Purpose: This essay-conversation brings together two literacy scholars who have worked with religious literacies: Suresh Canagarajah and Anne Elrod Whitney. They discuss not only the importance of religious literacies research but also their own experiences conducting such research as people of faith themselves. Design/methodology/approach: The…

Writing assessment can be used for a variety of purposes, both inside the classroom and outside: supporting student learning, assigning a grade, placing students in appropriate courses, allowing them to exit a course or sequence of courses, certifying proficiency, and evaluating programs. Given the high-stakes nature of many of these assessment…

In an attempt to control the spread of COVID-19 in Australia in 2020 state and territory governments mandated the closing of schools for all but vulnerable children and the children of frontline workers in various parts of Australia for various lengths of time. In what follows, five English teachers from across Australia reflect on the everyday…

As English language arts (ELA) teacher educators committed to growing students' passion for reading, writing, and thinking critically, the authors acknowledge the impact that emerging digital technologies have on educational practices. Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) is one such technology that has sparked both excitement and concern.…

Exploring the Yiddish language of my father, grandmother, her grandmother, and beyond, this autobiographical article frames language as an ever-changing space where identities are negotiated, formed, and contested. Placing the history of Yiddish alongside my own familial relationship to the language, I explore how the stories of individual lives…

We, as community college English teachers, have the opportunity to empower students who have been subjected to years of top-down, teacher-directed education. We have the obligation to make them critical thinkers, improving their chances of being thoughtful and successful adults. It all begins with the way we teach writing and the respect we have…

Poets Laura Purdie Salas and Janet Wong have known each other for several years, but mostly in an online, task-driven environment, for example, serving on the board of the Children's Literature Assembly (CLA) and cochairing the 2014 CLA Master Class on Poetry Across the Curriculum (Salas et al., 2015). They strengthened their bond by interviewing…

Looking back now on the contribution of Annette Patterson, to whom this issue of "English in Australia" is dedicated, Brian Moon states that, "he is reminded not only of her intelligence and her capacity for independent thought and inquiry, but also of her courage in questioning some powerful orthodoxies in English education."…

This statement is a response to several recent and historical exigencies that have demonstrated a need for a broader conversation about citation justice in rhetoric, composition, and writing studies. This position statement aims to encourage scholars to engage in citation justice in all areas of scholarly production, with the specific goals of:…

The Students' Right to Read provides resources that can be used to help discuss and ensure students' free access to all texts. The genesis of the Students' Right to Read was an original Council statement, "Request for Reconsideration of a Work," prepared by the Committee on the Right to Read of the National Council of Teachers of English…

In response to the Covid-19 pandemic, on 18 March 2020, Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced the immediate closure of schools in England. (The closure was not absolute: schools would remain open for vulnerable children and the children of key workers. In practice, though, very few children have continued to attend.) In what follows, nine English…

This article emerges out of my autobiography as an English language educator and the conversations that I had with three other English teachers in universities in Padang, Indonesia. These conversations formed the core of my doctoral thesis, in which I used Benedict Anderson and Edward Said to theorise our situation as English educators working in…

The National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) and its members support the implementation of K-12 ethnic studies curricula nationwide. As a professional organization committed to professional development and the creation of innovative curricula, NCTE seeks to play an instrumental role in the developmental needs of ethnic studies teachers and…

In this special issue of "English in Australia" dedicated to Annette Patterson, Bronwyn Mellor reflects on this "gentle dissenter". Annette Patterson published articles, book chapters, and school textbooks in Australia, the USA, and the UK. Her incisive intellect and commitment to education probably meant that she was not ever…

In this month's interview, Kappan's editor talks with high school English teacher and researcher Lisa Scherff about the ongoing struggle over who gets to define the English language arts curriculum. Dating back to the creation of the subject area, more than a century ago, classroom teachers have advocated for a varied course of study that helps…