An anti-racist English education

Figures & data

Table 1. Premises of power in English education.

Premise	Elaboration
English is a colonial language of power	We understand English as a medium for linguistic imperialism and the maintenance of Anglonormativity, shaped by its colonial histories and its ongoing logics of coloniality.
Standardised and academic English are linguistic varieties of power	We conceptualise standardised and academic English as social and colonial constructions which were designed on the language practices of those occupying privileged racial and economic positions.
Language is a communicative mode of power	We understand that language is a mode of power to contain and control, and that there is a hierarchy of modes: with written and spoken language typically taking precedent over signed and multimodal language practices.
Whiteness, coloniality, masculinity, cis-heteronormativity, able-bodied-ness, neurotypicality, monolingualism, monoculturalism, middle-class-ness, and native speakerism are entangled ideologies of power operationalised through language.	We emphasise the ideological nature of language and how these ideologies emerge out of specific sociohistorical, gendered, racial, economic, and political contexts.

Table 2. Dimensions of racial violence and racial affirmation.

Dimensions of Racial Violence	Description	Dimensions of Racial Affirmation	Description
Physical violence	Physical abuse and assault that stems from racial discrimination and prejudicial ideologies	Physical affirmation	Affirming the critical and creative nature of racial-ethnic joy and pleasure as embodied and psychosocial practices of healing from trauma in safe, brave, and allied spaces
Symbolic violence	A metaphorical representation and realisation of violence	Symbolic affirmation	Engaging in (re)design and counter-storying as a means to resist erasure and/or misrepresentation, to assert the diversity of racialised experiences and meaning-making into a space, and to see racial/ethnic difference embedded into the curriculum
Linguistic violence	Marginalising, policing, and annihilating the language of racialised children and teachers	Linguistic affirmation	Recognising, affirming, celebrating, and critically engaging with a range of (English) language varieties and meaning-making practices as valuable assets for critical-creative language and literacy education
Curricular and pedagogic violence	Curricula, teaching texts, classroom materials, and standards that center white and Eurocentric notions of existing and being in the world	Curricular and pedagogic affirmation	Curricula, teaching texts, classroom materials, and standards that engage in pluriversality and intersectionality by centring a broad range of racialised, ethnic, cultural, literary, linguistic, and meaning-making traditions, practices, and positions
Systemic school violence	Policies, processes, structures, customs, and laws which reflect and reproduce racist and hegemonic ideologies	Systemic school affirmation	Collaborative, community-based policies, processes, structures, customs, and laws that create the conditions for valuing and fully understanding difference, cultural sustainability and hybridity, as well as civic participation

Figure 1. Dimensions of an anti-racist English education.