Discourse: The power of language and communication

DISCOURSE: THE POWER OF LANGUAGE AND COMMUNICATION.

DRAFT

WITH THANKS TO. Contributors:

Illustrations & Photography:

Phase 4 & 5 Shades of Noir Team

Jay Lee

Arooj Khan Claire Hiscock Kerian Preddie Connor McLaren Claire Hiscock Louise Stern Yasmin Akim Charisse Chikwiri Patricia Petersen Hangna Koh Hillary Wan Joseph Hill Kelly Walter Eva He Mathilde Heu Mary Lo Hansika Jethnani Pamela Sakyl Linett Kamala INFO: W: shadesofnoir.org.uk E: info@shadesofnoir.org.uk Tw: @shadesofnoir Fb: shadesofnoir

OUR SUPPORTER:

CONTENTS. 06.

Welcome

07.

A Note From The Lead

09.

Key Questions

10.

Peer Review

16.

Key Data

Arooj Khan, Claire Hiscock

20 .

Expanding The Conversation

72.

Further Resources Key terms, Further Reading, Digital Resources

WELCOME. ‘People sometimes refer to “bigoted” or “prejudiced” language, but in fact, language itself is neutral, a vehicle for conveying the attitudes of its users; it has no agenda or bias of its own, but rather reflects (and reinforces) those of the people who use it.’

Deborah Schaffer, Ph.D., & Rachel Schaffer, Ph.D. How are social constructions like gender, race, and class reinforced through language?

What psychological impact do certain words hold in society and in turn have an effect on an individual’s actions? What role does language play in preserving power for a select group of people? How is language used to desensitise us from inequalities?

The way in which we use language can be an instrument to firstly understanding our own conscious or subconscious prejudices regarding racial, gender and class inequality and how that is stemmed in a much wider universal problem which we are then able to recognise through specific cultures. Understanding the framing of these social constructions is essential to understanding how language is used to reinforce a concentration of power; the disadvantage of poor people and ethnic minorities; the demonisation of the “other”; and neutralisation of human rights violations.

‘In an oppressive set-up, where language is used as a tool of instruction, emotions remain subdued, leading to psychological and emotional oppression.’

Elliot Ziwira, 2016 By starting to interrogate the use of language through various social institutions (educational, political, economic, family and religious) and media outlets, there then leaves space to analyse how the normalities of the use of language as an oppressive tool are intrinsically present through everyday instances.

This Terms of Reference will aim to explore and shed light on the different ways in which language contributes to real-life power disparities from the evolvement through etymology of certain words to how language functions through various social institutions. It will also address how it can be used in various ways to challenge some of the injustices that are embedded in everyday communication. It will address the different symbolisms of language through mainstream culture and the various ways that individuals and groups use communication to empower and call claims to justice.

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A NOTE FROM THE LEAD.

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I’ve always struggled with communicating my thoughts and ideas verbally and also through writing, especially academic writing. I always wondered why it was such a difficult and emotionally draining task for me to do. If most of my peers could easily pull together a short essay without too much strain then why was it such a problem for me? It was only while preparing my dissertation as part of my BA degree that I really started to understand and learn how to “properly” structure an essay and make sure that the content is engaging and consistent.

I still have trouble with it now, but I understand that part of the reason is because academic discourse is an exclusive way of communicating and sharing information – something that wasn’t familiar to me. Although language creates understanding and a way to exchange information, it also acts as a symbolic system that functions to enable pockets of power and hierarchy to exist. It can be used explicitly through discriminatory slurs and rhetoric, but these are also embedded into language in a much more subtle way. I’ve always tried to be wary of my own use of communication, whether that is written, spoken or body language when engaging in sensitive topics but I’ve sometimes found myself slipping into toxic narratives which seems to be an intrinsic part of culture and therefore, language.

It is the unnoticed or unquestioned uses of words that interest and also worry me most about the way we communicate that reinforce arbitrary power and prejudices. It is rooted in household sayings like: ‘the black sheep of the family’ and ‘white lies’, socially used statements like: ‘don’t be a pussy’ and ‘man up’, and on a more globalised scale, like the terms: ‘black money’ and ‘ethnic cleansing’. There is also a lot of concern around how other systems are replicating this bias language through the use of the internet and more importantly through Artificial Intelligence. There have already been a number of cases where AI has reproduced these notions, for example, how search algorithms have associated images of black and brown people with negative words and images of white people with more positive words. I find that a lot of terminology upholds existing racial, class and gender stereotypes that - in a world where we’re consciously trying to move away from discriminatory associations - should be considered a little more closely.

With this said, there are currently many individuals and groups that aim to tackle this complex issue and challenge the status quo in various ways, such as the use of poetry, music and art, the creation and use of drag language, and through non-verbal communication like sign language.

This Terms of Reference aims to explore some of the wide and complicated issues surrounding language in its many forms, and how we can rearticulate a more inclusive idea of the world.

- Sahar

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KEY QUESTIONS.

1. What do certain words represent in society?

2. How does language reinforce power disparities?

3. How do you/others challenge the boundaries of language?

4. What are your personal experiences of racial, gender or class profiling through language?

5. How are you trying to challenge the normalities of the use of certain words?

6. Are you involved in any spaces that reimagine different ways of using language?

7. How does an individual’s actions play in enforcing the biases of language?

8. How has technology interpreted biases in language? (e.g. through speech recognition, social media, artificial intelligence etc.)

9. How is language used to desensitise inequality/human right issues?

10. What role does media and political communication play in contributing to hateful rhetoric?

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PEER REVIEW.

Shades of Noir has been pleased to invite Arooj Khan and Claire Hiscock to peer review this Terms of Reference.

Arooj Khan is the Research and Knowledge Manager for Business in the Community’s Education campaign, and an Urban Geographies PhD student at the University of Birmingham. She is also a Community Arts Facilitator who utilises arts workshops as a medium to discuss area specific issues. She has evaluated programmes on behalf of the Barbican, Create London, InIVA and The Hayward Gallery.

She has also partnered with Metal Arts, Thurrock Arts Trail and Hidden Gems to facilitate bespoke arts workshops. She frequently writes and comments on race, creative research methods, the diasporan identity, social mobility, regeneration and neo-liberalism, typically through an intersectional lens.

Claire Hiscock is a Language Development Tutor at the University of the Arts London. She works with both undergraduate and postgraduate students whose first language tends not to be English. Her interest in Language and Power became more focused when studying under Norman Fairclough at Lancaster university. Now she teaches Academic Language skills across the different colleges and the many disciplines at the University of the Arts. Her work focuses on ensuring that language does not become a barrier to attainment and that all students can get the most from their studies. For many years, she lived and worked in Italy, where she developed a postgraduate course that drew on world English literature to develop courses that expanded the vision of the traditional canon. Back in London, she still aims in her work to extend understandings of the richness and diversity of the forms that language can take.

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A NOTE FROM AROOJ KHAN. Imagine that it’s 3000 AD, and an apocalyptic event has resulted in most of the world being destroyed.

Visitors from another planet approach Earth and uncover a piece of academic writing encrypted within a memory storage device; a modern-day Rosetta Stone.

The language is English. The singular lingua franca of the world for at least 500 years prior to our apocalyptic end.

What nuances, subjectivities and polemics does this text contain?

In order to encourage ruminations regarding the above question, I want to consider language in the context of one of the key domains where people of colour will encounter the very complex power relations at play that will shape the majority of their life experiences: the education system.

Rosetta Stone analogies aside, language and our ability to communicate is indeed powerful.

We needn’t look further than rhetoric within the classroom to acknowledge this.

Institutions which exist on the basis of human-enforced complex power relations (student, teacher, senior leadership team, school governors etc.) bring with them the preconceived binary of subjugation and superiority.

The power of subjugating language, communication and discourse in the classroom has not gone unnoticed. In a recent poll of BAME teachers conducted by the National Union of Teachers, 62% of respondents stated that schools do not treat BAME pupils fairly. This is further supported by the fact that Black Caribbean students are three times more likely to be expelled. When this is broken down by gender, Black Caribbean boys are four times as likely to be expelled compared to all boys, and black Caribbean girls are twice as likely to be expelled compared to all girls.

In order to tackle such disparities in academic performance, a number of research reports and initiatives have been published and championed by the Department for Education in relation to ‘disadvantaged’ students in primary and secondary school. ‘Disadvantaged’ pupils are defined as those who are eligible for Free School Meals and are looked after by the local authority. It serves as an umbrella term under which all of the complexities of intersectional identities, missed opportunities and concrete ceilings lie. Touching upon the issue of race by way of key data trends but never articulating clearly that race, gender and other domains are intrinsically linked to a life of ‘disadvantage’.

The use of such incomplete terms contributes towards the complexity of unfair power relations, whereby it proves increasingly difficult to pinpoint the basis of such prejudices.

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Discourses in schools have a distinct ability to mimic society’s social ills. This was particularly prevalent during the Brexit decision. According to thirty police forces, there was a 54% hike in xenophobic racial abuse and assaults within schools. There was a particular increase in antiMuslim sentiment (subsequently unrelated to the terms and conditions of Brexit, yet a perfect demonstration of normalised islamophobia), with students and teachers alike being subjected to religion-related abuse. The insidious nature of racist discourse in educational institutions is further perpetuated by the recent academisation of schools. This has resulted in academy schools becoming free from local authority implemented regulations. This lack of regularity has the potential to turn schools into a breeding ground for both overt and covert prejudice.

Another key issue regarding the power of language and communications in educational institutions, particularly in higher education, is the prevalence of a colonised curriculum and the privileging of Eurocentric discourses. This can be identified by the Eurocentric bias of curriculum topics and its affiliated heralded writers. According to the ECU report (2015), internationally excellent academic research is not usually based on the Global South, nor does it touch upon topics regarding the racialized diaspora. The report also shared the widely held belief that academics who do not conduct research on Eurocentric interests were disadvantaging their own career advancement. Respondents to the affiliated survey also felt that their work was less likely to be valued if it were published in non-European or American journals.

In addition to this, the elevation of European thought has resulted in increasingly accepted and systemised views of white racial superiority which has been used to elevate western languages and discourses. Immanuel Kant for example, a key figure on many social sciences reading lists, was particularly notorious for his inability to correlate intellect with people of colour, he once stated that “the race of the whites contains all talents and motives in itself”, whereas in relation to black intellect he retorts that: “it can be educated, but only to the education of servants”.

Furthermore the English language, as the lingua franca of the higher education sector, has presented a complex relationship with the controlling trends in international academia.

Which in turn contributes to a decreasing diversity of research topics covered and methodologies used given that the privileging of the English language is inherently linked to the prioritising of Eurocentric conceptual, theoretical and methodological frameworks.

