Warda Farah, our guest blogger this week, is a Social Entrepreneur, Speech and Language Therapist, adjunct lecturer and author. She set up her company, Language Waves, to address the barriers that Black and minoritized families face when accessing Speech and Language Therapy services, by offering alternative services that are culturally and linguistically affirming. Her approach is guided by her own experiences as a neurodivergent Black woman and subverts the traditional medical model of Speech & Language Therapy by centering language as a multimodal emancipatory tool that resists the standard language ideologies imposed on minorities. “Whilst wearing many hats,” says Farah, “ultimately my work aims to centre Black Joy.”
As a student, I was constantly bombarded with the idea that the way I thought, spoke, and wrote was not good enough. I was made to believe that my writing lacked structure, was grammatically inconsistent, and always missed the mark. For years, I struggled with my writing, never feeling confident in my ability to express my thoughts clearly and coherently.
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