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Insights from Native American Studies for Theorizing Race and Racism in Linguistics (Response to Charity Hudley, Mallinson, and Bucholtz)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2026

Wesley Y. Leonard
Wesley Y. Leonard*
Affiliation:
University of California, Riverside
*
[wesley.leonard@ucr.edu]
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Abstract

Drawing from Native American Studies, I explore how the LSA Statement on Race (2019) applies to Native Americans, who are unique among racial groups in the United States since ‘Native American’ is also a political status and tribes are nations. Focusing on the fundamental tenet of tribal critical race theory that colonization is endemic to society (Brayboy 2005), I argue that the ways in which Native American languages are represented in linguistic scholarship reflects colonial norms, which also guide the severe underrepresentation of Native Americans in the discipline. Integrating these ideas into antiracist frameworks facilitates social justice in linguistic science.

Keywords

Native American StudiesNative American languageshistory of Linguisticslinguistics educationracecolonialismsocial justice

Information

Type
Perspectives
Information
Language , Volume 96 , Issue 4 , December 2020 , pp. e281 - e291
Copyright
Copyright © 2020 Linguistic Society of America

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Footnotes

*

I thank this paper's referees along with the participants in the Natives4Linguistics satellite workshop at the 2018 Linguistic Society of America annual meeting, many of whom shared perspectives that have informed my thinking about the intersections of Indigeneity, linguistic science, and racism. Funding for the Natives4Linguistics workshop was provided by the National Science Foundation, BCS grant no. 1743743.

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