Despite the above, it is heartening to see that those in power and those who hold a distinct privilege are coming to terms with the advantages that a diversity of intellect brings to academia. It is becoming commonplace for publications to be made on a combined ethical and intellectual basis in order to challenge the Eurocentric privilege and to continue to champion the discourses of the unheard through the power of 12 // DISCOURSE: THE POWER OF LANGUAGE AND COMMUNICATION.

language. Furthermore, teachers as part of the NUT have also been vocal regarding the dangerous stigmatisation that Operation Prevent attributes to Muslim students.

Therefore, given the above, I echo the writers in this edition of Terms of Reference.

I wholeheartedly agree that words are not neutral. Language, its meaning and implications are politically and ideologically driven. The manipulation of discourse and power are characteristics of complex, overarching power relations. For many years, language has been used to frame the discourse of taught curriculum’s within educational institutions. The power to establish educational discourse is a common narrative for white intellect, one that continues to place people of colour’s intellect, language and discourse as significantly inferior in the education system and out.

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A NOTE FROM CLAIRE HISCOCK. Many years ago, I had the privilege to offer a home for a short while to a 12-yearold Deaf girl from Belarus whose main language was sign language. The weeks we shared were given over to much conversation, laughter (and bickering) with my daughters who were of a similar age. What might be considered unusual about this is that, although they had 4 languages between them, the girls did not have one in common: my daughters don’t sign or speak Russian, but speak Italian and English.

Ana preferred not to use oral language but could read and lip read Russian.

Despite the lack of a common language, Ana told us all about her family and about her dreams: she wanted to become a beautician. It was language that bound my daughters to Ana, but Ana’s reluctance to use oral language was frowned on by her teachers. I always wondered why her teachers, who signed, but were from the hearing community, were so insistent that Ana play to her weakest language when her strengths were in signing and using gestures, images and a dictionary to tell compelling stories. I suspect it was because they believed their job was to be bring their Deaf students into the hearing world because oral language was ‘best’. I wondered how this hierarchy of languages, where oral language was superior to signing would play out as Ana grew up and wanted to achieve her dream of becoming a beautician. Ana returned to Minsk and temperatures of -30C in a flimsy jacket that she had decided was the chicest thing she owned. Her last question was to ask when she could return. Belarus is a troubled country. I received no reply to the letters I sent. The connection between Ana’s school and my university was broken, but Ana has her own place in my heart.

Why am I telling this story? This volume is about the power of language, and the contributions included are potent testament to that power. They speak of the human need and longing to connect, to reach out to others through language and the beauty there is in that connection. The pieces here are made of written text, images and sound and show the wealth of ways which we use to communicate. But they speak also of the abuse of that power, of language used to exclude. Ana’s story is an illustration of language bringing people together and a warning that establishing a “hierarchy of languages” will always lead to exclusion, not only of entire groups of people, but also of an individual from their very inner being, a point made very movingly in Charisse Chikwiri’s elegant, heartfelt love letter to the Shona language and Pamela Sakyi, in her documentation of the endangered languages of Ghana.

The beauty of the many different forms of human communication is another thread that connects the contributions of this volume. The contributors include artists and sculptors, poets, film makers and designers. They communicate through written, oral and sign languages. The very diversity of the pieces shines a light on the eloquence these different languages. Louise Stern asks ‘why are we so driven to try defining ourselves and our experience of the world through language’. Her suggestion that the answer lies ‘at the heart of the mysterious, joyful, and sad human condition’ is a leitmotif of this volume.

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A theme that also echoes through the pieces is highlighted in Joseph Hill’s reminder that ‘in language, there are codes that are related to power and oppression and it can maintain our worldviews in a way that allow us to reproduce social inequalities.’ That the use of language to maintain structures of inequality is of great concern in education is the substance of my piece and is raised by other contributors including Linett Kamala, who reminds us of the greater proportion of black pupils and pupils from mixed ethnic origins in pupil referral units in mainstream schools. Hillary Wan takes up this point about the damage caused when language is used for exclusion in HE and argues passionately for different languages and the cultures they express to be brought into to the system rather than be shut out.

Which brings me to the other argument in this volume. An argument that Joseph Hill emphatically reminds us of when he says that ‘not only do we have to be aware of the power of words, we have to be aware of the personal and societal narratives that come with the words.’ The point is that language, is inextricable from culture, or, as Eva He puts it, ‘words impose ideology’. Recognising this should have consequences for how we live our lives. Kerian Preddie speaks of ‘fractured perspectives’. The contributions appeal for recognition of the importance of valuing languages and cultures that are not our own. Connor Mclaren writes that, when language and culture are inclusive, ‘nothing will be greater than feeling that sense of belonging.’

This volume, then, is a call for no one to tell us what language we should use just because our language does not conform to their norms or expectations. A call for us to celebrate all the languages that we do use. The languages we use to communicate what is most important to us, and that we use to cry and to laugh in. The languages that we fight in and have to continue to fight for. As Hillary Wan, puts it, we need to take up language as an arm ‘to fight for the rights that should have never been taken away in the first place.’

To return to my Ana and the wealth of her language, we need to fight for a time when we can all rejoice in all the polyphonic, polychrome, diverse forms language takes.

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KEY DATA.

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EXPANDING THE CONVERSATION.

THE POWER OF LANGUAGE OR THE LANGUAGE OF POWER?

CLAIRE HISCOCK, LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT TUTOR, UAL.

Language is power, life, and the instrument of culture, the instrument of domination and liberation. Angela Carter (1983), Notes from the Front Line - You know Shakespeare?

- Not personally.

- I read it at school.

- Well, I have the complete works here.

- They’re a lovely set, aren’t they?

Yes, they are very well bound.

- They’re embossed in gold.

- Mmm, really nice.

Part of our heritage.

‘Course, they’re not something you can actually read.

Abigail’s Party (1977) Mike Leigh.

Abigail’s party is a period piece. But the notion of a hegemony of knowledges and cultural meaning-making that the play highlights is fundamental to the Higher Education Institutions that today’s young people are crippling themselves with debt to be part of. The books, here, are for display, ‘embossed in gold.’ They are a visual display, but of the characters’ cultural ‘failings’.

Although they are ‘part of our heritage,’ the characters can’t ‘actually read’ them. The ‘heritage’ the characters want to display is one from which they themselves are excluded. Its language is not one they can actually access.

On access to the language of power, the writer and broadcaster, Lindsay Johns, argues that schools should teach students “proper” English He believes that the street speech of Peckham, where he works with young people, disempowers

and limits the life chances of those who speak it. You can listen to his talk here.

Another approach has been taken by British Universities, where there has been a significant move towards multimedia, interactive modes of text production or ‘digital literacies’. This is particularly relevant for Art and Design institutions where the ability to harness the increasing ascendancy of the visual image over that of the written text is seen as a way of empowering students. Lindsay Johns suggests schools combat linguistic exclusion by insisting on proficiency in “proper English”. British universities, on the other hand, are expanding the forms of text production that student participation can take. What both views recognise is the power struggle inherent in language use in HE. I want to look at this struggle differently.

As an English teacher, the Art and Design tutors at my university frequently grumble to me that their international students have ‘problems with grammar’ and that more and ‘better’ grammar should be taught and students’ work corrected for ‘grammar mistakes’ Over time, I have come to believe that this means: ‘The students are expressing themselves in ways with which I am not familiar, and this makes me uncomfortable. It makes me uncomfortable because their language differs so completely from what I have always been used to and have been taught to accept – without questioning - is what English should be.’

My students’ first language is not English.

The languages they speak are not, generally,

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European, yet they are required to join discourse communities that are deeply embedded in the power structures of an English medium, Western-centric institution.

We need to analyse language use within these communities to recognise the dynamics of participation and the relationship between language, power and ideology. We need to recognise how power relationships are preserved within communities of practice if we are to understand why tutors find it so challenging to engage with contributions that don’t meet their expectations of language.

The ‘critical thinking’ so dear to British academics is deeply entrenched in their own knowledge-construction practices and written literacies. Academia has historically valued writing as the medium for the analytical and critical thinking that is the foundation of Western academic debate. Academic discourse is ‘embedded in the established practices and [commonsense] assumptions’ of HE institutions (Fairclough 2014:145) And academics rarely question how these written texts embody the power relations and struggles within the institutions that produce them.

Lecturers have, by definition, been rewarded with success in an environment which views its own discourse practices as the gold standard. They have, therefore, had no reason to critique the discourse of their own communities of practice. This unquestioning acceptance, this taking for granted of what language at university should look like, “legitimizes existing power relations.’ (ibid: 64)) My students, like other disenfranchised groups, can take an active part ‘in the

innovative meaning-making practices of a community’ (Fairclough, 2013:217) but only if their language conforms.

The seriousness of dismissing language that does not conform cannot be underestimated.

Universities should not be places where marginalised groups are further excluded and their potential constrained by language.

Recognising how language use contributes to the hierarchical nature of academic discourse is a necessary move towards emancipation.

Digital practices could challenge the linguistic status quo, if, and only if they are a demonstration of ‘a new will to contest the ownership of university pedagogical practice.’ (Goodfellow, 2008:149) So often, it is the same students who shine in the digital as receive accolades for their written work. And they are, too frequently, the same students who mirror the lecturers’ own discourse in their work.

The digital, then, does not, with any certainty, offer an alternative to existing structures of inequality, to the established hierarchies and patterns of exclusion in HE. ‘Transformation without critique is unlikely to redress inequalities in power in higher education.’ (ibid) Nor will my teaching ‘academic’ English language automatically open up prospects to students who struggle to produce texts for tutors’ approval. If tutors, and students, fail to understand how language underpins unequal relations of power and do not challenge the accepted orthodoxies and ideologies that are embedded in the language they use, inequalities of opportunity will continue

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to exist - regardless of my lessons in ‘proper English grammar’ and regardless of new, multimedia forms of engagement.

Angela Carter, ‘Notes From the Front Line’ in On Gender and Writing ed.

Micheline Wandor, Pandora, 1983 Barton, D. P & Tusting, K (2005) Beyond communities of practice: language, power and social context. Learning in doing, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

Fairclough, N, (2010) Critical Discourse Analysis: The Critical Study of Language London: Routledge Fairclough, N, (2014) Language and Power. London: Routledge Goodfellow, R. (2008). Digital Literacies: Texts, Knowledge and Power in Higher Education. In: Solly, Martin; Conoscenti, Michelangelo and Campagna, Sandra eds.

Verbal/Visual Narrative Texts in Higher Education. Linguistic Insights: Studies in Language and Communication (80). Bern: Peter Lang, pp. 135–151. London: Routledge

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BEING A BLACK MAN. KERIAN PREDDIE, BA CULTURE, CRITICISM AND CURATION, UAL.

Our society is shaped by the constructed biases that help enforce a profitable royalist/capitalist agenda. The insidious social and polemical norm setting help maintain systematic control by targeting particular groups based on ethnicity, gender and class. In this essay I will analyse some of the underlying effects of constructed negative media representation of black men throughout society.

