University and Michigan State University did not meet any of the criteria. It is important to note that none of these components alone comprise an antiracist statement, but rather a statement becomes antiracist when it is comprised of all the components taken together. Whether or not a linguistic justice statement actually qualifies as antiracist is a crucial consideration, as Baker-Bell put forth linguistic justice as a specifically antiracist language and writing pedagogy. 

We identified explicit naming of racism as referents to individual races and discrimination, using the language of racism and antiracism and discussion of oppression in eight of the statements. For example, the statement from University of Connecticut includes “Our institutional position means that we often bear witness to ‘everyday racism’ (Geller et al. 2007) in institutional policies or instructor feedback.” However, explicit naming of racism could be as simple as Indiana University Bloomington, whose statement’s only direct mention of racism is “we will continue to educate ourselves, each other, and our students on ways we speak and write about issues of racism, oppression, and bias.” Given that explicit naming of racism ranged widely in terms of attention paid to it, it is clear that naming racism alone cannot make a statement antiracist. 

Nine statements included terms connoting active support due to the use of modal verbs as discussed earlier. By using a future tense to define commitments and actions, statements indicated that linguistic justice is an ongoing process and that these actions may not necessarily be taken currently. Some examples of active support include straightforward support such as “The CEW is committed to ongoing action” (The University of Buffalo) and more specific language such as “We must advocate for and enact linguistic justice in our writing center, at UConn, and in the world.” (University of Connecticut). While Colorado State University did articulate “We respect students' native languages, dialects, pronouns, and perspectives,” we did not qualify this as active, antiracist support because their statement did not define or name linguistic racism. However, University of Buffalo, University of Connecticut, Washington State University, University of Nevada Las Vegas, Emory University, University of California San Diego, and Drexel University included concrete action steps in their statements which showcased the ways in which they have worked to take material antiracist actions in their centers. 

Unlike the writing centers that do not name race or racism in discussing linguistic justice, University of Connecticut, Washington State University, University of California San Diego, Columbia University, and University of Buffalo make clear the harmful and negative impact linguistic racism has. University of Connecticut, in particular, takes accountability for that impact through an analysis of their own complicity. Examples of negative sequelae mentioned in these statements include: “segregated students of diverse language backgrounds into remedial tracks” (University of Connecticut) and “the stigmatization and oppression of Black language” (University of Buffalo). However, references to the negative sequelae are limited in comparison to statements articulating active support or hope. 

Lastly, use of hopeful language was measured by the inclusion of a discourse of change, dismantled linguistic hierarchies, and future tense action steps. University of Connecticut, for example, expressed the hope of “Making our center a welcoming and accessible environment that offers writers a variety of modalities for tutoring and learning.” The University of Buffalo similarly stated “our goal is to create an inclusive, participatory community that is welcoming to new members, and through deep listening to all members, adjusts its practices to support the empowerment of all community members.” This use of hopeful language is important to antiracism as it imagines a future and a way forward. 


Conclusion

Patterns in Writing Center Linguistic Justice and Antiracist Statements 

In summary, our Critical Discourse Analysis of writing center linguistic justice and antiracist statements revealed a number of common linguistic and thematic patterns. Those writing their own statements might consider these trends or use them to critique and revise a current statement. However, these patterns are not necessarily patterns that should be reproduced. In particular, writing centers might strive to disrupt the discourse pattern of orienting to DEI efforts and instead explicitly engage with issues of race and racism. 

Linguistic Patterns: 

  • We/our language referring to writing centers and they/them language referring to students/writers 

  • Writing center-relevant action verbs, such as help, develop, and support 

  • Modal verbs such as will, connoting future, and potentially present, action 

Discourse Patterns: 

  • Orientation towards diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts rather than specifically racial justice

In addition to linguistic concerns, writing centers might consider shaping the genre of linguistic justice statements in other ways. Having tutors contribute to the writing and revision of such statements could make them particularly salient for the communities the writing center serves at a particular institution and lead to insights professional staff and researchers might miss. Additionally, collaboratively constructing such a statement could lead to greater feelings of inclusion and community among the writing center tutors and staff by not only sharing their mission with the public but clarifying the shared beliefs of the people who work there. 

