A Year of Activism: Perspectives on the 2020 U.S. Elections, Part 6

This month’s post, the sixth in Teacher-Scholar-Activist and Spark’s 12-part series “A Year of Activism: Perspectives on the 2020 U.S. Elections,” comes from Don Unger (University of Mississippi) and Liz. Lane (University of Memphis), members of the Spark Editorial Collective. Drs. Unger and Lane use their post to amplify voices from various organizations in writing, rhetoric, and literacy studies in an attempt to move toward building an anti-racist coalition across these fields. Finally, they offer links to resources that list specific actions that such a coalition could take to fight white supremacy in academic workplaces and in our local communities.

In the remaining months leading up to the U.S. elections, this series will feature critical perspectives on those elections, issues related to them, and thoughts about how scholar-activists (teachers and students) can intervene. We encourage readers to share these posts and to discuss the ideas with people in your communities, classrooms, and workplaces.

Liz Lane & Don Unger, Managing Editors—Spark

Darin Jensen, Editor—Teacher, Scholar, Activist

Standing Against Anti-Black Racism Within and Beyond the Academy: Amplifying Strategies for Action

By Don Unger & Liz Lane

As members of the Spark Editorial Collective, we stand in solidarity with the ongoing protests for Black Lives across the U.S. and the world. While these protests reflect direct action taken against George Floyd’s murder by Minneapolis cops, Breonna Taylor’s murder by Louisville cops, Tony McDade’s murder by Tallahassee cops, and Rayshard Brooks’ murder by Atlanta cops, they also connect to the centuries-long struggle against America’s racist history and white supremacist system that perpetuates and normalizes violence against Black people. Protestors make these connections clear in innumerable ways, including through calls to defund the police calls to remove racist monuments, and calls to recognize Juneteenth as a national holiday.

Connecting these protests to this ongoing struggle to dismantle white supremacy, we believe that there is no meaningful activism that stands apart from the struggle to assert that Black Lives Matter because this slogan and the movement organized around it distills all that intersectional and coalitional approaches to activism mean. Black Lives Matter grapples with the complex of race, nationality and ethnicity, class, gender identity and expression, and sexuality because it means addressing the lived realities of Black people.

Contextualizing this rallying cry and struggle to academia means addressing the lived realities of Black people who work in and for academic institutions, who attend these institutions, and who are impacted by the economic, social, and intellectual policies and practices that these institutions propagate. Yet, it is not enough to simply write about our opposition to racism and solidarity with BLM; we must also act in ways that contribute to changes in the policies, laws, and structures that perpetuate white supremacy.

At its core, Spark seeks to amplify our contributors’ day-to-day work involving “intersectional and collaborative efforts at political change.” In that spirit, we use this statement in order to draw attention to the work that others in writing, rhetoric, and literacy studies have started and demonstrated some commitment to. In this post we do so by linking to and reprinting a number of statements from organizations in these academic disciplines, noting in particular those statements that propose concrete strategies for anti-racist action in the academy, such as the statements from the Association of Teachers of Technical Writing President, the Council of Programs in Technical and Scientific Communication Diversity Committee, the NextGen LISTSERV, and the College Composition and Communication Labor Caucus, among others. Then, we provide a list of resources that support anti-racist work within institutions, departments, and classrooms as well as resources that address anti-racist work outside the academy.

We ask you to read these statements and to use the resources. We call on you to stand behind your organization’s solidarity statements as well as the statements you have made to your personal social media accounts by taking action in ways that move the struggle forward in your institutions, departments, committees, and classrooms. Furthermore, these resources reflect and intersect with the movement to assert that Black Lives Matter in our communities, in the U.S., and in the world. We call on you to move beyond your academic institutions and to engage in anti-racist work in your communities.

Black Lives Matter.

