# Black English (blacklish), as explained by a black man. **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 16, 2000, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-english-blacklish-as-explained-by-a-black-man/41489 "2000-11-16T18:40:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Stuffy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f17d59/32.png) [@Stuffy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stuffy)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2000, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-english-blacklish-as-explained-by-a-black-man/41489/61 "2000-11-18T16:08:09Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Reboot42 \* > Class conflict? I never considered class, because among all races there are class divisions. In this instance I did not consider it because of the wide spread general imitation by young people of black generated transient styles and actions. I don’t recall very many people finding the ‘poor white’ stereotype of the 70s and 80s as something to imitate. FTR, that was a pretty funny analogy! > [@](#): > > Over the decades, as education and conditions changed, so did the language and attitudes. The sudden return to a street language by a large percentage of blacks, to me anyhow, seems to be a retrograde action. It did not appear until the 90s, when great strides were being made in race relations, which is kind of odd because African Americans were getting more of what they wanted. I disagree, I believe that you became more AWARE of the speech patterns and dress due to blacks increasing role in entertainment. > [@](#): > > It is as if as they won the long fight, some felt that they were loosing some form of racial identity and retreated into things designed to create one, adopting and raising to high points of honor past repressed or poverty based living conditions. Again, in the inner city vast swaths of poverty still exist. These same conditions are inspiring the entertainment (Rap) and imitiation you’re picking up. That lower income blacks might adopt this as sort of an identity is not surprising. As example of this would be similar to the poorer whites in the 50’s adopting a thugish appearance, and slang. > [@](#): > > It makes me wonder if it might not be the Hells Kitchen example: people through economic and educational changes moved away from that hell hole in NYC, but some moved back, preferring the violent lifestyle and antisocial behavior to ‘normal behavior.’ They could not cope with achieving what they had fought for and were more used to the ‘exciting’ life style. You’re still missing a point. Many lower income blacks still live in poverty conditions that breed the types of behaviors you seem to uncomfortable with. Again, you seem to ignore some of the very points you yourself made. It’s why you see a dichotomy between lower and higher income blacks. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2000, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-english-blacklish-as-explained-by-a-black-man/41489/62 "2000-11-18T16:21:27Z")
> [@](#): > > The sudden return to a street language by a large percentage of blacks, to me anyhow, seems to be a retrograde action. It did not appear until the 90s, when great strides were being made in race relations, which is kind of odd because African Americans were getting more of what they wanted. Which, of course, is why black speech as an “incomprehensible” dialect was being used as a source of humor in the 1970s and 1980s (_e.g._, **Airplane** ), right? As to your contention that your retrogression occurred in the 1990s when blacks were getting “more of what they wanted,” I can only conclude that you really do not pay much attention to national news. After 12 years of Republican control of the White House followed by several years of Republican control of the Congress, there is a very great perception among the poorest of the black population that they have no hope of joining society. They exactly fit the models of the poorest Londoners who were the subject of so much hand-wringing of over _their_ refusal to speak the Queen’s English. This is not an issue of whether poverty or opportunity are worse or better now than they were twenty years ago. The issue is the perception within the community. I still challenge your contention that speaking an “impenetrable” black dialect is all that common. At my current client site, over half the building is black and the floor where I work is composed of 60-70% black clerical workers. I do not have any trouble speaking with any of them for any reason. I have also never heard a snatch of conversation, walking past a black group in the lunch room, that I could not understand. (Where they might be more likely to use idioms among their friends.) I am not suggesting that there are not blacks who have chosen to speak AAVE to the exclusion of Standard English. I am suggesting that your broad characterization that _they_ (most blacks) are doing it is simply taking a few isolated incidents and using them to paint a whole group of society with a broad brush. Your OP asked > [@](#): > > Why do many blacks demand equality but then fight to develop things that separate them from everyone else? You have chosen to categorize a large blacks into one lump. Where is the evidence that the ones demanding “equality” are the ones trying to stay “separate”? I would suggest that you read the arguments of W.E.B. Du Bois and Booker T. Washington. This debate has engaged the black community for 100 years. On the one side are those who are willing to make some accomodations to black culture to be more readily accepted by the larger white society in America (Washington). On the other side are those who argue that white society in America will never accept blacks, no matter how well-educated or “proper” they are and that blacks are more likely to _survive_ if they organize themselves into their own self-supporting society (Du Bois). (There are many variations of each theme. Those are simply the broader strokes to describe them. And, of course, most blacks, like most everyone, are simply trying to get out of bed in the morning, get their kids to school, handle their jobs, and try to find a life–few people of any color spend much of their waking time trying to put forth an effort to impose any particular philosophy on the world.) By looking at different actions by different _individuals_ who happen to be black and trying to describe “black” culture in terms of a single set of events, you are setting up false dichotomies over which you can wring your hands, while never fully understanding what is actually happening. ---
