Issues of Race and Ethnicity in Basic Writing

Morris Young, Miami University

When issues of race and ethnicity are examined in the larger field of composition and rhetoric, there are a few easy categories in which we can expect such discussions to fall. We often see theoretical arguments for the rhetorical construction of identity such as Ralph Cintron's Angels' Town, studies of the literacy practices of particular communities such as Juan Guerra's Close to Home or Jacqueline Jones Royster's Traces of a Stream, or mixed-genre pieces which blend memoir with critical examinations of personal and cultural literacies such as Victor Villanueva's Bootstraps and Keith Gilyard's Voices of the Self. Despite these studies and many others which reveal the complex literacy practices of people of diverse backgrounds, the category of basic writer is perhaps one that we still easily associate with our examinations of race and ethnicity in the study of writing. Indeed, as William DeGenaro and Ed White point out in their Teaching Basic Writing module, Assessment and the Basic Writer, and others have as well, the term "basic writer" remains a contested one. While I don't have the space here to make an extended theoretical argument about the overdetermination of race/ethnicity and assumptions about non-standard literacy, or to discuss the politics of remediation and how this may disproportionately affect people of color, I do hope to offer some things to consider when we are faced with issues of race and ethnicity in our basic writing classrooms.

While my own research about race/ethnicity and writing has not been primarily in the field of basic writing, I have had the opportunity to work in a "bridge" program in Hawai'i where I worked with students primarily of Asian or Pacific Islander backgrounds who were first generation college students (see my article "Narratives of Identity"). In working with these students I came to understand how a legacy of language discrimination in their community, contemporary cultural and political activities, and a desire for education can shape a pedagogy for basic writing. While issues of race/ethnicity inflected this pedagogy, they remained part of an array of factors which informed my practice and the students' work, rather than a central organizing principle.

As an Asian American myself, I have often found myself in situations where my own literacy status has been at issue--whether it is questions about a perceived accent or comments about the quality of my English, I know what it feels like to have race/ethnicity conflated with literacy. Given my own experience, you might expect that I would be a proponent of raising issues of race/ethnicity in our classrooms, especially the basic writing classroom where race/ethnicity has often been used to marginalize students. What could be more empowering in the writing classroom than to use writing to challenge racism or discrimination or other acts of social injustice? But before we do this, I still believe it is important to ask ourselves what our reasons are for raising issues of race and ethnicity in the writing classroom.

William DeGenaro and Ed White point out that the "other" has been used to describe the basic writer, to mark them as different from us. Not surprisingly, the "other" has often been used to describe those marked by race/ethnicity as well as other socially marginal positions. Our best pedagogical instincts may tell us to invert these positions, to socially empower the "other." We may do this in a number of ways: including writing from marginalized groups; recognizing the value of "non-standard" forms; and encouraging writers to find and use their own voices. However, despite this "positive" empowerment, do we run the risk of maintaining the label of "other" if we reinforce the notion that race/ethnicity is the primary (if not essential) identity of these writers? We must be cautious when we develop what we think are appropriate pedagogies for these classrooms, not because we risk being culturally insensitive, but because we risk reproducing unequal structures of power which maintain race as a category of "other."

This does not mean, however, that we cannot or should not engage race and ethnicity in the writing classroom. Rather, the question is how do we incorporate race/ethnicity in our pedagogy in a way that students understand that they are not necessarily the central reason for such a discussion, that they are not merely the objects of examination? How do we avoid charges by students who often feel that instructors are still acting as gatekeepers by not giving them access to the language of dominant culture but instead ask them for personal narratives written in their "authentic" voices? One way to do this (and I do this in many of my writing classes) is to have students create a literacy history where they examine their process for acquiring language, writing, education, or whatever other way we describe literacy. Often these literacy histories are inflected with issues of race and ethnicity, but also culture, social class, gender, region, religion, and other social experiences. There are other "assignments" that can be developed to have students engage in important critical debates and to enact critical thinking rather than reduce the curriculum to discrete "functional" and "skills-based" models of writing. For example, by having students interview others, do field research about local issues, as well as create both personal and critical narratives for examining this material, they can understand the larger role that race and ethnicity may play in a community's consciousness. By creating a larger context for the examination of literacy and by extension for the conditions for writing, students understand their experiences in more complicated ways. In turn, this can also create a better understanding of the contexts for writing--the school, the workplace, or the home--which enables students to make decisions about appropriate discourses, rhetorics, and strategies for writing.

