Bringing Language to AsianCrit: Introducing a Challenging Linguistic Racism Tenet

This conceptual paper expands Asian critical (AsianCrit) theory by introducing a new tenet— challenging linguistic racism —to foreground language as both a mechanism of racial oppression and a site of resistance to racism. While AsianCrit has illuminated how white supremacy shapes Asian (American) racialization, it has yet to theorize the role of language in these processes. Drawing on a raciolinguistic perspective, the challenging linguistic racism tenet bridges race and language in AsianCrit to better account for the ways language and language ideologies sustain and disrupt racial hierarchies. This expansion advances interdisciplinary understandings of race, language, and power, offering researchers, educators, and policymakers a framework for confronting white supremacy and promoting racially and linguistically just education.