As a young black male of a diaspora, my heritage, and consequent self-determined values are at friction against the domination and ubiquity of white-centered capitalism.

My life is confined by both subjective and subjugating discourses that have personal and societal consequences largely outside my control. These ubiquitous, interwoven biases underlie all areas of human activity, and are illuminated to me by the slightest shifting of my lens. The value of my race and heritage battles with the impact of media misrepresentation, and the resulting public anxiety. It is a narrative representation that supplants my individuality and history with prevalent negative perceptions of illiteracy, hyper-sexuality, and deviancy regardless of my education and social positioning - “longstanding legacies that may take generations to shift.” (The Opportunity Agenda, 2011) The 2011 study conducted by The Opportunity Agenda on Media Representations and Impact on the Lives of Black Men and Boys, presents this as a “Core problem”. One that creates “A troubling link between media portrayals and lowered life chances for black males.” (The Opportunity Agenda, 2011). Comments such as, “Do you

know have any gear” or the term “young progressive black man” are just a few coded examples of language directly and indirectly informed by distorted media representation.

Both of these examples largely define my experiences outside and on occasion, inside my own community. These pre-determined and reaffirmed prejudicial representations continue to isolate blacks, and black men in particular, repositioning us to a place of constant vulnerability and persecution where upward mobility is made is extremely difficult. Negative representation is prevalent in mainstream media, despite the occasional T.V. or media respite, whereby a “positive”, more socially acceptable narrative or protagonist is introduced.

Positive coverage of ‘respectable’ black males are predominantly all entertainers.

Individuals who’s exceptionalities are in sports, music, or dance. But even with their talents and elevated position within society, black entertainers are subject to the same institutional racial biases. This phenomena is particularly present within the film industry, black actors have historically played lesser roles, and often been the vehicles to transport media messages of deviancy. Also, the most prevalent roles often reflect “limited life choices”. When was the last time you have seen a black college professor, doctor, lawyer or scientist selling a product?” (Donaldson, 2015). These fractured perspectives continue to impact our individual potential and collective progress. The study also claims “Dealing with negative expectations may also create stress and drain cognitive resources in some contexts - leading to the lowered

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performance associated with stereotype threat.” (The Opportunity Agenda, 2011) It is my contention that to drastically reframe these dialogues and change the perception of black men in society, black people need to assume greater influence by owning and controlling media and production houses.

Our societal perceptions are dominated by the visual representations of media and, I believe, it is only through possession and reconstruction of our image as black people that we can ensure our future development, happiness, and mobility as a group.

My journey from the working-world back into academia and the creative industry has widened my perspective. Although initially unnerving, and intimidating, the freedom with which I now express myself reflects the realisation that as a ‘black man’ I can not be defined by the prevalent norms society presses upon me. I have learned to embrace the provocation of prevalent norms and separate myself from the biased, standards of others; accepting that these misconceptions are part of my journey. Yet, I will neither be defined by those norms nor accept that my race is responsible for their creation.

Further Reading: The Opportunity Journal (2011, October).

Media Representations and Impact on the Lives of Black Men and Boys. Retrievable at: www.racialequitytools.org/resourcefiles/ Media-Impact-onLives-of-Black-Menand-Boys-OppAgenda.pdf (P. 13) The Opportunity Journal (2011, October).

Media Representations and Impact on the Lives of Black Men and Boys. Retrieved at: www.racialequitytools.org/resourcefiles/ Media-Impact-onLives-of-Black-Menand-Boys-OppAgenda.pdf (P. 13) The Opportunity Journal (2011, October).

Media Representations and Impact on the Lives of Black Men and Boys.

Retrieved from: www.racialequitytools.org/ resourcefiles/Media-Impact-onLives-of-BlackMen-and-Boys-OppAgenda.pdf (P. 15) Donaldson, L. (2015, August 12). When the media misrepresents black men, the effects are felt in the real world. www. theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/ aug/12/media-misrepresents-blackmen-effects-felt-real-world

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I’M DEAF AND GAY & THAT’S TOTALLY OKAY.

CONNOR MCLAREN, HEALTH RESEARCH TECHNICIAN, DEAF HEALTH COMMUNICATIONS AND QUALITY OF LIFE CENTRE.

Ever since I can remember, I have identified as gay. No internal confusion, no coming-out horror story. My label as a gay male, while it came with understandable insecurities, never greatly interfered with my daily life. I might even call myself lucky in that sense.

However, a deep part of me never felt truly comfortable among the large heterosexual population surrounding me. Strike one.

directions: hearing, Deaf, straight, and gay.

The straight and hearing worlds require no explanation. In the gay world, guys have shied away from me because of my immersion in American Sign Language (ASL) and Deaf culture, a concept so unfamiliar to most. In the Deaf community, I have sometimes felt unwelcome for not being “Deaf enough” because I wear a cochlear implant to hear.

Now, throw another curveball that is widely but falsely seen as a debilitating condition: being Deaf. Strike two.I grew up with the idea that I had two strikes against me. I have had to face discrimination from all

While most people have interacted with members of a minority group, very few have insight into the challenges of being a “double-minority.” Many double-minority members have few places where they feel

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truly welcome. I spent most of my high school years in a vain search for friends and partners who shared my DNA. The gene pool of Deaf and gay individuals was a null set.

At the beginning of high school, my Deaf aunt, who I have always looked up to as a role model, sat me down and signed to me, “Connor, I don’t want to discourage you but the chances of you dating and marrying a hearing partner are incredibly slim. I went through it all, and I just want to warn you.”

I took what she said as gospel, and I saw the future that I had envisioned for myself crumble before my eyes. My aunt had crushed my hopes of finding the perfect guy. I calculated that my prospects of finding a Deaf, gay and overall compatible partner were limited to about 0.01 percent of the population.

Though I continued to hold my head up high, the burden of the labels that I wore grew heavier throughout my high school years. Every time I went out on a date, I feared the moments that I would have to hide behind a false nod and smile because I could not hear the guy. I worried about mumblers and guys who were impossible to lip-read because they did not move their mouths when they talked. And, worst of all, I agonised over the thought that my Deafness would prove to be a burden for others and push everyone away from me, one by one. It wasn’t until I hit college that I realised how wrong my aunt was.

I realised that my aunt was born in a time when very limited technology was available

to empower her in a hearing world. Back then, ASL was stigmatized, and Deaf people were more isolated from mainstream society. She was not able to function in the hearing world nearly as well as I do. I realized that no two people, regardless of the minority groups they are a part of, have the same experiences — everyone can be “cool” and “unique” with high self-esteem.

I could have the best of both the hearing and Deaf worlds. With this discovery came the realisation that guys, regardless of their hearing ability, were also unique. Some do not bat an eye at other Deaf guys, while others are interested in Deaf culture and who I am as a person. I was on some quixotic quest to find the perfect match and the only person stopping me was, well, me.

Maybe attending such an open-minded university opened my eyes and made me realise this. Or the fact that I got lucky with such supportive people around me. At college, while I admit that not every guy I meet is open to my deafness and that it is still difficult to communicate with people at times, I feel much more accepted. In the gay world, many guys now embrace my Deafness. I have spread awareness of Deaf culture and ASL to many of my hearing friends, who actually think that I am “cool” and “unique.” On top of that, one of my best friends at college is Deaf.

Being a part of both the Deaf and LGBT communities has opened up my world immensely, affording me opportunities to meet a lot of amazing people I would not have otherwise met. People I know

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find this hard to believe when I tell them that, if I could hit the reset button and choose my sexual orientation and hearing ability, I cannot say that I would choose to be hearing and straight. My special experiences, which few other people have shared, have built my character and made me a stronger individual — more able to empathise with others and value diversity. Those two strikes that I thought I had were really blessings in disguise.

So here is my message, and I realis e it is easier said than done: Hang in there — no matter what minority groups you identify with and how alone you may sometimes feel. With patience and support, you will eventually find somewhere in the world, and nothing will be greater than feeling that sense of belonging — and trust me, it will be worth the wait.

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LOUISE STERN. WRITER AND ARTIST.

For those who may not know you or be familiar with your work, in your own words how would you describe yourself?

I am a writer and artist; my work looks at communication and language, often filtered through my deafness and my native sign language.

You once mentioned that language is what makes us human, would you be able to elaborate for us?

All living creatures communicate, but the extent to which we depend on formal language distinguishes us from other animals.

Why is instinct not enough for us? Why are we so driven to try defining ourselves and our experience of the world through language? I believe that these things are at the heart of the mysterious, joyful, and sad human condition.

Sad human condition, that’s an interesting perspective. Why do you think it’s sad if that’s also what distinguishes us?

I do think that the human condition has a considerable element of sadness - while it also has much else. Looking in the newspaper daily is sad…. while there are of course great beauties and kindnesses all around me on the street daily, our need to delineate and distinguish doesn’t lend itself to a joyful created reality in my eyes - certainly not what we have the potential for. Our need for formal language is a large part of that.

How do you/others challenge the boundaries of language?

Questioning not just what we say, but how we say it may never have been more essential.

In this day and age, when words surround us but may not transmit much of substance, we should ask what relationship words have to concrete reality. What is true? When we remove the screen of language, are we able to see more clearly or see different things?

These are pressing concerns. Anyone who pushes us to see new things is challenging the boundaries of language; I am interested in addressing them explicitly in my work.

Apart from yourself, Is there anyone in particular that comes to mind when you think about those who push us to see new things and challenging the boundaries of language? Who inspires you to push the boundaries of language?

So many! Juan Rulfo, Paul Celan, Tessa Farmer, Saskia de Brauw, Alberto Giacometti, Jean Rhys, Omar Salamanca Lopez, Francis Bacon to name a few. Not that I place myself in their category at all, but that is who inspires me, along with the deaf community.

How are you trying to challenge the normalities of the use of certain words?

In my work, I try to find tangible expression in language. Instead of saying ‘bad’ or ‘ good’ in a piece of writing, I want to use words that show how something that I want to put across as bad or as good smells, feels, looks. By doing this, I hope I am asking myself and the reader what it is that perception is based on. In the short film I just wrote and directed for Film 4, handwritten notes are shown on screen as

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one way of showing dialogue. Banal words look strange; throwaway phrases acquire resonance, especially when presented alongside the heightened physical expression that also features in the film. Via these creative strategies and others, I want to investigate the true meaning of words and how we see them. Why do we make the judgments that we do in everyday life?

Sounds very interesting? Are you allowed to tell us abit more about it and when it will be airing?

It’s called “Boat” - it’s a 20-minute short based on a story from my first book, expanded with elements from visual work. It has some beautiful actors and dancers, and was shot on 16mm film by Patrick Mellor. We’re in post production now and then it will go out to film festivals - other venues for its release will depend on Film 4 and how good it is!

Are you involved in any spaces that reimagine different ways of using language?

My work is this space; other creative works that awaken me are this space.

How does an individual’s actions play in enforcing the biases of language?

