Words Create Worlds

Words Create Worlds: How Language Shapes Belonging

Getting To We

Language is the architecture of connection. The words we choose determine who feels seen, who feels excluded, and how deeply we trust one another.

At Getting to We, we view language as a tool for belonging. Our words carry values—whether we acknowledge it or not. A casual comment can close a door; an intentional phrase can open one.

We teach teams and communities to listen to their own language: Who does this include? Who does it silence? What assumptions lie within it?

Each reflection becomes an opportunity to align speech with empathy.

Inclusion begins in the sentences we speak. By choosing words that reflect care, curiosity, and respect, we create spaces where everyone belongs—and that’s where transformation begins.

Words Create Worlds Award

Congratulations to 2025 Words Create Worlds Award recipient Frederick Joseph, Author of This Thing of Ours. Joseph’s writing is timely in its presentation as a rallying cry for injustice that comes from the voices of young adults who meet the challenges of the time with real courage and as models for what it means to be an upstander.

The book’s themes elevate the power of storytelling and the written word in such a refreshing way in an era where social media often presents ideas in fragmented, biased ways that flatten the nuances inherent in these complex issues.

As a YA book with adult themes, it’s accessible across all ages and one that can and should be discussed in schools and universities, across family dinner tables, and in every kind of book club from traditional to “boozy” book clubs.