Oracy: The Politics of Speech Education (Cambridge University Press, 2025)
Edited by Tom F. Wright (University of Sussex) | With a foreword by Alastair Campbell
Oracy has become one of the most prominent ideas in modern education. But where has this idea come from? Should speech education be seen as positive, or does it hold unintended consequences? How can problems over definitions, teaching and assessment ever be overcome?
In this book Wright brings the best positive and sceptical arguments for oracy together in one book. Experts from education, politics, academia and the charity sector consider the benefits and risks of speech education, place it in global context, and offer practical guidance for those trying to implement it on the ground.
Contributors include: the political commentator Alastair Campbell; the linguist Deborah Cameron; the educationalists Neil Mercer and Alan Howe; teaching leader Qamar Shafiq; anthropologist Karin Barber; sociolinguist Ian Cushing; political scientist Stephen Coleman; and many others.
Read the introduction to the book here
Read Tom F. Wright’s chapter on the history of oracy on our blog here
‘Oracy and English Studies’: special volume of English: The Journal of the English Association, Summer 2022
Edited by Arlene Holmes-Henderson and Tom F. Wright
Including essays from Alan Finlayson (Political theorist, University of East Anglia); Stephen Coleman (Political ethnographer, University of Leeds),
Read Alan’s piece on our blog page here
Read the introduction ‘Making the voice matter in English Studies teaching’ here
How People Talk About Politics (Bloomsbury, 2021)
By Stephen Coleman (University of Leeds)
This book explores the nature of talking about politically contentious issues and how our society can begin to develop a more constructive culture of political talk.
Uniquely, this study focuses on citizens own experiences and reflections on developing, practising and evaluating their own political voices. Based on seventy in-depth interviews with a diverse range of people, Stephen Coleman explores the intricate nature of interpersonal political talk and what this means for public attitudes towards politics and how people negotiate their political identities. Engaging with a broad range of subjects from Political Communication to Sociology this book offers valuable insight into how the public can discuss politically turbulent topics in a meaningful and constructive way.
Read the chapter ‘We Need to talk - but how? here
‘I am very sensitive on the subject of accent’: Children, young people and attitudes to speech in inter-war Britain
by Hester Barron (University of Sussex), Modern British History, Vol. 36, Issue 1, 2025 |
This article considers elite and popular attitudes to speech and accent in inter-war Britain, specifically with regard to children and young people. It begins by showing that speech was a consistent preoccupation of educationalists, for whom classed prejudices complemented more progressive concerns about citizenship and employment. It continues by considering everyday school practices, charting the ways in which schools tried to influence their pupils’ speech. Efforts were often variable—and Mass-Observation accounts show that teachers’ attitudes were not always consistent either—but children might respond positively nonetheless. Finally, it considers influences external to school such as family attitudes, the wireless, and the cinema, showing that concerns with speech and language were not limited to an educational hierarchy but were often shared by working-class parents and sometimes children themselves. The article thus suggests that there was less of a difference between official attitudes and the (literal and metaphorical) vernacular than is and was often assumed. It argues that widespread attention to speech and language was one way in which social and educational aspirations were fostered amidst the new technologies, consumerism, and democracy of inter-war Britain.
Special volume of The Use of English : The Journal for Teachers of English on ‘Oracy’
Edited by Arlene Holmes-Henderson and Tom F. Wright
Including an introduction to Geoff Barton, Chair of Commission on Future of Oracy Education
Pieces include: ‘Oracy’: what are we talking about?! (Catherine Pape); Oracy: an integral part of any classroom (Freya Odell); Oracy takes time but is well worth the wait; (Emily Frontain); Oracy and the FE learning environment (Nicola Wigmore); Amplifying oracy: navigating classroom change in the AI era (Stephanie Miller); Oracy, AI, and authentic voices (Lin Goran); Oracy in the Deaf classroom (Tracy Irish); Reversing democratic decline through oracy (Ed Sweett)
‘Oracy Education: Perspectives from Research, Policy and Practice
edited by Arlene Holmes-Henderson (Durham) and Tom F. Wright (Sussex)
Rhetoric, oracy and citizenship: curricular innovations from Scotland, Slovenia and Norway,
By Arlene Holmes-Henderson et al. Literacy, Vol 56.3 (2022)
This article positions rhetoric as a bridge between oracy and citizenship education. The first comparative curricular study of Scotland, Slovenia and Norway, it demonstrates shared policy aims and practical challenges in the delivery of oracy and citizenship education in these three nations.
You can read the article open access here