Every time we use words reflexively, we are enforcing the bias of language.

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In Style and Number 5 - from a separate photo series taken in Chican, the deaf village, that I’m working on bringing movement to in a new art project

Terry and Sofia - from a photo series focusing on physicality

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A page from A Strange Story - a book of short stories made up solely of handwritten conversations and shown as an artwork.

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MANKIND. PATRICIA PETERSEN, BA FINE ART, UAL.

With this video piece, I have attempted to investigate gender biased linguistics in English. I have looked at words that are biased to the male gender but are used as a general term for all genders and non-binary identities. By looking closer to the definitions in the dictionary I discovered that some of these words were defined exclusively to the male gender even though they are commonly used for all genders and non-binary identities.

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IF “MASTERY OF LANGUAGE AFFORDS REMARKABLE POWER”, THEN HOW MUCH DO I HAVE ACCESS TO? CHARISSE CHIKWIRI, SHADES OF NOIR GRADUATE.

I’ve been reading Black Skin, White Masks by Frantz Fanon and the first chapter got me thinking a lot about language and its significance beyond being a means of communication.

Consider this blog a documentation of this particular train of thought.

This blog is my burger buns, the meat (or halloumi and mushroom if you’re vegetarian) is still cooking.

There are two quotes in particular that I intend to expand upon: “A man who has a language consequently possesses the world expressed & implied by that language. What we are getting at becomes plain: mastery of language affords remarkable power.”

This quote illustrates a world with multiple dimensions, each with a different range of knowledge and understanding to the one beside it. Each dimension is accessible by portal and language is the key. When multiple portals are opened, they merge to inform one another. (I’ve been talking a lot about ‘other’ dimensions ever since watching Stranger Things, it’s great, watch it!)

language reflect the evolution of the people of the culture it belongs to. Language can either mean inclusion or exclusion.

It can bring diasporans together and alongside culture create a home away from home, or it can be the reason why barriers between people are formed.

“To speak means to be in a position to use a certain syntax, to grasp the morphology of this or that language, but it means above all to assume a culture, to support the weight of a civilisation” I am a Shona-speaking Zimbabwean and an English-speaking British citizen; my mastery of language is limited to the two.

How does this shape my understanding of the world, how many dimensions do I have access to and how do they merge to form my existence? With the languages that I speak, how much power am I afforded in this world?

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HANGNA KOH.

MA INFORMATION EXPERIENCE DESIGN (IED), ROYAL COLLEGE OF ART.

Okinoshima, situated halfway between Japan and Korea, is a sacred island home of Shinto gods. It recently became a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and now only priests are granted entry. The ocean surrounding the island is also believed to be sacred, considered a gateway between cultures. The island represents my search for personal cultural identity as a South Korean-JapaneseAustralian artist in the UK. My project is more broadly about oceans that connect us emotionally, culturally and physically, using the metaphor of a network to map between water to land to individual, to understand importance and value of identity.

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POWER OF WRITING. HILLARY WAN, BA FASHION DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT, UAL.

Ever since I was a child, I was being taught the disciplines of “forgiveness” and “not attracting attentions to yourself”, as I am suppose to be a humble quiet girl now, and will be a humble quiet wife in the future.

This faulty thinking has affected me greatly when encountering unpleasant experiences especially targeting me as a Chinese studying abroad. The course provided an academic key text that uses extreme biased examples targeting Chinese people. For example, “China seeks to imitate the West in everything, without understanding the reason why.” (Bartlett, Cole, and Rocamora, 2013) When questioning the key text’s integrity,

the tutor replied with “misunderstanding” and “over analyzing” the text. After pointing out the specific examples that are offensive and requiring an explanation to the phrase “misunderstanding the language”, the tutor swerved the conversation and did not reply with a straight answer. My family told me that there is nothing I can do, and the “haters will always hate”. Even when facing racial discrimination from fellow students, I was told by my parents to stay calm and let it go because I am in a foreign country, “their territory” is the phrase they used.

This is just the tip of the iceberg on how I was treated by the university and how a

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traditional Chinese family would react when facing discrimination targeting Asians.

With the culture and society feeding into the impression of “Madam Butterfly”, it is difficult to break out from the social normality that were being fed to me. It is even harder when the education system that I should have learned equality and liberation from, had failed to teach students important moral lessons, or even consider the possibility of respecting the voice and opinions of a person who traveled thousands of miles away from their home seeking education that they think the country should provide.

Reflecting on the past, I am lucky, standing on the shoulders of the giants that had fought many battles for the life that I have for now.

Discrimination still exists, and will always exist whether the the person is conscious about the action or not. “Humans, either burst from silence, or perish from it.” (Lu, 1926) It is time for me to join in the battle and continue to fight to educate the ones that needed it. I am more than grateful to be able to have a chance to speak for myself and hopefully many others that faced the same problems like I did. This chance, not just to work for a better education experience, but also to be the infantry, to fight for the rights that should have never been taken away in the first place.

the school’s database and present more viewpoints for academics to think about.

“We have come to live in a world of culture as fashion, in which each of us can pick and choose cultural identities like we pick and choose clothes.” (Mathews, 2000) If studying in a diverse environment and being exposed to equality is the needle and thread for the “clothes”. What we can do now is to present and design as much garments that no one is excluded or does not feel comfortable in. And one day, people will start to wear each others shoes, and fully appreciate the splendid possibilities of understanding and embracing a new culture.

Bartlett, D., Cole, S. and Rocamora, A. (2013). Fashion media.

London: Bloomsbury, p.145.

Lu, X. (1926). In Memory of Miss Liu HeZhen. Yu Si, 74.

Mathews, Gordon. (2000). Global Culture/ Individual Identity: Searching for home in the cultural supermarket.

1st ed. Oxon: Routledge.

Picture: The Loner (2011). [video] Korea: Sticky Monster Lab.

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JOSEPH HILL. ASSISTANT PROFESSOR, NATIONAL TECHNICAL INSTITUTE FOR THE DEAF

For those who may not know you or be familiar with your work, in your own words how would you describe yourself?

I am an assistant professor at the National Technical Institute for the Deaf which is one of the schools at Rochester Institute of Technology. I am known for my work on the southern dialect of American Sign Language (ASL) called “Black ASL,” which is part of the legacy of racial segregation in the South. I am a co-author along with Drs. Carolyn McCaskill, Ceil Lucas, and Robert Bayley, on the book, “The Hidden Treasure of Black ASL: Its History and Structure,” published by Gallaudet University Press. The book includes the historical coverage of different segregated schools for black deaf children in the South, the description and analysis of distinct linguistic features of Black ASL, and the social and geographical factors that have defined and maintained Black ASL as we know today.

I am also known for my work on language attitudes in the deaf communities in America and social justice in the sign language interpreting field. This work is partially inspired by my involvement in Black ASL. Initially, I got involved in the Black ASL project because I was curious and I wanted to see what made that dialect different, but over time, I saw that in the interviews with black deaf seniors, when they were in school, they were subjected to segregation that kept them isolated from white deaf children and black deaf children did not have as much educational resources and support as white deaf children did.

So the language input they had was qualitatively different than did white deaf students at the other schools. When desegregation happened, black deaf students who were in the integrated setting typically pushed aside their own language and adopted the variety that was typical at the white deaf schools. So that interrupted the cultural transmission of Black ASL to the next generations of black deaf students which affected the core vocabulary developed by black deaf children before desegregation.

But even so, there are elements of Black ASL that still exist today due to the social and geographical factors that are based on race. It is not a surprise since racism still exist in the American society on all levels.

What do certain words represent in society?

I am not sure what this question is asking for, but based on the other questions, I am going to assume it is related to race, gender, and class. Racism exists in the deaf communities as it does in the American society in general.

Every generation of deaf and hard of hearing people have been privileged or oppressed by racism and other forms of oppression in some ways depending on their social identities and the communities they are part of. Just as we have the n-word in English, there is a few equivalent signs in ASL that have the same derogatory meaning against black people.

The signs, in general, are not acceptable when used in the open, but in private, they are still in use. There are sexism, homophobia, transphobia, classism, and more in the American Deaf community. Just as there is social justice activism in the society, we also have it in the American Deaf community and

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they have signs like “intersectionality,” “social justice,” “equality,” “privilege,” and more.

The deaf communities are the microcosm of the American society so they are subjected to the same social forces and movements.

How does language reinforce power disparities?

In language, there are codes that are related to power and oppression and it can maintain our worldviews in a way that allow us to reproduce social inequalities. When I say maintain, I mean when our worldviews are not challenged, we are not aware of disparities and injustice that have occurred and are still happening in our lives. So it is important for us to be introspective and engage in a dialogue that may challenge our worldviews. When we face the challenge, we have to allow ourselves to be open to the process of change in order to move toward the better part of our humanity. So not only we have to be aware of the power of words, we have to be aware of the personal and societal narratives that come with the words.

How do you/others challenge the boundaries of language?

I am not what you mean by the boundaries of language. Language is like a river; it is always changing and whatever happens to it, language will adapt to the culture at a given time. Actually, language is more like water; it is defined by geography, so people perceive rivers, creeks, lakes, and ponds differently just by the physical environments.

It is the same with languages with the social and geographical boundaries and the social narratives so the boundaries and narratives influence people’s perception of which language varieties are acceptable and which ones are not. I think one thing about signed languages is that not everyone believes that they are languages in their own rights. Most people believe that languages have to be spoken and anything else have to be based on

those languages like writing, texting, Morse code, and signing. But signed languages are different in term of structure, modality, vocabulary, history, and socio-cultural effects.

Language is actually in the brain and it comes out in a different mode that can be spoken, written, and signed. Any difference in words and phrases in a language in whatever mode is based on socio-cultural, political, economic, and geographical differences.

What are your personal experiences of racial, gender or class profiling through language?

I know there are studies that show that people’s social identities can be identified based on speech and that can be used against them. For example, there are cases of housing discrimination and employment discrimination against black people just by the sound of their voices and their speech. Even though racial discrimination is illegal, it is hard to prove racial discrimination if it is just based on the speech sounds. It is same with gay speech and accented speech from other languages (depending on which languages).

With signing, it is similar. There are certain ways of signing that are acceptable in the mainstream ASL community, but when it comes to people of color’s way of signing, there is generally a question of how acceptable their signing is. If it matches perfectly, they are treated as part of the ASL community. If it is different, then their signing is open to criticism. It is the case that signers of color are subjected to double standards when it comes to signing, especially on the public front.

I have seen a video of a black deaf woman who is an ASL teacher and she decided to contribute her thoughts about the controversy of de-initialization of ASL signs, meaning changing the handshapes of the signs so they appear to have no relationship with English.

For example, removing the F handshape from the FAMILY sign and use the 5 handshape instead to depict a group of people. I thought

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the black deaf teacher made a few good points in her video. But instead, she got criticism from some people who commented about her choice of signs and questioned her teaching credentials and linguistic knowledge. It was disappointing, but it was not surprising.