Finally, as I have suggested already, issues of race and ethnicity should not be the "essential" categories of identity, apart from culture, social class, gender, etc. I do want to raise the possibility that there are other modes of identity and experience that can play a role in our thinking about race and ethnicity. For example, in Hawaii, the native Hawaiian sovereignty movement has played a significant role in the social and political landscape. The concept of Nation is important to increasingly more Native Hawaiians, and is another way that race and ethnicity might be engaged in the classroom. I can imagine that similar experiences are true for Native American nations and tribes or other peoples who face questions today about sovereignty rights (e.g., Puerto Ricans). While I have not discussed ESL issues here, the conflation of the ESL writer and race/ethnicity is also a common issue. How might ESL issues broaden the discussion about race/ethnicity in the classroom? Do we make the same assumptions about ESL writers that we do about the writer marked by race/ethnicity?

I hope I have raised some interesting issues for discussion. Below are some more directed questions to help generate conversation about race, ethnicity, and the basic writer.

• What are our reasons for raising issues of race and ethnicity in discussions about basic writing?
• How do we teach students the language of dominant culture without reinforcing domination?
• How do we avoid maintaining the categories of "other" when we engage issues of race and ethnicity in the classroom?
• Are there structural changes that we can make to address the disproportionate number of people of color in basic writing classrooms?
• How do students feel--especially students of color--when race/ethnicity is discussed in the writing classroom?
• Do we have research to support the belief that acknowledging/discussing race/ethnicity in classes made of people of color is an effective pedagogy?
• How do you position yourself in these discussions of race/ethnicity?
• How do we avoid conflating the ESL writer with the writer marked by race/ethnicity?

Suggested Readings

Cintron, Ralph. Angel's Town: Chero Ways, Gang Life, and Rhetorics of the Everyday. Boston: Beacon P, 1997.

Delpit, Lisa. Other People's Children: Cultural Conflict in the Classroom. New York: The New Press, 1995.

Gilyard, Keith. "Basic Writing, Cost Effectiveness, and Ideology." Journal of Basic Writing Vol. 19.1 (2000): 36-42.
---. Voices of the Self: A Study of Language Competence. Detroit: Wayne State UP, 1991.

Harrington, Susanmarie and Linda Adler-Kassner. "'The Dilemma that Stills Counts': Basic Writing at a Political Crossroads."      Journal of Basic Writing Vol. 17.2 (1998):3-24.

Horner, Bruce and Min-Zhan Lu. Representing the "Other": Basic Writers and the Teaching of Basic Writing. Urbana: NCTE      1999.

Lamos, Steve. "Basic Writing, CUNY, and ‘Mainstreaming': (De)Racialization Reconsidered." Journal of Basic Writing
     Vol. 19.2 (2000): 22-43.

Norment, Nathaniel, Jr. "Some Effects of Culture-Referenced Topics on the Writing Performance of African American      Students." Journal of Basic Writing Vol. 16.2 (1997): 17-45.

Royster, Jacqueline Jones. Traces of a Stream: Literacy and Social Change Among African American Women. Pittsburgh:      U of Pittsburgh P, 2000.

Royster, Jacqueline Jones and Rebecca Greenberg Taylor. "Constructing Teacher Identity in the Basic Writing Classroom."      Journal of Basic Writing Vol 16.1 (1997): 27-50.

Villanueva, Victor, Jr. Bootstraps: From an American Academic of Color. Urbana: NCTE, 1993.

Ybarra, Raul. "Cultural Dissonance in Basic Writing Courses." Journal of Basic Writing Vol. 20.1 (2001): 37-52.

Young, Morris. "Narratives of Identity: Theorizing the Writer and the Nation." Journal of Basic Writing 15.2 (Fall 1996): 50-     75.