Citing Underrepresented Voices

As an Afro-Indigenous person (Mvskoke) who is reconnecting with my culture, I look at research through a narrative point of view. Where did these ideas, traditions, food, etc. come from? I focus on research from the cultural, oral history, point of view, and examine the many ways we can learn to move backwards in time with the knowledge we hold in our own blood and body. As a genealogist, much of my research is informed by family and cultural knowledge, as well as social context.

Citation Politics

Citation politics is about reproducing sameness. If we are always citing white, male authors, we are forever drawing from a very limited set of experiences. Women are cited less on average than research authored by men, but if a woman co-authors with a man, the paper has a higher chance of being cited. BIPOC researchers and other marginalized folks are less cited than their white colleagues even if they have more experience and authority than white researchers. Well-cited scholars have authority because they are well cited. But well cited does not mean quality especially at the expense of those less cited.

What and who you choose to cite is a reflection of your positionalities.

You will come to research as you, and as a result, you bring your knowledge, experiences, opinions, and skills to the conversation. This affects who you include in your research, who you exclude, and who you consider an authority on the subject matters. 

Remember that Citation selection is never passive. Researchers make a conscious decision who to include and who to exclude in their work. We need to discuss our intentions and why we chose to cite certain resources over others. It holds us accountable for the research we do and the creations we produce. Who you cite matters just as much as what you cite!

I am a person of color and not from the US. I almost always felt in during my growing years that “White People” do the research. Somehow, all the names of the researchers or scientists I knew were white or I do not know if Whites get more recognition for their work or they always had more means and power to do and shine.”

Breaking the Citation Cycle

Practice citation counting: literally count how many women, BIPOC (Black, Indigenous and People of Color), and other marginalized folks are included in your references. Count how many nontraditional sources you cited. Google the authors to see who they are if you need to. Don’t make assumptions about gender or race. Do your research and see if you can find writing about identity by the authors themselves.

Push against the narrow definition of academic scholarship that is exclusive, misogynistic and racist. Just because someone’s work has not been heavily cited does not mean it does not have value. Strive towards citation politics that are feminist, antiracist and inclusive.

There are different kinds of authority. Consider the context in which you are writing and determine: what kind of expert do you need? For example, when might a government site not be as reliable as a personal narrative?

There are more contributors to research than just the author(s). Take a critical look at the methodology section to see who contributed and who didn’t.

Balance in Citation

• Gender Balance Assessment Tool (GBAT): “Women are cited less often than men, and are also underrepresented in syllabi. Yet even well-meaning scholars may find that they have difficulty assessing how gender-balanced their bibliographies and syllabi really are. Counting is tedious and prone to human error, and scholars may not know the gender identities of all the authors they cite. This tool aims to help with that, by automating the process of evaluating the (probabilistic) gender of each name and then providing an estimate of what percentage of the authors on a syllabus are women.”
• Cite Black Women: A movement that engages with social media and aesthetic representation in order to push people to critically rethink the politics of knowledge production by engaging in a radical praxis of citation that acknowledges and honors Black women’s transnational intellectual production.
• Cite Black Authors: A database that seeks to enhance recognition and citation of Black academic voices, made by and for Black researchers.
• Black Studies Center: Scholarly and general interest sources, newspapers, and other primary sources surrounding the Black experience in America.
• I-Portal (Indigenous Studies Portal): From the University of Saskatchewan’s library, the I-Portal is a search tool for the work of Indigenous scholars, thinkers, and contributors across formats and origins.
• How to Cite Like a Badass Tech Feminist of Color (eZine): SHINE Theory as a tactic aims to counter the erasure of Black, Indigenous and People of Color in research by reconsidering traditional ideas of expertise.
• Conducting research through an anti-racism lens guide: From the University of Minnesota, this is a guide to de-centering whiteness in research and acknowledging the racist systems in academia.

This page was constructed with help from Tulane University’s Latinx Studies Guide and Salem State University’s Act Up: Citation Politics Guide.