**Author:** ![divemaster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/divemaster/32/78_2.png) [@divemaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/divemaster)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2000, 2:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-english-blacklish-as-explained-by-a-black-man/41489/63 "2000-11-19T02:20:41Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by divemaster \* > \*\* > > > [@](#): > > > > \*Originally posted by Fretful Porpentine \* > > \*\*Does anybody else think Reboot42’s posting style sounds _awfully_ familiar? \*\* > > I know where you are coming from. \…It’ll all come out in the end. \*\* I guess it did. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2000, 5:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-english-blacklish-as-explained-by-a-black-man/41489/64 "2000-11-19T05:42:38Z")
I doubt we’ll ever persuade Mark from his opinions, but, perhaps, we are providing food for thought for folks with his leanings who have not seen genuine facts presented, before. ---
**Author:** ![Needs2know](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/b5e925/32.png) [@Needs2know](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Needs2know)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2000, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-english-blacklish-as-explained-by-a-black-man/41489/65 "2000-11-20T14:59:42Z")
Why indeed is anyone suprised by any of Reeboot’s views. You find them generalized and broad sweeping? They lack sensitivity? Or is it that you honestly think these views are not shared by a large segment of the non-black community? There have been other posters on this board that have hinted at similar ideas. What I cannot understand about other whites who feel this way is why? I maintain that whites or any other group that insist in finding some fault, blame or threat in any other group are simply afraid. What of, I can’t be sure. Afraid that they will one day be accepted as equal to you and therefore the whole world will know that you aren’t shit!? You are just as stupid, culturally, morally and ethically bankrupt as the group you’ve loved to hate for so long? Afraid that you will somehow lose the upperhand culturally, socially and economically. If that’s the case then just say so. At least white supremicists have the guts to say so. They at least have the guts to say they are afraid that their race will die out. But veiled attempts to cover fear and predjudice under the guise of “they are only hurting themselves”. Is just the rantings of terrified cowards. If you’re gonna be a racist go ahead a be one, don’t be lukewarm about it. Stand up for what you believe in even if it is motivated by fear. Fear is a pretty damned good motivator if you ask me. Needs2know ---
**Author:** ![Gundy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/b782af/32.png) [@Gundy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gundy)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2000, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-english-blacklish-as-explained-by-a-black-man/41489/66 "2000-11-20T16:09:08Z")
> [@](#): > > _Originally posted by Kimstu_ > Gundy, I went back over the thread and I cannot figure out what you’re talking about here. As far as I can tell, although many of us disagreed with some of Reboot’s assertions, nobody called him a racist at all, or even suggested he might be racist, until he’d posted three or four messages including some of his unfortunate generalizations. I agree it’s not good to be over-hasty in accusing people of racism, but it doesn’t seem to me that that’s happened in this case. If you think it has, could you point out some specific examples in “many of the first responses”, please? Having reviewed the thread, I have to admit that I can’t point to a response that says, “You’re a racist.” Sorry I overstated. But the tone seemed accusatory to me. To quote another poster, maybe that’s not the case, but the subtext is there. > [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Collounsbury \* > Not sure what you mean here. You mean should it compete with normalized standard English. Well, that all depends on the political (ultimately economic) clout of the community. I frankly don’t care one way or the other. But given reality, it ain’t (hehe) gonna happen. I only mean that it shouldn’t supplant normal English. I agree that it ain’t gonna happen. > [@](#): > > Oh Gundy, take yourself down to a nice research libarary and spend a day reading about American dialects in linguistics texts Southern dialect (white version) has its own lively literature. I have no interest in it so I can’t share any real information, but interest in southern dialects (plural) is actually one of the older areas of interest in American linguistics, from what I have been led to understand. Oh Collounsbury, enh. I’ll take your word on it. For the record, how many Georgia schools have asked that their children be taught in cracker-speak? > [@](#): > > Dialects are simply variants of any given language. Recognizing a dialect is simply