Profiles of Activism in the Lives of Writing, Rhetoric, and Literacy Studies Scholars
Ruth Osorio, April 2024
When I was an undergraduate student, I dreamed of being a badass scholar-activist like Angela Davis the way that young kids dream of being a princess or a dragon. As a baby feminist and scholar, I admired Dr. Davis for her powerful writing and speaking on Black feminism and class struggle, and her impeccable style. When I decided to apply to graduate school, I did so with Angela Davis in mind, imagining a future career where I meandered in a labyrinth of books one day and shut down the streets in a protest the next.
More than a decade later, I learned that being a badass activist-scholar is a lot tougher than I thought as a twenty-one year-old.
As an undergrad, I didn’t know about the risks of political activity for faculty, especially for those in precarious positions: non-tenure track faculty, contingent faculty, grad student instructors, pre-tenure faculty. I didn’t anticipate the crackdown on “divisive topics” in K-12 and higher education in states like Florida and Virginia or political groups emerging to single out and monitor leftist professors. I didn’t foresee the challenges of balancing parenthood with activism, parenthood with teaching, parenthood with research, parenthood with, well, anything. And in all my naive whiteness, I didn’t understand how minoritized faculty, especially Black women, face increased scrutiny in every aspect of their job, making scholar-activism a riskier techne than I had ever realized.
And yet, as a graduate student and then as an Assistant Professor, I remained committed to the scholar-activist praxis that Angela Davis embodies: that activism is a knowledge-making practice, that our research should be conducted for and with our communities, that we have the power to identify and address injustice if we work collectively.
These concepts are too complex and intersectional for one person to explore, so when I was asked to teach a feminism-themed graduate course, I realized I had an incredible opportunity: to collectively explore the risks and rewards of scholar-activism. In Spring 2023, I designed and taught a graduate course titled “Making/Studying Feminist Activism” at Old Dominion University in spring 2023. Thirteen brilliant, powerful graduate students from English, International Studies, and Human Movement Sciences enrolled in the class, prepared to engage with two central questions: how do we study feminist activism, and how do we make it as scholars? Rather than separate our activist selves from our teaching and research selves, this class aimed to provide the tools to integrate all aspects of our identities into our work and to honor the expansive ways that work can manifest.
To reflect on these two central questions, the thirteen emerging scholars in the course interviewed thirteen different scholars around the country who prioritize activism in their lives. I asked for volunteers on Twitter. Over a dozen people responded, and from there, we were off! I compiled a list of the volunteers and short descriptions of their activist work, and then students selected whom they wanted to interview. In class, we developed interview questions, discussed recording strategies, and crafted introductory and thank you emails. Outside of class, the emerging scholars interviewed the folks featured in this issue, some over video conference and others over email, about what it means to live activism as scholars, teachers, and humans. The graduate students then wrote up profiles, getting feedback from their interviewees at multiple stages of revision. At the same time, I reached out to Spark managing editor Don Unger about publishing these profiles in the journal so that the wider field can learn how their colleagues challenge oppressive systems and imagine new worlds in different, creative world-making ways. Don was enthusiastic about the project, even offering to contribute a collaboratively written profile with the current Conference on College Composition and Communication (CCCC) Chairs about their activism. The result of this collective inquiry on what it means to be a scholar-activist lies before you now.
This special issue emerged from conversations in the class about how people integrate activism into their academic work (or how they don’t). Because approaches to scholar-activism are, by necessity, so diverse and contextual, we set out to talk to as many self-identified activists as possible. We wanted to learn how other people deal with the pressure and disappointments of scholar-activism and how they balance the different roles. Featuring thirteen profiles of scholars, mostly in writing studies, the graduate student writers captured the expansive, diverse, and divergent forms of activism our colleagues practice. A mosaic approach to understanding scholar-activism is necessary because there is no singular approach; activism is an expansive practice that encompasses multiple modes of engagement, and because different forms of oppression and different contexts demand different strategies.
The profiles illustrate the myriad of ways teacher-scholars manifest activism. For some scholars, like Jordan Frith, they intentionally separate their scholarship and activism, not out of fear of repercussion but because they want to nourish and protect their passions from the pressure of academic production. As Olivia Wood explains in her profile, “most academic research is inherently limited in what good it can do,” and while teaching can feel closer to activism, it is “still inherently limited by the requirements of the institution and the nature of the teacher/student relationship.” Transdisabled Cavar explains in their interview that disability activism has, historically and contemporarily, operated outside of “the purview of academia”—and for good reason, given the institution’s legacy of hostility toward disabled people. Rather than mold their activism to fit the constraints of academia, such scholar-activists generate activist projects outside of their work life by using their research and writing skills to further activist inquiries far outside the walls of the academy.