Statements and Calls to Action By Writing, Rhetoric & Literacy Studies Organizations

In the days following George Floyd’s murder and the Black Lives Matter-led protests around the U.S. and the world, a number writing, rhetoric, and literacy studies organizations issued statements. These statements range from brief declarations of solidarity to more in-depth arguments about specific actions that their constituents should take to support the protests and to address racism within their academic institutions, departments, and classrooms. Below we link to and reprint some of these many statements as an attempt, on the one hand, to amplify others’ voices in this struggle, and on the other hand, as an attempt to demonstrate how a popular front is building across these fields. In that sense, we link to these statements so that members from various organizations will read what one another has said, learn from them, and turn the strategies described in them into plans for action.

American Society for the History of Rhetoric Statement

Association of Teachers of Technical Writing President’s Statement

Council of Programs in Technical and Scientific Communication Diversity Committee’s Action Items to Redress Anti-Black Racism in Technical and Scientific Communication

Council of Writing Program Administrators President’s Statement

Digital Black Lit (Literatures & Literacies) and Composition’s (DBLAC) Call

NextGEN Call for Action and Accountability

National Council of Teachers of English Takes A Stance Against Racism

Rhetoric Society of America Board of Directors’ Statement Condemning Anti-Black Violence

National Council of Teachers of English/Conference on College Composition & Communication Caucus & Standing Group Statements

Here we reprint some of the many statements issued by NCTE/CCCC groups. We link back to the websites and social media accounts where we found these statements when possible.

Black Caucus

Black Caucus Statement

American Indian Caucus

Image shows a photo of a raised fist holding a feather. text reads, "The Americcan Indian Caucus of NCTE/CCCC stands in solidarity with the Black Caucus and with our Black indigenous kin. We condemn the ongoing acts of settler-colonial violence and are working on redressing anti-Blackness in our own communities and tribal nations. We will continue to do the decolonial work it takes to undo systemic injustices for us all. We affirm that Black lives Matter. Join us in donating to the efforts against state-sanctioned violence: blacklivesmatter.com"

Asian/Asian American Caucus

Statement reads: "The Asian and Asian American Caucus (AAAC) stands in solidarity with the Black Caucus members and with our Black neighbors, friends, and colleagues. As scholars, teachers, and students, we have learned much from Black resistance and scholarship, and are indebted to the Black scholars and activists whose work has created space for us. We confrim our commitment to supporting the Black community, to amplify Black voices and bodies, and to validate Black expereinces in the fight against anti-Black racism. We acknowledge and will work against the legacy of the model minority narrative and anit-Black racism in our own communities that have kep some of us silent in this struggle."

Disability Studies Standing Group

Statement reads, "The members of the NCTE/CCCC Disability Studies Standing Group roll, tic, stim, and stand with the Black community, especially our Black disabled members, our Black comrades who will become disabled while protesting, and all of the Black people who face racialized ableism. We affirm that any liberation worth pursuing is a collective one: nothing about us without us."

Feminist Caucus

Statement reads, "Black lives matter. We recognize that Black people face racist violence, on a regular basis, and Black men, women, trans people, and nonbinary people are killed by racism everyday in the United States. We condemn this systemic, racist violence. Black lives matter. For too long, mainstream feminism has meant white feminism. But as the CCCC Feminist Caucus, we articulate our profound debt to the Black feminist scholars and other scholars of color who have built and continue to build our field. We commit to anti-racist work in our teaching, scholarship, and service. Black lives matter."

Jewish Caucus

Statement reads, "As members of the NCTE/CCCC Jewish Caucus, we stand in solidarity with our Black colleagues, friends, students, and family members in the ongoing fight against anti-Black racism. We support the efforts of the protestors and we recognize the unique labor of the Black Jewish members of our community. We commit to fighting the deeply ingrained and insidious white supremacy and anti-Black racism that perpetuate and attempt to legitimize police brutality and racist violence. Our words should not be the end of our efforts bu the beginning. We must commit to antiracist action, in our classrooms, our schools, our professional organizations, our discipline, and our communities."

Labor Caucus

Please note that this statement is substantially longer than most. What we reprint in this graphic is a small excerpt.