How are you trying to challenge the normalities of the use of certain words?

I am still trying to find a better way to do it. Right now, I am doing it through social media by sharing resources and contributing my thoughts related to social issues. I find that doing workshop presentations are the most effective way to challenge the normalities of maintaining words and concepts that contain offensive meanings and contribute to social divisions. I have been publishing different materials, but they are largely for academic audiences. I need to translate them to accessible materials that are appropriate for the public. That takes time and I need to find right people to do that with so I can make that possible. But right now, it is social media and workshops.

Are you involved in any spaces that reimagine different ways of using language?

Right now, I am not actively involved in anything like that. I have seen people doing that kind of thing like I mentioned above about the controversy of de-initializing ASL signs. I am not involved in that at all because it comes with the complicated package of including and excluding people based on how well they know ASL and how well connected they are in the deaf community. There is a lot to unpack in term of racial, gender, generational, educational, and economic privileges. I have important projects that I need to tend to so I am not going to touch that.

How does an individual’s actions play in enforcing the biases of language?

I believe that I have mentioned that in one of the questions above. We all have biases and we all have certain beliefs about language. It seems like in this society, language is equated with speech and with speech, there are certain dialects that are deemed appropriated over the others based on social prestige. If we had accepted that there were different language varieties and no one were better than other, this wouldn’t be an issue. But there are some varieties that carry prestige based on socio-economic and political privilege of the certain communities and the amount of influence over the society. So the language is coded in a way is reinforced by people’s customs and behaviors so it is not detectable to themselves, but it is noticeable to other people who are part of the stigmatized or marginalized community.

How has technology interpreted biases in language? (e.g. through speech recognition, social media, artificial intelligence etc.)

I don’t think technology has a way to interpret biases in language. It is a tool for us, like how language is a tool for human beings. It is us that have biases and through the use of tools, our biases appear. So it is the practice that we need to look at with a critical eye, not the tool. I think it is difficult to look at different practices because it comes with so many different viewpoints and experiences that it is overwhelming for some people. And for some people, the practices are normal to their eyes so for us to bring up an issue, we could be accused of being divisive. It is something that we have to push through and to be consistent with our activism. With the change in practice, we can use the tools appropriately.

How is language used to desensitise inequality/human right issues?

Language is an ideological tool that can be used to shape people’s perception and

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behaviour and to maintain or change community practices. It can also be used to distort people’s perception and understanding of an event. All it takes is to have certain elements in a story that makes it appear as truth. If it lends itself to someone’s belief system, it will be accepted as truth. So in the case of human right issues, one has to appeal to people’s sensibilities and belief about their own community that is more deserving than others and the story will have a life of its own as a community narrative.

In the case of racism, one has to appeal to the sense of white superiority and the belief in the institution that has everyone’s interest (that usually mean themselves) that makes it easy to disregard human right issues.

What role does media and political communication play in contributing to hateful rhetoric?

I believe the basis of all this is the economy, the kind of economy we have that encourages domination and oppression. Media and politics are part of the institution that privilege certain communities of people over others. With the system in the place that perpetuates and normalize the social divisions, we don’t have to look very far to see how normal the hateful rhetoric we see playing out in media and political communication every day. The systems are interconnected so it is difficult to pinpoint one thing. We have to address as many things as possible so we can show how everything is connected. What I do know is that the hateful rhetoric pays because it keeps people engaged on the media.

We have to be resistant to that and find other avenues that won’t contribute our dollars to the oppressive institutions.

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VISUAL EROTICIZATION AND BEAUTIFICATION. YASMIN AKIM, BA PHOTOGRAPHY, UAL.

The Political Configuration of the Female.

Visual Eroticization and Beautification of the female body is a result of patriarchy and a false sense of ownership of ‘the other’, the visual representations of women are commoditised within popular culture and public discourse. ‘In a world ordered by sexual imbalance, pleasure in looking has been split between active male and passive female.’ The male gaze projects its phantasy of possession.

The female form exudes pleasurable desire at a superficial level as women are presented as something to be obtained, which in due course, establishes the need to compete in the name of desire.

‘The scopophilic instinct (pleasure in looking at another person as an erotic object), and, in contradistinction, ego libido (forming identification processes) act as formations, mechanisms which the cinema has played on. The image of woman as (passive) raw material for the (active) gaze of man takes the argument a step further into the structure of representation, adding a further demanded

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by the ideology of the patriarchal order as it worked out in its favorite cinematic form – illusionistic narrative film. The argument turns again to the psychoanalytic background in that woman as representation signifies castration, inducing voyeuristic or fetishistic mechanisms to circumvent her threat.’ (L. Mulvey, 1975, Pg. 7) In a lecture based on psychoanalytic criticism, at Yale U.S.A (2009) Professor Paul Fry explores the work of Jacques Lacan in consideration of ego ideals that we are all attached to - ‘This symbolic ego ideal is something that is impossible to acquire, one recognises what one lacks, and so this takes a variety of phallocentric forms’. He compares Lacainian theory to L. Murvely, and how she states that the female object of desire is the spectators gaze itself, which as a social phenomenon, represents lack and the power that is attached to that desire. “the paradox of phallocentrism in all its manifestations is that it depends on the image of the castrated woman to give order and meaning to its world. An idea of women stands as lynch pin to the system: it is her lack that produces the phallus as a symbolic presence…”

to monumental and phallocentric ideals. It is thought-provoking to look at ‘Villa dei Misteri’ (The Villa of the Mysteries) as an example of the male gaze. These preserved artworks of an ancient Roman Villa (400 metres northwest of Pompeii, southern Italy) show women, who are eroticised for what they represent – which is the gift of harbouring life. Interestingly, Bice Benvenuto explains in her book about the site - ‘the analytical unveiling initiates the many, those who want to carry on living to make sense of death which life entails.’

In this era - patriarchy is reaffirmed within the spectacle, where this objectification is deployed from the ‘elevated’ position of the male gaze creating an imbalance within the power that the photographed subject inhabits in comparison to the photographer, this has an effect on the viewer, the appearance of women and their value are bound together.

As photographers, ‘powerful white men’ use their lenses to focus on ‘credibility’ and ‘recognition’ within what is deemed to be desirable, through access to regulated means of production and distribution, which inevitably, has an effect on popular culture and our collective subconscious relation to gender from a young age.

(L. Mulvey, 1975, Pg.1) We can trace the origins of phallic worship, and symbolism within the traditions, artwork and festivities of Ancient Folklore. Our attachment to phallic imagery is so vastly persistent that it is practically overlooked; one can easily interpret the constructed landscape of architecture and warfare as a modern nod

Bearing this in mind, photography from a feminist perspective is limited in its immediacy, but it is undeniably crucial in the way that it broadens the possibility for empathy towards people from different walks of life. Feminists are subversive rather than complacent within their motivations, representation is expanded

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rather than focused on a singular aspect of femininity, which is the politically airbrushed – Comparatively, the feminist gaze is attracted to the ‘imperfections’ that make us all human, along with the aspects of life that tend to be overlooked, and genuine connections. Empowering photography is collaborative as if one looks closely - it allows the viewer to make their own mind up about a person for who they truly are, as well as the photographer. Photography executed from a feminist perspective is progressive due to the symbolic deconstruction of the male gaze; this exploration of new possibilities can be exposed within visual language successfully. When a woman is the bearer of her own image, she has the opportunity to transcend the confines of desiring to be deemed simply as ‘the object of desire’ or ‘lack’ as they can generate a deeper meaning within the capture of their aura.

Benvenuto, B. (1994). Concerning the rites of psychoanalysis or The villa of the mysteries. New York: Routledge.

Butler, J, 2007. Gender Trouble. 2nd ed. United Kingdom: Routledge Debord, G, 1967. Society of the Spectacle.

1st ed. United Kingdom: Rebel Press Mulvey, L. 1989, Visual and other pleasures. 5th ed. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.

Professor Paul Fry - Jacques Lacan in Theory. - YouTube. [ONLINE] Available at: www.youtube.com/ watch?v=lkAXsR5WINc&t=1716s

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VIEWPOINT AND HIDDEN BEAUTY.

KELLY WALTER, ARTIST, RESEARCHER AND CURATOR. Viewpoint

Hidden Beauty

Viewpoint is a board game designed and developed in response to two previous projects (Percival Magic Cards and Hidden Beauty). Initially, borrowing from board game vernacular (Battleship, Tic Tac Toe and rolling dice), I sought to examine an individual’s response to simplified visual symbols.

Broadsheet poster inspired by two sculptures from the RISD Museum Gallery Collection (“African Venus” by Charles Henri Joseph Cordier and the “Bust of Madame Recamier by Joseph Chinard).

The project explored the topics of exoticism and beauty in the female form. I wanted to explore the similarities and differences in the material qualities of both bronze and marble sculptures, through folded paper, typography and photographs. The final poster was an 18” x 27” broadsheet poster that folded down into a “6” x 9” rectangle.

Each player was given two sets of black and white cards. One set used only pronouns (I, He, She, Me, You, etc.) while the other side used only oppositional words (Alone, There, Beside, Among, etc.). The second set of cards used pronouns (to indicate to the player their outward facing “viewpoint”), while the other side used black and red visuals (to visually convey their “viewpoint” to an opponent).

The object of the game was to have both players interpret the visual card from their opponent and put down a corresponding word on a blank square on their board. By the end the players would have a series of 5 rounds of cards that they could be rearranged and ordered on Board 2 to prompt a new discussion.

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WORDS FAILED. EVA HE, BA SCULPTURE, UAL.

Words, here I mean the fundamental element of language, of which the purpose is to communicate.

Of course, words are successful in constructing a society, such as being used in official documents or transcripts.

Words are also efficient for individuals to learn the functionality and the moral norms of the world. Words reflects norms, norms that are supposed to provide a common sense that is from a total objective point of view. Words are supposed to be accurate, they are pins on concepts. They provide efficiency in communication.

Then, Why failure?

Words failed by distorting and diminishing the information we, as individual consciousnesses, take in.

Words created an illusion of how the outside world is constructed: 1. Nouns give the units of things. Those with no names do not exist. Being used in social/ethical life, words impose ideology.

If there’s no word for what you are or what you are doing, then your identity is effaced and what you are doing is meaningless.

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2. Developed from the previous idea, the right that is given to a certain group to legitimize the meaning of words consolidates the society strata. Words after all are exclusive. Words are the substantiation of individuals compromising with the rest of people as a whole. For every one of us, to use language is to confront the otherness of being.

But, I am still using words writing this article. I do not think that there exists a better method to communicate more accurately... Thus I have to make it clear that, those failures I mentioned above come hand in hand with the success in constructing the existence of OUR “solid” culture/ history/ social structure. (Solidness only comes after the simplification and subtraction done by the language of words.) For the norms we have in mind, In the sake of those success of the whole species, individual sentimental lost of meanings are trivial.