However, others confront the institution’s restrictions by leveraging the resources, audiences, and opportunities of the academy to further their work, and many focus their activist efforts on the institution itself. For others, like Anna Zeemont and Charles Woods, their professional positions provide avenues for activism within the profession, educating colleagues through anti-racist pedagogical workshops and a community-based podcast, respectively. Disabled academics like Matt Dowell, Ada Hubrig, and Amy Gaeta target ableist attitudes and policies in their universities, organizing to make space for disabled faculty and students. And for the CCCC chairs–Jennifer Sano-Francini, Frankie Condon, Staci Perryman-Clark, and Holly Hassel, academic institutions are primed and ready for deep, structural change. While some see policy documents, constitutions, or bylaws as tedious service work, these rad women all see the behind-the-scenes writing as critical to the cultural transformation of an organization. Their interview shines light on this often invisible labor, illustrating the activist power of leadership, mentorship, and service to the field.
No matter the space or focus the folks profiled here choose, one theme resonates through all the interviews: the importance of community. For Travis Rountree, community is central to any activist enterprise. He defines activism as “enacting community work in/and standing up for an oppressed group of folx in some sort of action.” Rountree embodies this emphasis on community through his activism, helping to found Sylva Pride in Western North Carolina and organizing the community’s first pride festival in 2021. Similarly, Nabila Hijazi’s advocacy for Muslim women, in particular refugees, emphasizes how community and identity often overlap, which poses unique challenges and opportunities. And because community isn’t isolated to something that happens out there, away from academia, it’s important to build community within academia and beyond. Lauren Cagle cultivates community by bridging academics and local activists in her climate work, collaborating to create service-learning projects, consortiums, and workshops in pursuit of environmental justice. By fostering collaboration and connection in a world that privileges individualism, these scholar-activists imagine new ways of moving through and building our worlds.
The profiles provide different perspectives on what activism is, but perhaps what is even more interesting is how they detail a nuanced tension around the identity activist. Even though all the people profiled in this special issue work earnestly to transform their communities, some were reluctant to call themselves activists. Amber Buck and Logan Middleton both gravitate toward the label organizer, with Buck seeing activists “as being more kind of forefront and rallying the troops” than the long-term, less glamorous, often unseen work of organizing. Middleton worries that the label activist promotes a kind of individualism that erases the interdependence of moving toward justice, a concern that Hubrig shares. It is no surprise that rhetoricians are careful with their use of language, with these folks carefully analyzing the implications of identifying as an activist. For many featured in this issue, the label is less important than the work, the community, and the pursuit of justice.
Though this special issue is full of brave and beautiful stories of resistance and creation, one of its limitations is that it still does not cover the full breadth of activism in our profession. The majority of profiles are of white scholars, which means that we do not deeply address the perspectives, experiences, and risks that scholars of color, and in particular Black women scholars, face when navigating a white supremacist institution as humans and activists. Generationally, too, the scholars profiled here are, for the most part, early career scholars, largely because I crowdsourced the list from people who are directly in my social circles. Thus, we do not devote enough time or space to recognizing the folks who have been doing The Work for decades, making space for future generations of scholar-activists in writing studies. We know that this class-project-turned-special-issue showcases only a tiny portion of the powerful activism in our profession, and we hope to see more scholarship documenting this work, until activism is seen as a method of inquiry central to our field and not just work we do in addition to “real scholarship.”
