8 Writing for inclusion and diversity

Open textbook readers come from a wide diversity of user groups. They may be from different:

• socio-economic classes
• geographic locations
• educational attainment
• age groups
• socio-political affiliations
• cultural and ethnic backgrounds.

Including a wide range of perspectives in your textbook provides a richer and more complex worldview and can help ensure that more readers identify with and relate to the material. Some other benefits are:

• Engaging more students because they recognise themselves or their life experiences in the material.
• Appealing to instructors in a variety of educational settings.
• Creating a more interesting reading and learning experience.

How to be inclusive

Writers should ensure their work is accurate, unbiased, and a respectful representation of genders, races, cultures, geographies, ethnic backgrounds, disabilities, nationalities, ages, sexual orientations, socio-economic statuses and diverse viewpoints.

Writers can do this by referring to guides such as the APA inclusive language guide, which gives detailed information about appropriate terminology and explains why some terminology can be seen to have negative connotations in diverse communities. In Monash University Library (MUL) open textbook projects we suggest authors follow the Australian Government Style Manual, which has information on inclusive language. Authors may also wish to consult with advocacy groups at their institutions or employ a sensitivity reader.

Note that the most appropriate language can be context and individual specific. For example many style guides direct writers to use people-first language when describing people with disabilities. However many disabled people prefer identity-first language and preferences can differ between communities. Likewise, there is no single agreed upon terminology when writing about the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples of Australia.

Sensitivity reading

Consider engaging a sensitivity reader to review your text if you are writing about cultures outside your lived experience.

A sensitivity reader is someone who reads for offensive content, misrepresentation, stereotypes, bias, lack of understanding, etc. They create a report for an author and/or publisher outlining the problems that they find in a piece of work and offer solutions in how to fix them. By doing this, the literary quality of a work is substantially improved. (University of Alberta Library, 2022)

Depending on the work in question, engaging a peer reviewer or copyeditor from a specific demographic or performing a cultural safety check may be necessary. See the Copyediting Your Book chapter for more information.

Checklist for inclusion and diversity

To help authors navigate this area, MUL has compiled an Inclusive Language Checklist [PDF, 20 KB]. The list is intended as a quick reference guide that prompts authors to consider a range of aspects and is by no means exhaustive.

Attributions

This chapter was adapted from:

‘Inclusivity and Accessibility’ in RMIT Open Publishing Toolkit For Authors by Julian Blake, Jennifer Hurley, Ian Kolk, Anne Lennox, Stuart Moffat, Mark Parsons, Frank Ponte, Emily Russell, and Carrie Thomas. The book is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial 4.0 International License.  Copyright © 2022 by RMIT University.

‘Accessibility, Diversity and Inclusion’ in Self- Publishing Guide by Lauri M. Aesoph. The book is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial 4.0 International License.  Copyright © 2018 by Lauri M. Aesoph.

‘Resources for Diverse and Inclusive Representation‘ in Open Publishing Guide for Authors by Nikki Andersen, Deborah King, Adrian Stagg and Emilia Bell. The book is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommerical-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Copyright © 2023 by University of Southern Queensland.

References

Ethnocentrism. (2024). In Dictionary.com. Retrieved August 12, 2024, from http://www.dictionary.com/browse/ethnocentrism.

University of Alberta Library. (2022). Writing, editing, and publishing Indigenous stories: Sensitivity reading. https://guides.library.ualberta.ca/c.php?g=708820&p=5049650