In this article, we show how Ofsted operates as institutional language police, and how the inspectorate's attitudes about language maintain race-class inequalities under a guise of social justice, equality and evidence-based practice. Our research has repeatedly demonstrated how Ofsted reproduces long-standing, deficit-based and colonial logics…

This article reports on an UKLA funded study which is working with young readers to explore the use of fictional texts to interrogate raciolinguistic ideologies in schools. We draw on data generated from workshops where young students read and responded to "Front Desk," a 2018 novel by the Chinese writer Kelly Yang, which centres around…

This article examines textual traces of the standard language ideology within current education policy in England, focusing on post-2010 reforms which are characterised by a (re)shift towards conservatism, discipline, and standards. Using tools and methods from critical stylistics and the critical discourse analysis of language policy, I…

Racism is pervasive within the lives of racially minoritised pre-service teachers in England, but little work has explored how perceptions about language feature here. Based on interviews and workshops with 26 racially minoritised pre-service teachers, I describe their experiences of language oppression whilst on school experience placements,…

Since their introduction by the Conservative government in 2013, primary school children in England have taken a mandated grammar, punctuation and spelling assessment, which places an emphasis on decontextualised, standardised English and the identification of traditional grammatical terminology. Despite some concise criticisms from educational…

Purpose: This paper is a critical reflection on the linguistic conservatism as found within current curriculum policies and assessment regimes in the UK, arguing that they represents a form of linguicism which serves to entrench linguistic social injustices. This paper aims to trace the "trajectory" of policy across different levels,…