Language in Times of Unspeakability

This is a fascinating event for educators and leaders interested in rich discussions and practical advice related to language education, oracy, civic participation, creativity, social justice and young people. And it's hosted in a primary school led by an amazing headteacher. Join this free event.

My poem in 'Keep Telling of Gaza' published by Sidhe Press.

We need language for the now against the imperative to escape to the future. We need language for this moment of intense injustices and immense suffering and for what this means for our language, life, living and relationships. We need language for a different philosophy of time.

These heartbeats have gone flat

Just wanted to share this again. I've listened twice, and I would encourage everyone to listen. Its the most important conversation of our lifetime.

Here is a recording of "Responding to Gaza: Sanctuary, Silence and Selective Empathy" I answer three questions: Why responding?, Why Gaza/Palestine?, Why there's been no or little response from universities? I end with a note on moving forwards with the wounds of Gaza. youtu.be/PEWFMZI5UAU?...

#InternationalWomen'sDay Poem published in 'To Lay Sun Into A Forest', Sidhe Press.

I have just submitted this book. Delivered on my birthday to renew my commitment to intellectual integrity. It positions the Genocide in Gaza as an applied linguistics issue, while revisiting the discipline’s commitment to investigating the role of language in real world problems.

Responding to Gaza How do I respond? How do I sustain a response? How do I prepare a response that is possible, sayable, pronouncable and breathtakingly responsive? How do I speak with my academic confident tonality when it's time for cries? To register: le.ac.uk/cite/sanctua...

Colonial morality has always assumed the inferiority of feelings described as 'irrational'. To feel requires a specific kind of reason—one rich in social knowledge and vocabulary of social critique. To feel is to be more than rational. To feel more fully is to be human.

Some articles are hard to write. Others are almost impossible to publish. This article combined both challenges. With gratitude to our editor and reviewers for their solidarity and intellectual integrity. Article open access: unisapressjournals.co.za/index.php/EA...

This poem by @khawlabadwan.bsky.social took my breath away. We see this displaced concern all over the place. Turning away from the true violation and invoking the name of false risk, false protection. “We shall protect them. And we shall keep them unseen.” Alt text added

Reflections on research ethics during a livestreamed genocide.. Unseen. Based on real events..

Reflections on decoloniality as a buzzword in academia From decolonise this and decolonise that to decolonial thought Plus..

How can we, then, move forward with this wounded world? The short answer is through imagining and demanding a future that is at odds with this fascist, necropolitical present.

What if we insist on a vision for education that attends to the serious work of human presencing in a world in pain? What if pedagogical poetics becomes the reminder of intellectual integrity, with humility and vulnerability in pursuit of new-ness? How might we exist for one another, then?

“Four of my children just evaporated,” Badran said, holding back tears. “I looked for them a million times. Not a piece was left. Where did they go?” There are no words to adequately describe the evil here.

Genocide destroys language just as it destroys life and land. It kills thinking and transformational thought. This destruction is everywhere. But the human spirit has to find a way- as it always does. What now?

Hospicing Gaza ( غزة ) - A piece we should never have had to write. Scholarship when every hope is gone and out of the failure of our disciplines We invite you to read our piece again @khawlabadwan.bsky.social @uofgunescorila.bsky.social

Our article is now fully published in volume 25 (6) and open access after online publication early in 2026 It was the most read paper in the journal in 2025 @khawlabadwan.bsky.social www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

‘They wanted to build a pier For aid, they said For ease of access, they said They wanted to build a pier Made of the rubble of our homes Mixed with blood, limbs and bones They wanted to build a pier ….’

We invite you again to this urgent yet daunting work which introduces a scholarship of heartbreak through stunned languaging. The most read piece in Language & Intercultural Communication. A beginning, a trouble. A call, a response. A rethinking www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

When words are said, ignored and absented, they demand to be said again and again for as long as the night lasts. On language in times of immense suffering...

The language issue at the heart of Gaza is where thought that has failed and academic disciplines and organisations that have been unable to articulate the evidence of their own eyes will be and is being remade. Out of Ashlaa.

Gaza is a language issue at heart. A key issue for the reluctant discipline of Applied Linguistics whose broken premise is about the use and abuse of language in the 'real world'. Tribute to Gaza, humanity's eternal heartbreak

Look again..

It's the age of p.e.a.c.e.

Just wait.. This cannot be a new year.. yet

On this day we remember where the story began In Palestine PALESTINE that is the world and through her we continue to see the world

"It's good news to refuse things are they are"

Behold the angry sky Let the reckoning be

"On the 77th anniversary of the Declaration of Human Rights We remember the years before the rights were named, and the people who are still denied them" #Gaza #Palestine #HumanRightsDay

On #language from behind the line that marks the death world in #Gaza. Listen.. Just listen It is the wisdom from behind the line

Today marks the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People, a day to reaffirm commitment to justice, equality, and human rights. Free Palestine Reading List for November 29 – December 5 (2025): publishersforpalestine.org/2025/11/29/f...

On languaging burnt lands and broken contracts, between words and worlds: a wordsmithery of struggle from the rubble

A future in which we survived this co-struggle shimmers in this poem by @khawlabadwan.bsky.social “One day that's not here yet we will use the past tense announcing the fall of this evil We shall teach our children how humanity survived…”

So happy to say our book is now published! Working with the amazing editorial team has been a privilege, including @abihackett.bsky.social, @davidbenshannon.bsky.social, Vishnu Kkn, Christina MacRae, Rachel Holmes, @khawlabadwan.bsky.social, Rosie Flewitt and @wardasworld.bsky.social. Thanks all! 🌸

I quit Palestine', a sentence from historical drama, #Palestine36, said by Thomas, a British diplomat who was disturbed by the injustices he witnessed. We can't 'quit Palestine' as injustices, colonial baraberity, and the language of fake peace remain the same

On language and the colonial custody of words and meanings in a world where linguistic gaslighting is a daily encounter: Who decides which meanings to ascribe

On #language, cultural responsibility, ethical response-ability, and world-building: And we keep telling…

On language, activism and compassion: Learn this creative wordsmithery that breathes compassion

On language, Ai, and care: The interruption of care The disruption of the machine

and the coldness of the world #KeepTellingofGaza

On language, thinking and feeling: to feel is to engage a different type of reason feel deeper and feel more fully

On #language as a site of interconnected historical struggles and traumas: Hiroshima becomes a unit

On #language as rebellion, preservation, and imagination: words with wings wings with words #KeepTellingofGaza

yet attempted again #KeepTellingofGaza

From a year ago We #keeptellingofgaza

“A different world is possible” Reposted with alt text. No stopping, keep telling. Together we can birth a different world.