I am writing to share a new publication: a chapter in Best of Journals in Rhetoric and Composition 2021, edited by Kristi Girdharry, Charles Lesh, Jessica Pauszek, David Blakesley, and Steve Parks and published with Parlor Press (2023).
This chapter includes both a reprint of my previous article “Rhetorical and Pedagogical Interventions for Countering Microaggressions” co-authored with Rasha Diab and with contributions by Cedric Burrows and Thomas Ferrel. It also includes four pages of new supplementary material (a combination of reflections and reflection questions).
I am grateful that our chapter was selected for this collection, especially because it was a long and rocky road to publication. We write a bit about the article’s journey in the supplementary pages, which are organized into three sections:
Part I: Reflections on the Origins of the Article
Part II: Description of Research Methods, Findings, and/or Pedagogical Impact
Part III: Discussion Questions (questions for noticing, contextualizing, and intervening)
To read the article and these new sections, purchase the edited collection, which includes a range of interesting and important scholarship, or download a PDF of our chapter here.
As shown here, the reflections begin with larger contextualization and gratitude for all this work teaches:
“For years, together and separately and with other collaborators, including Cedric and Thomas, we (Beth and Rasha) have been researching, teaching, and writing about power and power abuses. Repeatedly, we have witnessed and experienced violent power dynamics ignored and denied when named as such. And repeatedly, we have sought ways to learn more, to show up and act on commitments to justice. This work is deeply humbling, requires a lot of reflective self-work, and asks more of us everyday and for the long haul.”
We are grateful to share this chapter as part of ongoing work, which includes last year’s article “Microaggressions: Too Sanitized, Too Safe, and Too Small?” and a lot of behind-the-scenes writing pointing us toward a book.
We especially hope that the discussion questions can be used for journaling, reflection, and ongoing self-work, work-with-others, and work-within-institutions.
We continue to believe that we need attention to the micro (everyday and interactional harms) alongside the macro (systems, logics, and institutionalization) that generate and fuel aggression. May we understand and intervene into aggression in all its forms toward fueling its inverse: affiliation, accountability, collective action, solidarity, community care, and justice.
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This post is written by Beth Godbee, Ph.D. for Heart-Head-Hands: Everyday Living for Justice. For more posts like this one, consider “Microaggressions: Too Sanitized, Too Safe, and Too Small?” and “Q&A with Rasha Diab: Pursuing Peace as Everyday Practice.”
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