Inclusion in Linguistics

Abstract Inclusion in Linguistics, the companion volume to Decolonizing Linguistics, aims to reinvent linguistics as a space of belonging across race, gender, class, disability, geographic region, and more. The volume’s introduction theorizes inclusion as fundamental to social justice and describes the extensive dialogic and collaborative process through which the volume was developed. The twenty chapters are organized around four themes. Contributors first discuss intersectional forms of exclusion in linguistics: researchers’ anti-autistic ableism, the exclusion of Deaf Global South researchers of color, the marginalization of Filipinx American students and scholars, disciplinary transphobia, and the need for a big tent linguistics. The second section addresses institutional steps toward inclusion: supporting first-generation college students and scholars, navigating student pronouns in the classroom, the role of HBCUs in fostering Black linguists, exclusionary linguistic theory in India, and harmful practices in language technology. The third section focuses on educational justice: teaching linguistics inclusively to high school and community college students, creating a Cabo Verdean Creole bilingual public school curriculum, engaging students of color in introductory linguistics through online language, training settler TESOL teachers in Indigenous epistemologies, giving K-12 teachers linguistic tools for teaching social justice issues, inclusive pedagogies in formal linguistics, and departmental social justice initiatives. The fourth section describes collaborations to create an inclusive public-facing linguistics: developing an online linguistics series, and educating the public about linguistic diversity. The volume’s conclusion outlines actions that linguists can take through research, teaching, and institutional structures to advance inclusion in linguistics and move the field toward social justice.