Ian Cushing

Reader in Critical Applied Linguistics, Manchester Metropolitan University. Imagining futures of linguistic justice in schools. Editor @CritStudsEd.

[Ian Cushing @ian_cushing]

i am still in shock but I have won a Philip Leverhulme Prize. starting in autumn 2026 for 3 years, i’ll be looking at linguistic justice in schools, particularly in how children and teachers engage in radical, grassroots activism for structural change. 🌸 https://t.co/OVZwEHurxW

[Warwick Mansell @warwickmansell]

New: Northern Irish writers almost entirely absent from draft new Northern Ireland English curriculum
https://t.co/mYceugUNTX
Statistical analysis of exemplar authors mentioned in the draft shows only two of 78 writers are of Northern Irish nationality.

[Jan Rowe @Janroweljmu]

What exactly is high potential about it?

[Joe Hanley ⏹️ @JoeEHanley]

'It's the same idiots with the same tripe'.

Missed this important publication from a few months ago from @viv_ellis & @ian_cushing, examining the impact of DfE reforms on teacher educators & the anger felt towards those 'advisors' who helped design them.
https://t.co/MBvhvsSjWg

[Warwick Mansell @warwickmansell]

Sorry the link to the article below didn't work. Here's a working one https://t.co/2gKxm9HqMl

[Warwick Mansell @warwickmansell]

New: Real Teaching. Real Evidence. Real Results. And real rightwing associations for well-known education organisation?
https://t.co/e7NsZYFm5T
Houston, do we have a problem, asks this new diary piece featuring researchED’s stateside sojourn next month.

[Warwick Mansell @warwickmansell]

Pupil’s comments on reading could be read alongside
@BarbaraBleiman 's recent posts re hyper-control of English teaching: https://t.co/g9MBdw4On5 @englishspecial

[Warwick Mansell @warwickmansell]

“I really used to enjoy reading. But now, in school, I can’t read without having this fear of me being in trouble for not tracking every line with a bookmark,” BBC SW investigates behaviour management policies at Athena Academy Trust. (At 3.55 here: https://t.co/hEnhfl97sq )

[Barbara Bleiman 🎓 Education is Conversation @BarbaraBleiman]

This blog shares one teacher's bleak experience of a curriculum imposed from above. Emails from anxious, demoralised teachers come to EMC quite often & suggest that it's a growing problem that needs urgent discussion. If it's an issue for you, let us know. https://t.co/1pWjkdgrK6

[Stephen Vainker @StephenVainker]

A pretty forceful piece (paywalled) on Hattie's plagiarism, AI use, & the uni's reluctance to properly investigate.

It could only be published because of News Corp's robust legal team. At this point the only thing stopping the story being all over ed media is his litigiousness.

[Stephen Vainker @StephenVainker]

I'm delighted that Times Higher Ed have covered the BERA story.

Less delighted that in their response BERA demonstrates it doesn't understand the issue (at all) and doesn't take it seriously.

Link below👇

[Carmel O'Hagan @CarmelOHagan1]

Slanting away from SLANT https://t.co/d43nKnqqXT via @Penny_Ten

[Ian Cushing @ian_cushing]

now in an issue and always open access: how deficit thinking about language gets designed into school discipline policies, and how deviations from ideologies of normative speech get encoded as imagined signs of misbehaviour. https://t.co/qGt9AKHl3L

[Ian Cushing @ian_cushing]

what does ‘misbehaviour’ sound like? in new open access work i ask this question in the context of school discipline policies, looking at how ideologies of ‘im/proper language’ and ‘im/proper behaviour’ coalesce and get co-constructed with one another. https://t.co/qGt9AKHl3L

[Dr Ruby (she/her) jaboukies everything @PaperWhispers]

So Jim Ratcliffe who moved to Monaco in order to reduce his UK tax bill by *£4 billion* is whinging about 'too many immigrants in the UK as the cause of economic destabilisation'. The billionaire tax dodger telling you that the taxed thousandaire is the reason for your poverty.

[Ian Cushing @ian_cushing]

@FayeGriffiths8 💯

[Ian Cushing @ian_cushing]

in this blog i outline the theory of change for linguistic justice in schools that i am working with and hoping to develop as part of my Leverhulme project, beginning in the autumn 💜

[National Association for the Teaching of English @NATEfeed]

With a Philip Leverhulme Prize, @ian_cushing is leading a three-year project on linguistic justice in schools. The research aims to drive systemic change, challenge deficit views of language, and build more just educational futures. https://t.co/kYTKdTswzF #NATE

[Ian Cushing @ian_cushing]

officially the worst take

[Melissa Chen @MsMelChen]

Some people are shocked at how Epstein comes across as so mediocre and dumb in his emails, citing his sloppy correspondences riddled with misspellings, erratic punctuation, absent capitalization, random spacings and weird syntax.

These aren't actually signs of illiteracy though. They are, in fact, assertions of status and also a window into his psyche.

Meticulous adherence to proper sentence structure and formatting in emails is the hallmark of the earnest professional - the diligent academic, the public intellectual seeking a donation, the ambitious subordinate eager to demonstrate competence and respectability.

Those who already command outsized power and deference can get away with communicating in ways that are deliberately terse, unpolished, even negligent. Such indifference to linguistic norms signals that the sender operates beyond the rules that constrain others. They need not invest time or effort in refinement because their position ensures the message will be received, deciphered, and acted upon regardless.

The recipient, aware of the hierarchy, instinctively compensates by overlooking errors and trying to decode meaning.

In this way, this negligence is a flex, an assertion that ordinary standards of clarity and courtesy simply do not apply to the author.

This pattern echoes broader codes of elite behavior. Just as certain high-status circles treat dress codes with studied nonchalance by say wearing the "wrong" thing precisely because they can, the powerful can afford to write poorly. The more unassailable one's position, the less one needs to perform propriety in prose.

(Interestingly there's horseshoe theory in action here where the only other people who will refuse to conform to linguistic standards are the indignant anti-imperialist woke types who think that insisting on proper linguistic standards is basically white supremacy)

[Dr Ruby (she/her) jaboukies everything @PaperWhispers]

On Epstein files:
1. Why is the press referring to girls as women?
2. Why is the press inventing a term, 'underage women', there is no such thing.
3. There is no such thing as 'sex with a child', it is called child rape or child sexual abuse.

Stop minimising the criminality.

[English at Manchester Met @MMUEnglishDept]

Congratulations to our Ian Cushing, Reader in Critical Applied Linguistics @ManMetUni, awarded a Philip Leverhulme Prize by the @LeverhulmeTrust for a 3-year project exploring youth activism and linguistic justice in schools with work in the UK and USA. https://t.co/uNMT1BDfHu

[Ian Cushing @ian_cushing]

@MichaelRosenYes @BBCRadio4 @NATEfeed @KingsCollegeLon @routledgebooks @BarbaraBleiman @EngMediaCentre I’m there! (through my computer) 🥰

[Jan Rowe @Janroweljmu]

Anyone know who decided on the successful tenders?

I’m incredulous about some decisions here, by the differences between subjects, and by the lack of representation in many cases.