Are they trivial, though, those idiosyncratic sections of living? Those sections of living that have been brutally marginalized for the values imposed on each one of us by society?

I can only speak for myself that, with language, the expression of mixed feelings that comes for no rational reasons (ex. melancholy) are not encouraged, and seldom do we dare to bring up anything that does not have a word for it.

This unspoken/ unwritten section of living cannot be deliberately put in to words. But they still strike the very inside of us sometimes when we see a

painting/ sculpture or finish reading a story loaded by millions of words. That section of life only shows itself in art.

Those idiosyncratic section of living, from my understanding, are the very proof of one’s humanity. That is what makes us human, not a gear helping the world function, not a machine producing and consuming, not an animal mating and reproducing. Those feelings are precious for they haven’t been sifted by the concept units of language. They are untouched by the society norms for they have been ignored. For me, they are the magic of life, they are the remains of the soul that have been breathed into our physical body.

When I speak of the failure of words, I only mean the failure of its functionality; giving definition and logic, fails to outline the humanity (or to say, the soul, the illogical).

For language premised that the world is objective and everything happens for a reason which counters the very nature of our (my) being.

I can give no further suggestion and I have no intention to call for people to cease using language. This piece of writing is only a reminder for myself to stop abandoning the mental experiences that do not fit in words.

I need to stop forcing myself to talk and think in a way that is not at ease. I don’t have to express in words and words only.

Words are not the more authentic way of expression. I’d better keep that in mind that words are man-made. I am more than a repeater of ideas within this society.

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SHONA, BECAUSE OF YOU I PRONOUNCE THE O’S IN ONIONS AND OVENS. CHARISSE CHIKWIRI, SHADES OF NOIR GRADUATE.

I was three years old when I migrated to the UK, speaking little to no English but fluent in Shona (as fluent as a three-yearold can be). This would be the perfect time to write a descriptive paragraph about how I felt when I landed on “the greener side”, but honestly, I remember Nothing.

Yes, I’ve been back to Zimbabwe several times but does going for a holiday really compare to being raised Kumusha? Kumusha = the place where you come from.

Whilst I can’t recall memories of Zimbabwe prior to me moving to this country, what I do have is my language, the Shona language.

I’m using medium to divert from the question which asked “how much power am I afforded by the languages I speak?”, because it is important for me to first establish what the languages I speak mean to me. I can’t begin to paint the bigger picture, without the initial understanding of colour. We’re still headed for the same destination, this is just a necessary pit stop.

Pit Stop №1 — The Shona Language. This was the first language I ever spoke. The main language my parents speak. I speak Shona to those who understand it. From the moment I say “hesi” (hi), those who understand it, know exactly where I come from. Shona

is the currency of the Zimbabwean side of my identity. Its exchanges are exclusive.

I need to take a break here, this has been a struggle to write. As a writer, I am in the practice of not only writing for myself but for others as well, for you to understand me. I am struggling to use English to concisely explain what Shona means to me. So instead I am going to write a letter to my native tongue, and I hope that through this I will break the barrier.

Dear Shona, You are not just a language; a dictionary of words I use to communicate. You are more than a skill I can add to my CV. You represent a side of me that only those close to me know. You represent my culture, the culture that has taught me to be nurturing and respectful.

You represent my mother’s roots and my father’s land, because of you I will never forget where I came from. Even though I don’t see her often, through you I remember the things my Grandma used to say.

Because of you my mum is “mama” and my grandma is “gogo”, it doesn’t matter if I speak English, who they are stay the same.

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I feel an intense love when I call my little sister “nhanha”, stronger than when I use her name.

You constantly remind me of the importance of family and togetherness. I appreciate how you call my mum’s sister “mainini”, which translates to “smaller/younger Mum.” I appreciate how you have no specific word for “cousin”, to you my cousins, are my brothers and sisters. You don’t like to distance yourself from your history and your relatives, so you use brother because you fear “cousin” will get lost in translation.

I notice how you seep into my second language, English, the language I use the most. I notice how because of you I pronounce the O’s in onions and ovens.

Each of your words tells a story. You are substantial. You are a living artefact. You will never die, so long as your people continue to speak you. I wish I had understood earlier, my history is significant now more than ever.

But soon I must ask you if I was to create a product out of you, what would your unique selling point be and how much would you be worth on the market?

I ask this not so that I can degrade you, I will never. My personal relationship with you will always remain. I ask so that I can widen my perspective and understand where you fit in the grand scheme of things.

I notice how sometimes when I am lost in intimacy, I turn to your words to express either love, joy or excitement without even realising. Shona, you are my memory’s oldest friend. No matter where I go, I can never seem to shake you.

There have been times that I have tried to suppress you, but you held on. For that, I thank you. I realise now that in this western world, I need you more than ever.

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INFRATHIN IN TRANSLATION.

MATHILDE HEU, MA CRITICAL PRACTICE, ROYAL COLLEGE OF ARTS. When writing in English, I feel like progressing underneath a thin membrane, which can be pierced at every moment, to reach my mother-tongue. Indeed, a word like membrane for example remains exactly the same in French. Thus, I feel an infrathin distance between the two. Furthermore, a membrane is a selective barrier, letting some elements pass through, and some not. A filter that I like to compare with the body, to sift the experiences which stimulate an interiority.

As I was reading, looking for aphorisms on the subject, I got caught by this delightful phrase of Roland Barthes : “ The language is a skin : I rub my language against the other. It is as if I had words instead of fingers, or fingers at the tip of my words. ” [1] Between drawing and writing, exists a strange similarity : as if writing was drawing sense out of words and ideas ; and drawing, similar to the gesture of writing, a serpentine stroke on the paper.

Being in this in-between, is like observing a body from underneath glass, another point of view, as in Patrick Tosani’s photograph, where the body offers itself in a way that you are not used to. Albeit, you know this body, but you discover its hitherto unseen parts. And thus,English constitutes for me this alien language that I am experiencing, and I wonder how this otherness, this exteriority, modifies an interiority. And by which means, after a relative period of time, this experience finds its output, and is crystallised to form an artwork and find its autonomy back in exteriority.

To carry on with the idea of being under, or

behind something, I would like to shortly talk about mirrors, as indeed, it also refers to a phenomenon happening behind a reflective surface. Anish Kapoor’s Sky Mirror suggests to our gaze the reflection of the sky, a break through the scenery, a reflection space[2].

Observing this, I find interesting to relate this work to what Giuseppe Penone wrote about his reflecting contact lenses : “ The reflected image is the border between reality and a dream-world or apparition ; it has no substance and is the instant which follows the changes in reality. ” Furthermore, a reflection is a reversed image, at least laterally inverted, which means that it reverses the forward/backward axis : “ if you stand side-on to a mirror, the mirror reverses your left and right, because that is the direction perpendicular to the mirror ” [3]. In addition, a reflection is a light-issue. Indeed, light takes time to travel, however it is imperceptible to the naked eye. It is therefore accurate to say that a mirror reflection is the ‘ instant ’ that follows reality. Once again there is an infrathin amount of time, sufficient enough to create a difference, that one can only imagine or understand theoretically.

Curiously, ‘ reflection ’ can both mean a process of thoughts and a reflected image whereas in French, two words exist, but they are differentiated by only one letter : one being reflexion with an ‘ x ’, that signifies the process of thinking and the other being reflection with a ‘ c ’ and means the reflected image.

I notice with amusement that a ‘ c ’ would be symmetrically inverted if seen as a reflection in a mirror. And by putting the

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two side-by-side, we would obtain the ‘ x ’ of the French word reflexion. Regarding Giuseppe Penone’s work, I find this anecdote interesting, according the fact that he uses both of the meanings of the word ‘ reflection’.

Thus, the transition from a language to another can be seen as similar to a shift, a trip toward an antipode: from a word to its translation, resulting in imperceptible change. One ends up at the same place, or almost the same, but, on the other side.

Like if a specific word and its translations were gathered on the surface of a sphere containing all their meanings : by entering the surface, and traveling to its antipode, one would meet on its way their definitions, to end up at the opposite coordination point. A fabulous trip as it tends to bring us closer to a nucleus, where the definitions collide and enrich words at their output.

[1]. My translation, original quotation : “ Le langage est une peau : je frotte mon langage contre l’autre. C’est comme si j’avais des mots en guise de doigts, ou des doigts au bout de mes mots.” Roland Barthes, Fragments D’un Discours Amoureux, Collection Tel Quel ( Paris : Éditions du Seuil, 1977 ), p. 43.

[2]. ‘ Sky Mirror ’ <http:// anishkapoor.com/230/sky-mirror> [ accessed 29 March 2017].

[3]. ‘ Mirror ’, Wikipedia, 2017 <https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php ?title=Mirror&oldid=775109129>.

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BRITISH GHANAIANS: LOST IN TRANSLATION DOCUMENTARY. PAMELA SAKYI, BA COMMUNICATIONS AND MEDIA, BRUNEL.

The Ghanaian Diaspora in London is facing a Language Endangerment crisis.

Language Endangerment occurs when a language is at risk of dying out because itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s speakers stop speaking it, or stop passing their language on to the next generations, instead they choose to communicate in a different language, such as English.

Levels of fluency amongst some 2nd generation Ghanaians in London are at an all-time low. As a result many feel disconnected from their family in Ghana and also feel disconnected from their rich cultural heritage. British Ghanaians:

Lost In Translation explores this issue of Language Endangerment, Its root causes and what can be done to inspire a Ghanaian language fluency revival. The pressure to maintain the language and culture on this side of the Motherland, is further enhanced by a prevalent mind set in Ghana, that speaking English is more favourable than native Ghanaian languages.

Recent migrants to the UK perpetuate this mindset by refusing to teach their children a Ghanaian language, preferring English.

There are many documented accounts of children in Ghana being punished for

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speaking in their native tongue. English is actually the official language of Ghana.

However, I argue in my documentary that whilst speaking a dominant language like English may make you more globally relevant and help your career prospects, it is also crucial to preserve your cultural heritage and knowing a Ghanaian language is an essential part of such preservation. I also believe that it puts 2nd generation Ghanaians in an advantageous position to visit Ghana and be better equipped to contribute towards its economy in the long term.

learning Twi proactively and more intensively and as a result I have been able to come to a deeper understanding of Ghanaian culture, practices and history, which has developed me as a British Ghanaian person on the whole. It is a huge advantage and I actually feel more ‘complete’ and ‘wholesome’. I have travelled to Ghana recently and have been shocked by many areas where language endangerment is happening. Yet I speak to some 2nd generation Ghanaians in the UK and they do not realise what is at stake.

Ghanaians have such a wealth of native languages and dialects. Colonialism introduced Ghana to the English language and I believe a colonial mindset is perpetuated when English is favoured over native Ghanaian languages. I believe it is better to be multilingual, which is scientifically proven to have substantial long-lived cognitive, social, personal, academic, and professional benefits.