Call to Action

This research illuminates several ways writing centers seeking to address linguistic racism and linguistic justice through public commitments and statements can move forward in their efforts. First, writing centers need to consider their audiences and purposes for such statements. While the audience is not explicitly articulated in these statements, their position on public facing websites indicate that the audience is likely inclusive of the student community. Is the statement designed to contribute to the scholarly discussion surrounding linguistic justice, or are writing centers aiming to empower and educate students on their right to their own language? If a writing centers’ purpose is the latter, these statements need to be easily digestible and clear for students who may be learning of linguistic justice for the first time. Even the term “linguistic justice” should be defined explicitly for students to benefit from such statements. Or is the statement merely aspirational, aimed at projecting a certain ethos for the writing center? Without clarity for those whom the statement is aimed at, antiracist and linguistic justice statements run the risk of becoming meaningless. Writing centers can make these statements more digestible and approachable for students by including tutor voices (particularly the voices of tutors of color) in the drafting process, as tutors are often students themselves just learning about these concepts for the first time and can provide insight on how best to meaningfully engage students with the goals of writing centers’ antiracist and linguistic justice statements. Further, tutors may be able to provide real-life insights on the impact of a statement that research or staff members cannot. After a draft of a linguistic justice statement is completed, staff might form focus groups or conduct interviews during which students who use writing center services–particularly students of color and students who are speakers of marginalized languages–review the statement. Having both student staff and students using the writing center be involved in the crafting and review of these statements could increase opportunities for real-world impact by attending to the particular needs of an institution’s unique student population.

Secondly, writing centers should be reflective not just of their own community but of their own complicity. While writing centers have always aimed at being inclusive, they too have upheld so-called “academic writing” standards and expectations. Writing centers, therefore, have committed the same epistemic and linguistic violence to students as their broader institutions. Writing centers should acknowledge that role in their antiracist and linguistic justice statements, as well as being explicit about what antiracist writing pedagogy and practices look like. 

Third, writing centers need to make statements actionable. Considering that statements studied here favored the use of modal, future verbs rather than present tense, statements should offer commitments writing centers can actually hold themselves accountable to. One such commitment writing centers could make would be to provide tutors with education on linguistic justice during training and ongoing professional development. Additional internal work may also be necessary. 

Final Thoughts 

In this article, we have discussed the linguistic patterns present in linguistic justice and antiracist statements and noted the small data set of such statements which are publicly available. We are not, however, suggesting that all writing centers must write and publicly share linguistic justice statements. In many locations in the United States, this might be impractical or unsafe–or perhaps illegal. Recent legislative attacks on DEI and critical race theory in the United States, such as those in Florida (Senate Bill 266), Texas (Senate Bills 16 and 17), Utah (House Bill 261), and Iowa (House File 616), have demonstrated that this is a dangerous epoch for those working toward social and linguistic justice in higher education and toward antiracism more broadly. Specifically, the pushback on the University of Washington, Tacoma Writing Center’s antiracism and social justice statement in 2017 shows the real-world stakes of these statements for writing centers (for more detail, see Asao Inoue’s blog post “Is Grammar Racist? A Response”). 

Instead, writing centers might consider having linguistic justice statements as internal documents–and this may already be the case for many of the schools we explored in this study. Writing centers might also practice linguistic and social justice in their tutor training and pedagogy in ways that are not apparent to outsiders considering only their websites. An anonymized study of the ways in which writing center practitioners are crafting internal documents and praxis toward linguistic justice is one avenue for future study. Additionally, this study only considers R1 universities; expanding the scope to consider community colleges, R2s, and/or SLACs might yield different results. Writing centers are uniquely positioned to take steps toward linguistic justice: not just impacting our individual centers, but the discipline of writing center studies and our institutions more broadly. We see this study as a starting point to help writing centers of all positionalities consider both their public-facing and internal antiracism work from a linguistic justice standpoint.

Notes

  1. Information in Table 1 was collected from current directors of these writing centers. We thank them for aiding us in providing this information. Dashes indicate that we did not receive a response to our emailed request for information.


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