While I have used this intro so far to highlight the activists, advocates, and organizers interviewed, I also need to highlight the dedication and care the writers brought to this project. When Lindsay Ball, Sofia Calicchio, Lee Gaul-Delange, Jessica Hurley, Kim Hales, Carol Harvest, Kim Hales, Jaclyn Hangar, Aaron Mason, Mel Joy Miller-Felton, Sara Noblin, Sidney Smith, Elle Tyson, and Lamaya Williams enrolled in a class titled “Making/Studying Feminist Activism,” I imagine they had no idea what to expect. I wasn’t sure myself, making things up as I went along. I knew one thing for sure: we would have to learn together. Fortunately, the emerging scholars in the class enthusiastically took up the challenge of reading, writing, discussing, and creating activism throughout the semester. In addition to these profiles, the students analyzed case studies of activism and crafted their own activist texts. They identified the risks of bringing their whole selves to an academic project and strategized how to navigate those risks authentically and collaboratively. We welcomed guest speakers to the class, Don Unger, Jennifer Nish, and Vyshali Manivannan, who inspired us with their brilliance and generosity. In all our activities and conversations, a common thread emerged: changing the status quo is scary work, but it’s a whole hell of a lot more fun with a group of co-conspirators, and even better, a group of friends.
Sometimes, it feels like we have no choice but to engage in activism. Since our class finished in May 2023, our neighboring state of North Carolina enacted restrictive abortion laws, the US Supreme Court gave queerphobic businesses the right to discriminate against LGBTQIA+ customers while prohibiting colleges and universities from continuing to use affirmative action in admissions policies, a boat full of families sunk off the coast of Greece while officials looked on unsympathetic to their plight, Virginia’s Education Department implemented anti-trans model policies for K-12 public schools, and temperatures have reached record-breaking highs, which contributed to uncontrollable wildfires in Canada. All of these and many other oppressive, tyrannical forces impact our professional lives, whether it’s through their impact on our home communities, our students, or our research. It’s easy to sink into despair, to throw up our hands and choose to let someone else deal with it. But, what inspires me in times like these are the people who show up, again and again, despite the fear, exhaustion, and seeming futility. It’s the dozens of Old Dominion graduates who chose to celebrate their whole beautiful queer and trans and BIPOC selves at their graduation by protesting the 2023 commencement speaker’s transphobic and racist educational policies. These students organized a silent, powerful, and colorful act of resistance. It’s the people profiled in this special issue, who find creative and strategic methods for upsetting dominant structures and loving their communities. And of course it’s Dr. Angela Davis, who is still on the frontlines, writing, speaking, and marching for freedom.
Class Reading List
Ahmed, Sara. (20 Sept. 2022). Feminism as lifework. Feminist Killjoys Blog. https://feministkilljoys.com/2022/09/20/feminism-as-lifework-a-dedication-to-bell-hooks/.
Ahmed, Sara. (1 June 2022). Feminist ears. Feminist Killjoys Blog. https://feministkilljoys.com/2022/06/01/feminist-ears/.
Arellano, Sonia C. (2022). Quilting as a qualitative, feminist research method: Expanding understandings of migrant deaths. Rhetoric Review, 41(1), 17–30.
Bay, Jennifer. (2019). Research Justice as Reciprocity: Homegrown Research Methodologies.” Community Literacy Journal, 14(1), 7–25.
Baniya, Sweta. (2021). The implications of transnational coalitional actions and activism in disaster response. Spark: A 4C4Equality Journal, 3. https://sparkactivism.com/volume-3-call/transnational-coalitional-actions-and-activism-in-disaster-response/.
Bessette, Jean. (2018). Retroactivism in the lesbian archives: Composing pasts and futures. SIU Press.
brown, adrienne maree. (2019). Pleasure activism: The politics of feeling good. AK Press.
Chen, Chen and Wang, Xiaobo. (17 Feb. 2022). Contemporary Chinese feminist activist rhetorics: #MeToo in China. Enculturation: A Journal of Rhetoric, Writing, and Culture, 33. https://enculturation.net/contemporary_chinese_feminist.
Fine, Michelle, Torre, Maria Elena, Boudin, Kathy, Bowen, Iris, Clark, Judith, Hylton, Donna Martinez, Migdalia, Rivera, Melissa, Roberts, Rosemarie A., Smart, Pamela, and Upegui, Debora. (2004). Participatory action research: From within and beyond prison bars. In Lois Weis and Michelle Fine (eds.), Working method: Research and social justice (95–119). New York: Routledge.
Hedva, Johanna. (12 Mar. 2022). Sick woman theory. Topical Cream. https://topicalcream.org/features/sick-woman-theory/.
hooks, bell. (2000). Feminism is for everybody: Passionate politics. South End Press.
hooks, bell. (2014). Teaching to transgress. Taylor & Francis.
Hubrig, Adam. (2020). ‘We move together:’ Reckoning with disability justice in community literacy studies. Community Literacy Journal, 14(2), 144–153.