By 2050 it is estimated that more than half of the world’s languages will die out due to more people choosing to and being encouraged to speak a dominant language such as English, Mandarin, Arabic, Portuguese, Spanish or French. When a community loses its languages it loses a sense of its rich cultural history, identity, heritage and roots, inherent in the languages and it also loses the power to represent itself in a unique way.

The documentary also highlights what it is like to be of a dual identity (mainly British and Ghanaian) and how factors of language and fluency play an important role. As a British Ghanaian myself, I spent a huge part of my life not knowing how to speak my mother’s language, Brong Twi. This meant being excluded from family conversations, jokes, stories, proverbs, idioms etc. I prided myself on being British and associated being African with a certain awkwardness and insecurity. In recent years I have been DISCOURSE: THE POWER OF LANGUAGE AND COMMUNICATION. // 65

THE AMERICAN DREAM BOOK SUMMARY.

MARY LO, BA TEXTILE DESIGN, UAL.

The American Dream reflects my experience as an Asian American from the age of 5 - a nod to an acknowledgement of when I realized race affected me and how it has encouraged me to be proactive and vocal â&#x20AC;&#x201C; especially in a time of such political unrest in America. It is a realization that the American Dream is not a visualization for people of color, but rather an assimilation to whiteness.

Although my experience is not limited to only an American one, this booklet was also inspired by my time at Chelsea seeing as how tutors and peers would collectively be amazed by my ability to articulate in English so fluently and consistently assuming my culture whilst questioning why race was such an important issue to me through microaggressions.

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IF ONLY WE LIVED IN A WORLD WHERE MY SYLLABLES DID NOT OFFEND YOURS. HANSIKA JETHNANI, EDUCATIONS OFFICER, UAL ARTS SU.

if only we lived in a world where my syllables did not offend yours i traveled across the ocean only to be told my mother tongue is a problem and to have the language of a world that broke mine enforced upon me - the migrant who left his heart at home for wages in a foreign land

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LINETT KAMALA.

LINETT KAMALA, BA GRAPHIC DESIGN, UAL. My work intends to respond to the theme by looking at the use of language within educational institutions, particularly with regards to class and race through the lens of a black British female. I will also draw upon my 16 years of experience working as a senior leader in a wide range of schools.

Through the creation of new paintings, I will explore and shed light on the different ways in which language contributes to real-life power disparities of certain words within English state schools.

As with many professions, education is filled with its own set of acronyms, which can sometimes be difficult for those outside of the field to access.

I am particularly drawn to the theme because language is an essential part of my process when creating works as the imagery is made up of words in a style which merges calligraffiti with abstract expressionism.

My key focus will be the use of language around the term ‘disadvantaged’ which is widely used within The Department for Education and Ofsted publications, as well as how this term is used in the educational institutions and charities. Indeed, one such organisation School Ambition Leadership states ‘we are working for a fair society built on an education system where every child can thrive, no matter what their background…. many young people from disadvantaged communities don’t achieve at school and can’t go on to realise their ambitions’.

Other key words which I will explore through my work include; communities,

ability, labels and access. However, the term disadvantaged is of significance for a number of reasons. Firstly, I believe it is used to desensitise inequality in an education system which is not equal in terms of resources and facilities through different types of schools. Secondarily, through my personal experiences as an educator, it is clear that the term has many connotations and underlying assumptions around class and race, which also play into issues around power and opportunity. Finally, the Department for Education allocates significant additional funds to schools for disadvantaged children via the pupil premium grant (PPG).

The pupil premium is additional funding for publicly funded schools in England to raise the attainment of disadvantaged pupils of all abilities and to close the gaps between them and their peers. School leaders have the autonomy to spend the PPG in ways which will raise attainment of disadvantaged children. However, this autonomy sits alongside the culture of high accountability within education. Other factors which come into play include: - In London large numbers of black and minority ethnic children fall into the category of being disadvantaged (London Education – Key Indicators).

- There is a strong link between effective leaders and those who achieve high attainment for their students, yet less than 4 per cent of head teachers in both primary and secondary schools are of black minority ethnic origin (Runnymede Trust - Visible and Invisible Barriers: Racism in teaching 2017).

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- In pupil referral units, there are a greater proportion of black pupils and pupils from mixed ethnic origins than in mainstream schools and a smaller proportion of Asian pupils (Department for Education Schools, pupils and their characteristics: January 2017).

As such the complexities of the term and how the impact of an individual or collective group plays in enforcing the biases of language through policy implementation can have long-term implications â&#x20AC;&#x201C; both negative and positive. My response to the theme will not only seek to contribute to this ongoing conversation, but to challenge the status quo and offer new ways of viewing educational specific language.

Website: www.linettkamala.com Instagram: @linett_kamala

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FURTHER RESOURCES.

KEY TERMS. Articulate

Having or showing the ability to speak fluently and coherently.

Artificial Intelligence The theory and development of computer systems able to perform tasks normally requiring human intelligence, such as visual perception, speech recognition, decision-making, and translation between languages.

ASL

Accronym for American Sign Language

Bias

Inclination or prejudice for or against one person or group, especially in a way considered to be unfair.

Black

A term used in certain countries, often in socially based systems of racial classification or of ethnicity to name people, especially one of African, Australian Aboriginal and/or Melanisian ancestry.

Black money

Income illegally obtained or not declared for tax purposes

Black sheep

A member of a family or group who is regarded as a disgrace to it.

Body Language

The conscious and unconscious movements and postures by which attitudes and feelings are communicated.

Class

A system of ordering society whereby people are divided into sets based on perceived social or economic status.

Cochlear Implant

A device that can be surgically implanted into a person's cochlea to stimulate it to cause hearing. It consists of a tiny receiver which is placed under the skin in the bony part behind the ear.

Colourism

A term coined by Alice Walker in 1982. Describes the ideology and practice that dark skinned people are lesser than light skinned people.

This ideology is indigenous to many cultures outside of the West but is one of the main foundations of racism and white supremacy.

Communicate

Share or exchange information, news, or ideas

Dating

Go out with (someone in whom one is romantically or sexually interested)

Deaf

Partially or wholly lacking or deprived of the sense of hearing; unable to hear.

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Democracy

A form of government, tied strongly to Anceint Greek political systems, wherein citizens of a state elect representatives to govern them and potentially have the power to remove such representatives from their position.

Desensitise

Make less sensitive

Disability

A disadvantage or handicap, especially one imposed or recognized by the law

Discrimination

The unjust or prejudicial treatment of different categories of people, especially on the grounds of race, age, or sex

Eloquent

Fluent or persuasive in speaking or writing

Ethnic

Relating to a population subgroup (within a larger or dominant national or cultural group) with a common national or cultural tradition.

Ethnic cleansing

The mass expulsion or killing of members of one ethnic or religious group in an area by those of another.

Ethnicity

A group of people who identify with each other on the basis of shared historical, social, cultural experiences, ancestry which distinguish them from other groups.

Etymology

The study of the origin of words and the way in which their meanings have changed throughout history.

Fluent

Able to express oneself easily and articulately.

Hierarchy

A system in which members of an organization or society are ranked according to relative status or authority

Inequality

Difference in size, degree, circumstances, etc.; lack of equality.

Innuendo

an allusive or oblique remark or hint, typically a suggestive or disparaging one

Internalised Racism Internalised racism is loosely defined as the internalisation by people of racist attitudes towards members of their own ethnic group.

Language

The method of human communication, either spoken or written, consisting of the use of words in a structured and conventional way.

LGBT

An initialism that stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender. ... It may be used to refer to anyone who is non-heterosexual or non-cisgender, instead of exclusively to people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender.

Lip read

(of a deaf person) understand speech from observing a speaker's lip movements.

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Marginalise

To relegate to the fringes, out of the mainstream; make seem unimportant:to place in a position of marginal importance, influence, or power.

Matriarchy

A social system in which females hold primary power, predominate in roles of political leadership, moral authority, social privilege and control of property at the specific exclusion of men, at least to a large degree. An example of a matriarchal society is Moja village in Northern Kenya founded by Rebecca Lolosoli.

Minority

The smaller number or part, especially a number or part representing less than half of the whole.

Misogynoir

A term referring to misogyny directed towards Black women, where race and gender both play roles in bias.

Narrative

A spoken or written account of connected events; a story.

Oppression

When a person or a group of people are subjected to unjust, and usually violent treatment by those in position of power.

Patriarchy

A social system in which cis-men hold primary power, predominate in roles of political leadership, moral authority, social privilege and control of property at the specific exclusion of women and non gender conforming people, at least to a large degree.

Prejudice

Hatred towards someone based on their identity. Example: An oppressed person of colour can be prejudiced against privileged races but cannot be racist.

Privilege

A special right, advantage, or immunity granted or available only to a individuals in particular groups by institutions.

Queer

An umbrella term for sexual and gender minorities that are not heterosexual and/or cisgender

Queer Phobia

Similar to Homophobia, describes a fear or hatred of queer folk (any one who is not heterosexual)

Quixotic

Extremely idealistic; unrealistic and impractical.

Race

A socially constructed system of classification of the human population into distinct, unequal, discontinuous groups, based, from the 17th century onwards, on physical features and ancestry. Though the concept existed long before this time, in many different forms, it was used by European scholars, scientists, merchants and nobility to legitimise and justify their genocide and dispossession of the peoples of America and enslavement of Sub-Saharan Africans.

Racial

Relating to race

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Racism

Acts of prejudice, bigotry, and/or discrimination of individuals of one race against members of other races. These acts do not count as racism if they are coming from members of a marginalised race, i.e. black people, as they do not have the social, political or economic power to make their actions opressive and effective.

Racism also refers to institutional, systemic, linguistic and economic structures that perpetuate the idea of racial superiority and inferiority, allowing for a wide range of effects, e.g. skin-bleaching, overrepresentation of PoC in prisons, underrepsentation of PoC in media, the poverty of Africa and its Diaspora community.

Representation

Refers to equality in opportunity and visibility. For example, representative media is media that is reflective of the variety of races, cultures, genders or religions that its entire readership belongs to.

Rhetoric

Language designed to have a persuasive or impressive effect, but which is often regarded as lacking in sincerity or meaningful content.

Sexuality

Refers to a person's sexual orientation/preferences in terms of sexual activities

Sign Language

A system of communication using visual gestures and signs, as used by deaf people.

Slur

An insulting or disparaging remark or innuendo

Status quo

The existing state of affairs, especially regarding social or political issues.

Stereotypes

A widely held but fixed and oversimplified image or idea of a particular type of person or thing.

Subversion

To undermine the power, authority and logic of an established system, culture or institution with the aim of overthrowing or causing a significant transformation.

Terminology

The body of terms used with a particular technical application in a subject of study, theory, profession, etc.

White lies

A harmless or trivial lie, especially one told to avoid hurting someone's feelings.

