Bridging Writerly Identities and Discourse Communities through Personal and Social Identity Wheels

This activity was designed to bridge the first two units of ISP100: Writing for University and Beyond, a first-year writing course required for most students at the University of Toronto Mississauga. These units focus on writing stories (critical examinations of one’s experiences of writing, language, and power) and discourse communities, respectively. The activity invites students to recognize the ways in which their identities are informed by their belonging to various discourse communities, and vice versa. Through mapping exercises and small- and full-group discussions, students move from personal identities to social identities and communities. By the end of the activity, they will hopefully have a better sense of the discourse communities they are a part of and that they can potentially study.

This activity is also an opportunity for community building in the classroom, and I have found that students enjoy reflecting about themselves and learning about each other as they fill out the handouts and discuss some of their answers, questions, and observations with peers and the instructor. If you choose to facilitate this activity, make sure to underscore during moments for discussion that students can choose if and how much to share with their peers and the whole group.

Please note that the personal and social identity wheels used in this activity were originally adapted for use by the Program on Intergroup Relations and the Spectrum Center, University of Michigan. I have further tweaked these resources for the purpose of this activity.

Bio: Nelesi Rodrigues (she/her) is an Assistant Professor at UTM’s Institute for the Study of University Pedagogy (ISUP) and in the Adult Education and Community Development program at OISE’s Department of Leadership, Higher & Adult Education. Her experiences as a Luso-Venezuelan migrant settler in Turtle Island, an English writing teacher, and a lifelong dance practitioner inform her scholarly work. Her research interests include embodied learning and rhetorics; transnational feminisms; arts-informed pedagogies; community writing; and migration, mobility justice, and learning.