Humanities Behind Bars. Contraband Love. https://humanitiesbehindbars.files.wordpress.com/2021/08/contraband-love-zine-2.pdf.
Jones, Rebecca. (2010). Rhetorical activism: Responsibility in the ivory tower. In JongHwa Lee and Seth Kahn (eds.), Activism and rhetoric: Theory and contexts for political engagement. Routledge.
Kovanen, Bruce, and Bowman, Andrew. (2021). Organizing-as-process: Building towards collective action in labor and beyond. Spark: A 4C4Equality Journal, 3. https://sparkactivism.com/volume-3-call/building-towards-collective-action-in-labor-and-beyond/.
Kynard, Carmen. (2013). ‘Before I’ll be a slave, I’ll be buried in my grave’: Black student protest as discursive challenge and social turn in nineteenth– and twentieth–century literacies. In Vernacular insurrections: Race, Black protest, and the new century in composition-literacies studies (25–66). SUNY Press.
Lorde, Audre. (1980). Transformation from silence into language and action. The Cancer Journals. Spinsters Ink.
Manivannan, Vyshali. (2022). Hollow me, hollow me, until only you remain. Spark: A 4C4Equality Journal, 4. https://sparkactivism.com/hollow-me/.
Mohanty, Chandra Talpade. (2003). ’Under western eyes’ revisited: Feminist solidarity through anticapitalist struggles. Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society, 28(2), 499–535.
Navickas, Kate. (2022). Feminist writing assignments: Enacting pedagogy through classroom genres. In Stephen E. Neaderhiser (ed.), Writing the classroom: Pedagogical documents as rhetorical genres (39–59). Utah State University Press.
Nish, Jennifer. (2022). Activist literacies: Transnational feminisms and social media rhetorics. University of South Carolina Press.
Novotny, Maria, De Hertog, Lori B. & Frost, Erin A. (2020). Rhetorics of reproductive justice in public & civic contexts toolkit. Reflections: A Journal of Community-Engaged Writing, 20(2). https://reflectionsjournal.net/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/ToolkitColor.pdf.
Osorio, Ruth. (2022). Disabling citizenship: Rhetorical practices of disabled world-making at the 1977 504 sit-in. College English, 84(3), 243–265.
Pough, Gwendolyn D. (2002). Empowering rhetoric: Black students writing Black Panthers. College Composition and Communication, 53(3), 466–486.
Pritchard, Eric Darnell, Unger, Don, and Lane, Liz. (2018). Eric Darnell Pritchard on Black queer literacies and activism. Constellations: A Cultural Rhetorics Publishing Space, 1. http://constell8cr.com/4c4e/interview_eric_darnell_pritchard.
Ribero, Ana Milena, and Arellano, Sonia C. (2019). Advocating comadrismo: A feminist mentoring approach for Latinas in rhetoric and composition. Peitho: Journal of the Coalition of Feminist Scholars in the History of Rhetoric and Composition, 21(2), 334–356.
Rich, Adrienne. (n.d.). Diving into the Wreck. Poets.org. https://poets.org/poem/diving-wreck.
Rivers, Nathaniel, and Weber, Ryan. (2011). Ecological, pedagogical, and public rhetoric. College Composition and Communication, 63(2), 187–218.
Serano, Julia. (2007). Trans girl manifesto. Whipping girl: A transsexual woman on sexism and the scapegoating of femininity. Seal Press.
Smith, Barbara. (1989). A press of our own: Woman of Color Press. Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies, 10(3), 11–13.
Spade, Dean. (2020). Mutual aid: Building solidarity during this crisis (and the next). Verso Books.
Stenberg, Shari. (2011). Teaching and (re)learning the rhetoric of emotion. Pedagogy, 11( 2), 349–369.
Wang, Bo. (2010). Engaging nüquanzhuyi: The making of a Chinese feminist rhetoric. College English, 72(4), 385–405.
Editor Bio
Ruth Osorio is an Assistant Professor of English and Women’s and Gender Studies at Old Dominion University, where she teaches courses of feminist activism, community writing, and disability rhetoric. Her work has been published in Constellations, College English, Rhetoric Review, enculturation, the Journal of Multimodal Rhetorics, and other cool places. She enjoys hiking, beaching, and reading novels.
You must be logged in to post a comment.