Ongoing Initiatives
Language is Power Speaker Series
Collaborators: the Centre for Teaching and Learning, Â鶹¹ÙÍø's University Library, and Â鶹¹ÙÍø's Student Academic Success Services
Fall and Winter (2026-27)
Online Events
The Language is Power Speaker Series reframes language production as a vital human act. Looking beyond critical literacy as a set of technical mechanics, this series highlights reading, writing, and speaking as significant to identity formation, critical thinking, and civic engagement. Through online and in-person events, we will explore inclusive, evidence-based approaches to developing and assessing communication skills in today's evolving higher education landscape. Together, we embrace language practices that sustain and celebrate all the dimensions of our humanity.
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Conference Presentations
June 18, 2026
Innovating for linguistic justice in higher education: A cross-unit approach.
by Dr. Johanna Amos, Yunyi Chen, & Dr. Karalyn McRae, Â鶹¹ÙÍø
Presented at the Society for Teaching and Learning in Higher Education Conference, Hamilton, ON.
Workshops
August 27, 2025
Linguistic Justice in Assessment
by Dr. Johanna Amos & Yunyi Chen, Â鶹¹ÙÍø
This conversational workshop explored the relationship between linguistic justice and generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) technologies. Participants examined opportunities and challenges associated with AI and considered how linguistic equity can be advanced in teaching and learning environments in the age of artificial intelligence.
February 26, 2025
Linguistic Justice in the Age of Artificial Intelligence: A Conversation
by Dr. Johanna Amos & Yunyi Chen, Â鶹¹ÙÍø
This workshop introduced the concept of linguistic justice, an anti-racist approach to language and assessment that encourages educators to critically examine the systems and structures that may limit multilingual students' opportunities to thrive academically.
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January 28, 2025
Accent Discrimination and (Re)Insitutionalized Listening
Dr. Vijay Ramjattan, Assistant Professor, University of Toronto | Sponsored by the Robert Sutherland Visitorship Fund
This interactive workshop explored accent discrimination and invited participants to reflect on how perceptions of different accents are shaped. Participants also considered how university policies, practices, and cultures can foster more inclusive listening environments that welcome linguistic diversity.
Resources
Confident Communication for Global Classrooms
In Canadian higher education classrooms, it is common to hear many varieties of English spoken by students and instructors from diverse cultural, educational, and linguistic backgrounds. Everyone of us speaks with an accent, and what listeners perceive as more or less understandable is often influenced by their familiarity with particular ways of speaking. Different ways of speaking English are to be expected in our diverse academic community, and we should be prepared to meet the challenges they may sometimes present.
Because communication is inherently collaborative, it is most effective when speakers and listeners share responsibility for making meaning together. While speakers strive to express themselves clearly, listeners also play an important role in fostering mutual understanding through active listening, openness, and curiosity.
Â鶹¹ÙÍø the Resource: This resource is intended to support effective communication in linguistically diverse learning environment. It encourages educators and students to recognize that difficulties in understanding a speaker may arise from a range of factors, including unfamiliar terminology, disciplinary concepts, pace of speech, audio quality, background knowledge, conversational conventions, cognitive load, or unfamiliar accents and speech patterns.
Rather than assuming that accent is the primary source of a communication challenge, we encourage you to identify the specific factors that may be affecting comprehension.
Use this resource as a guide to reflect on communication practices and identify approaches that may be most relevant to your context, whether you are an instructor, teaching assistant, or student. This resource can also be used to initiate conversations about communication expectations and collaboration in group/team environments.
This list of strategies and examples is not exhaustive. Adapt and apply them as appropriate to your learning, teaching, or group-work environment. The goal is to promote mutual understanding, inclusive participation, and effective communication for all members of our learning community.
Confident Communication for Global Classrooms (PDF, 233KB)
lets others remix, tweak, and build upon our work non-commercially, as long as they credit us and indicate if changes were made. All the slides on this page are shared under the Creative Commons license.