This excerpt from the longer statement reads, "we recognize that the work of undoing systems of white supremacy and racist oppression cannot be undertaken without explicitly addressing their beneficiaries. Too many white members of the field have colonized the labor of our BIPOC colleagues, including graduate students and contingent faculty, a practice we commit to opposing. Further, we commit to working in our own institutions and across our professional organizations to make sure white supremacist faculty are subject to justice, rather than being allowed to continue exploiting and abusing BIPOC colleagues. We further commit to enacting in our institutional spaces each of the action items articulated in the statement issued by our NextGen colleagues, which we align with and which we would also extend specifically to include BIPOC contingent faculty. No matter what types of reforms have been undertaken or advocated, we recognize that the pathway to equity and the recognition of the labors of our Black peers and students are evermore vital and need to be honored just the same. To our Black peers and students, we pledge that we will not stop fighting for equal justice in labor and deeds. We recognize that without it--and most importantly, because of it--we have been able to prosper in higher education while Black scholars are left in the margins. We pledge to stand with and amplify the voices of BIPOC scholars seeking to make higher education live up to its promises. Black Lives Matter and Black Labor Matters."

Latinx Caucus

Statement reads, "As members of the Latinx Caucus, we stand beside our Black relatives whose voices have too long gone unheard. Silence equals complicity and so we asser that Black Lives Matter, now and always."

Queer Caucus

Statement reads, "The members of the CCCC Queer Caucus mourn the Black people murdered by police. We stand with Black communities and their allies in protesting the material technologies, political systems, and social conditions that perpetuate white supremacy. We join the fight for justice across this country and the world. We call attention to the important leadership of Black queer and trans communities in this fight. We see you, we believe you, we are with you. The Compton’s Cafeteria riot in 1966 and the Stonewall Rebellion of 1969 remind us that modern LGBTQIA2+ activism entered the mainstream with bold and direct action against state violence. We remember this history and find in it strength to follow those who lead the way. We say their names. We remember Black and brown trans and queer leadership at Stonewall: Marsha P. Johnson, Stormé DeLarverie, Miss Major, and Sylvia Rivera. We grieve for Nina Pop, Tony McDade, and all the Black trans people murdered because of white supremacy, transphobia, and other discriminatory ideologies. We assert that Black Lives Matter. We affirm that intersectional, coalitional politics and alliances are necessary to end systemic oppression. We encourage white allies to listen to and amplify the voices of Black people fighting for justice. We embrace the many ways different bodies enact the activism needed to win this fight for justice, and we encourage everyone to use their power in supporting radical change, from joining rallies, to supporting organizations that provide aid to Black communities, to amplifying organizations and voices that speak truth to power, to carrying out the daily organizational work that dismantles white supremacy."

Resources About Anti-Black Racism & Taking Anti-Racist Action

Alongside solidarity statements, people have been circulating resources on social media platforms about anti-Black racism and anti-racist action. Here, we link to a few curated lists with robust resources that pose strategies for Black lives within and outside the academy:

Created by Joy Melody Woods (University of Texas at Austin) and Shardé M. Davis (University of Connecticut), the hashtag exists so that Black academics can publicly address some of their experiences in the academy, and it serves as a call for higher education to confront systemic racism.

This curated list includes links to petitions and funds, resources for protestors, a map of protests in the U.S. and around the world, and a “more resources” section that links to affiliated organizations and educational resources.

This New York magazine article lists 142 different funds that people can donate to, including direct support to the families of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, Tony McDade, David McAtee, and James Scurlock as well as bail and legal aid funds in various cities and regions. Also included are links to nonprofits that have sponsored and participated in protests, and links to other organizations that support Black people and fight for police reform and prison reform and/or abolition.

Created by Victoria Alexander (Salem State University), this guide provides a variety of resources pertaining to education (for various audiences and including many forms of media) and activism.

Created by the University of Southern California (USC) Libraries and the university’s Anti-Racist Pedagogy Organizing Committee, this guide includes classroom resources, readings for faculty/teachers about anti-racist methods, readings on whiteness and pedagogy, and supplemental resources, such as the “#BlackLivesMatter Syllabus” and a “Curriculum for White Americans to Educate Themselves on Race and Racism–from Ferguson to Charleston,” among other things.

By and large, this Google Doc is organized around “stage[s] of white identity development and their corresponding beliefs/thoughts/actions” as they pertain to race and anti-racism.

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