White Supremacy

White supremacy is an ideology centered upon the promotion of the belief, that white people are superior. It is argued by critical race theorist that all white people have a level of white supremacy values because of the media, education and politics have embedded whiteness as superior in society.

White Washing

A term used to describe white actors or actress playing non-fictional and historical non-white character roles. Therefore writing and disconnecting historical events and achievements to the non-white community.

Xenophobia

Fear and hatred of strangers or foreigners or of anything that is strange or foreign.

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FURTHER READING. Books: Fanon, F. Black Skin White Masks, US: Gove Press; 1952.

Rajagopalan, K. (2005). Language politics and the linguist. Revista Brasileira de Linguística Aplicada, 5(1), pp.83-95.

McWhorter, J. (n.d.). The language hoax. New York: University Press.

McWhorter, J. (2014). Our magnificent bastard tongue. New York: Gotham Books.

McWhorter, J. (2017). Talking back, talking Black. New York: Bellevue Literary press.

McCammon, H., Taylor, V., Reger, J. and Einwohner, R. (2017). The Oxford handbook of U.S. women’s social movement activism. Oxford university press.

Pauwels, A. and Winter, J. (2008). Feminist linguistic activism in the 21st century. Wiley.

Holmes, J. and Meyerhoff, M. (2003). The handbook of language and gender. Malden, Mass.: Blackwell.

McConnell-Ginet, S. (2011). Gender, Sexuality, and Meaning: Linguistic Practice and Politics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Hall, K. and Bucholtz, M. (n.d.). Black feminist theory and African American women’s linguistic practice. [S.l.]: [s.n.].

Bergvall, V., Bing, J. and Freed, A. (2014). Rethinking language and gender research. London: Routledge, Taylor and Francis.

Batibo, H. (2005). Language decline and death in Africa. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters.

Kyle, J. (1987). Sign and school. Clevedon, Avon, England: Multilingual Matters.

Costello, E. (n.d.). Random House American Sign Language dictionary.

Spencer, P. and Marschark, M. (2006). Advances in the spoken language development of deaf and hard-of-hearing children. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Lucas, C. (2014). Language and the Law in Deaf Communities.

Washington: Gallaudet University Press.

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Hall, E. (1990). The silent language. New York: Anchor Books/Doubleday.

Stern, L. (2011). Chattering. London: Granta.

Irujo Ametzaga, X. and Miglio, V. (n.d.). Language rights and cultural diversity.

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DIGITAL RESOURCES. Websites: The Student Union Lecture Series 5: Unsettling Whiteness www.soasradio.org/tags/decolonising-our-minds The Decolonising Our Minds Society is delighted to host renowned academic Barnor Hesse from Northwestern University.

The African Linguist Network www.theafricanlinguistnetwork.com/ The African Linguist Network is an online network that connects African linguistic and translation experts world-wide The Linguist List www.linguistlist.org/forms/langs/africa.cfm Dedicated to providing information on language and language analysis, and to providing the discipline of linguistics with the infrastructure necessary to function in the digital world The African Linguist Network www.alnresources.wordpress.com An online network that connects African linguistic and translation experts worldwide Languagematters www.languagematters.co.uk/ A specialist multilingual recruitment consultancy offering temporary, contract and permanent bilingual jobs Deaf First www.deaf-first.org.uk Provides support to colleges needing support for their deaf or hard of hearing students A.B.L www.appointmentsbilanguage.co.uk A recruitment consultancy providing multilingual people that will help communicate with international clients Network for Languages www.networkforlanguageslondon.org.uk Provides professional development opportunities, support, advice and networking opportunities for teachers in primary, secondary and further education DISCOURSE: THE POWER OF LANGUAGE AND COMMUNICATION. // 85

Charters Institute of Linguists www.ciol.org.uk Aims to enhance and promote the value of languages and language skills in the public interest and provides regulated qualifications through the IoL Educational Trust African American Linguists www.weboaal.com Promotes a bilingual society within the African-American community in order to prepare marketable citizens for a global economy The International Congress of Linguists www.icl20capetown.com Aims to connect with the major ways of studying the phenomenon of language, while being responsive to the diversity of contexts British Sign www.british-sign.co.uk Learn British Sign Language online Online Etymology Dictionary https://www.etymonline.com/ Find out the root of modern English words; they’re explanations of what words meant and how they sounded 600 or 2,000 years ago

Videos: The Grapevine www.youtube.com/channel/UCPf55sis3jNICWi3K1NsJMQ The Grapevine is a fresh and innovative take on the panel style discussion. The show places the topics of today in the hands and minds of young game changers, artists, cultural innovators, and professionals to dissect what the impact is for this generation.

Mashable UK https://mashable.com/2017/10/12/drag-queens-teach-lingo/#mtqwqFHDlOqN Mashable is a global, multi-platform media and entertainment company. This video shows drag queens from RuPaul’s Drag Con explaining drag terminology.

The School of Life https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MTMJygaGCBE The School of Life is an open source philosophy education site. This video explains how certain words match with certain feelings.

Akala’s Odyssey https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b09sc141/akalas-odyssey Writer and hip-hop artist Akala voyages across the Mediterranean and beyond to 86 // DISCOURSE: THE POWER OF LANGUAGE AND COMMUNICATION.

solve some of the mysteries behind Homer’s monumental poem, the Odyssey.

Sign Duo www.youtube.com/channel/UCET0ZgnCFLi1369c3ZWfSFA Deaf and Hearing Couple channel all about Deaf Culture, Sign Language, Relationships, and just the Journey of Life.

Eko Languages https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCGBvI8xXfyPWVXYRnvbe7rw A language learning Youtube channel.

Lang Focus https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCNhX3WQEkraW3VHPyup8jkQ A Youtube channel dedicated to understanding a learning the hidden meaning of different languages.

How artists create space for dialogue www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvype-frXWw Zoe Whitley explains how listening to artists, and talking with them, creates not only a new language for cultural dialogue but also consider new spaces for that dialogue to take place in her Ted Talk.

Podcasts: The Student Union Lecture Series 5: Unsettling Whiteness www.soasradio.org/tags/decolonising-our-minds The Decolonising Our Minds Society is delighted to host renowned academic Barnor Hesse from Northwestern University.

Hidden Brain https://www.npr.org/player/embed/577713815/581666488 Hidden Brain is a podcast on NPR radio. This podcast episode is about language; cognitive science professor Lera Boroditsky says the languages we speak can do more than that—they can shape how we see the world in profound ways.

Hidden Brain - Slanguage https://www.npr.org/player/embed/509022419/509037630 In this episode the linguist John McWhorter says all the “likes” and LOLs are part of a natural – and inevitable –evolution of language.

BBC Four Thought http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03brt2x Author and broadcaster Lindsay Johns argues that language is power, and makes the case for speaking English properly.

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Morning Edition https://www.npr.org/player/embed/1473161/1473162 Susan Stamberg talks with linguist Deborah Tannen about the power of language — in politics, at work and in the home.

Code Switch https://www.npr.org/player/embed/579757002/580129041 The use of the word ‘racist’ in the age of Trump.

LingLab Podcast https://www.mixcloud.com/Linglab/sociolinguistics-a-definition/ A podcast series defining and explaining what ‘sociolinguistics’ actually is.

Key Organisations: American Council of the teaching of foreign languages www.actfl.org/ The American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL) is dedicated to the improvement and expansion of the teaching and learning of all languages at all levels of instruction. ACTFL is an individual membership organization of more than 12,500 language educators and administrators from elementary through graduate education, as well as government and industry.

Modern Language Association www.mla.org/ In addition to hosting an annual convention and sustaining one of the finest publishing programs in the humanities, the MLA is a leading advocate for the study and teaching of languages and literatures and serves as a clearinghouse for professional resources for teachers and scholars. Visit the sections below to find out more about the MLA’s mission and governance or how to get in touch with us.

National Association for Bilingual Education www.nabe.org/ Since 1975, the National Association for Bilingual Education (NABE) has been a non-profit membership organization that works to advocate for educational equity and excellence for bilingual/multilingual students in a global society.

TESOL International Association www.tesol.org/ TESOL International Association, formerly Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages, is the largest professional organization for teachers of English as a second or foreign language Center for Applied Linguistics www.cal.org/ The Center for Applied Linguistics is a private, nonprofit organization founded in 1959 and headquartered in Washington, DC 88 // DISCOURSE: THE POWER OF LANGUAGE AND COMMUNICATION.

National Council of Teachers of English www2.ncte.org/ The National Council of Teachers of English is a United States professional organization dedicated to “improving the teaching and learning of English and the language arts at all levels of education.

The National Deaf Society www.ndcs.org.uk/ The National Deaf Children’s Society is the leading charity dedicated to creating a world without barriers for deaf children and young people.

British Deaf Association bda.org.uk The BDA is very much at the forefront of pushing for legal recognition of BSL in England, Wales and of BSL and Irish Sign Language (ISL) in Northern Ireland.

Scotland is the first country in the UK to pass a BSL (Scotland) Act in Sept 2015.

Achieving legal status means that BSL would be protected and promoted in the same way as Welsh and Gaelic languages. This would mean that service providers would be required to produce information and support where appropriate in BSL, giving equal access to services for sign language users and removing many of the commonplace barriers that they currently face, and which result in widespread discrimination.

Action on hearing loss www.actiononhearingloss.org.uk As the largest charity for people with hearing loss in the UK, we understand how hearing loss can affect everything in your life from your relationships, to your education and your job prospects.We’re here to support and help you, so you can take back control and live the live you choose From day-to-day-care, to practical information, to campaigning for a fairer world for people with hearing loss, and funding research to find a cure, we’re taking action on hearing loss.

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Twitter Users to Follow: @LanguageLog - Language Log is a group blog on language and linguistics started in the summer of 2003 by Mark Liberman and Geoffrey Pullum @lol_prosciutto - Aria Dean, writer, critic, artist and curator @ELRAnews - The European Language Resources Association, is a nonprofit organisation whose main mission is to make Language Resources (LRs) for Human Language Technologies (HLT) accessible to all @MyLanguageCloud - My Language Cloud is a new educational twitter feed for language development @WritersofColor - More visibility for writers of colour to ease their access to publications, and build a platform that is both easy for editors to use and accurately represents the writers @BritishSignBSL - A British Sign Language course online @SignatureDeaf - The UKâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s leading awarding body for deaf communication qualifications @black_in_ai - A place for sharing ideas, fostering collaborations and discussing initiatives to increase the presence of Black people in the field of Artificial Intelligence @Linguist_CIOL - The Linguist is the bi-monthly professional journal of the Chartered Institute of Linguists @IndianLinguist - Subcontinental socio-linguistics. Focused on Indian English, Hindi-Urdu and Bangla @Visual_Linguist - Professor at Tilburg University of language, (neuro) cognition, comics, emoji, and other multimodal communication

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We salute you!

Discourse: The Power of Language and Communication. © Shades Of Noir 2018