Chapter 8: Reconsidering Leadership Education Discourses Using Anti-Racism Frameworks

Numerous scholars in higher education and leadership learning have emphasized the importance of analyzing leadership language (Bertrand Jones et al., 2016; Dugan, 2017; Guthrie et al., 2013); however, discourse goes beyond studying language to include interpreting discourse in relation to social practices (Fairclough, 1995). As leadership educators, we have a set of practices consisting of various rules and structures that are normalized in our teaching and learning environments. These social practices can limit and expand student actions and interactions within the classroom or programmatic spaces. Discourses can be used to systematically exploit one social group to the benefit of another social group in our leadership education courses (Sensoy & DiAngelo, 2017). Although racism is not often seen in leadership education courses as a reality of both the content and practice of leadership, our classrooms and co-curricular programs are racialized (Ford & Krechel, 2023) and we, both students and educators, bring our complete selves into the classroom and co-curricular programs which are not void of both previous and current white supremacy conditioning. Gusa (2010) highlights that higher education institutions “do not have to be explicitly racist to create a hostile environment. Instead, unexamined historically situated White cultural ideology embedded in language, cultural practice, traditions, and perceptions of knowledge allow these institutions to remain racialized” (p. 465). With this in mind, we can draw from educators who facilitate dialogues on race and racism. This chapter will begin with defining discourse and its relationship to leadership learning, provide dominant discourse examples in leadership courses as entry points to critique, and offer considerations for doing discourse differently as leadership educators.