recognizing a describable variation. Linguistics is not in the business of making hierarchies and in fact finds the whole proper versus improper debate to be tedious. Proper is what has power and money. Improper is what does not. That’s the way things are. My dad’s family speaks hyper-proper speech. Why is it hyper-proper. Cause they’re well-off and their dialect is valued. I’m not complaining about that, its simply a sociological observation. Sure - I’m willing to bet your dad speaks that way because he wants to distinguish himself from the riff-raff, right? AAVE-speakers use AAVE for a similar reason, don’t they? Except it winds up working against many of them, I imagine. > [@](#): > > No, it is not. Slang is one thing, dialect is another. This is really a linguistics sort of question, but to say something is a dialect is to recognize a form of speech a variant of a recognizable constellation of dialects called a langauge. This is purely subjective, but it seems like a dialect, then, composed largely of mispronounced words and grammar mangling. I dunno. Still sounds bad to these ears. > [@](#): > > Bother. Standards schmandards. I don’t see that standard English is deteriorating from dialectal usage. It’s enriched in my mind. Much worse is “memoese” – the horrible business-speak bureacratic language of some of my colleagues is a much greater threat to the language than someone busting out with some dialect. Yeah, well, we’re talking about a whole new paradigm here. I’m glad we could dialogue. - I see what you’re saying here, and it’s disagreeable to me because it’s perpetuated by idiots trying to impress everyone with their smartitude. I don’t have a quarrel with, say, new words. They pop up, they go away, whatever. If not for that we wouldn’t have such gems as 23-skidoo and swank. I do have problems with poor subject-verb agreement and such things. > [@](#): > > Rules are made to be broken. It just has to be done with style. Don’t obsess about them. I’m hardly obsessing. I’m not hyper-proper in either my speech or my writing, but I do make an effort to sound coherent. I would hope that others would do the same. > [@](#): > > Frankly, my read is he’s a kkker trying not to see to be. Maybe that’s off-base but the subtext is there. I gather from some comments that his writing style ressembles a another poster whose opinions on race became clear. I think I have a suspicion as to who. I’m not going to speculate as to his motives, particularly since it’s water under the bridge now. ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2000, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-english-blacklish-as-explained-by-a-black-man/41489/67 "2000-11-20T16:27:24Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Gundy \* > \*\* > > This is purely subjective, but it seems like a dialect, then, composed largely of mispronounced words and grammar mangling. I dunno. Still sounds bad to these ears. > > \*\* It’s not grammar mangling. African-American Vernacular English (it was called Black English Vernacular or BEV in my Philosophy of Language class) follows perfectly sound grammatical rules, they are simply not the same grammatical rules used in Standard American English (SAE). In “The Language Instinct” Pinker says, “The most linguistically interesting thing about the dialect is how linguistically uninteresting it is: if Labov [who studied BEV] did not have to call attention to it to debunk the claim that ghetto children lack true linguistic competence, it would have been filed away as just another language.” It may sound bad to your ears, but that’s a reflection of your own personal prejudices and not the validity of the dialect. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2000, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-english-blacklish-as-explained-by-a-black-man/41489/68 "2000-11-20T16:41:07Z")
I hasten to chime in that I believe **Lamia** meant “personal prejudices in favor of the sound of the standard English that you’re accustomed to thinking of as ‘correct’” rather than “personal prejudices against black people that include disliking the sound of their vernacular dialect.” I agree that people who are trying to write or speak standard American English should get their subject-verb agreement right (as well as a host of other fine grammar points that I’m hyperobsessive about, such as not using “whom” for “who” or “like” for “as”). But if people are speaking a dialect of English that has different grammar rules that conflict with the ones we’re used to, it’s pointless to criticize it from the perspective of standard English. Lie back and enjoy it, says I. **Gundy:** _Yeah, well, we’re talking about a whole new paradigm here. I’m glad we could dialogue._ 🙂 Hee. You are pretty funny, **Gundy** , and I hope you stick around. (Can’t say I’m going to miss **Reboot42** , though.) ---
**Author:** ![Stuffy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f17d59/32.png) [@Stuffy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stuffy)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2000, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-english-blacklish-as-explained-by-a-black-man/41489/69 "2000-11-20T16:44:16Z")
> [@](#): > > Oh Collounsbury, enh. I’ll take your word on it. For the record, how many Georgia schools have asked that their children be taught in cracker-speak? FTR, **Gundy** , your information on the Ebonics debate is inaccurate. What the systm was trying to accomplish was getting Teachers to recognize that many children in inner cities communicated thusly, and was an outreach effort to get teachers to learn how to effectively communicate with those children on their level. I haven’t been able to finfd the original copy of it, but here’s a little form site I’ve dug up > [@](#): > > There is evidence from Sweden, the US, and other countries that speakers of other varieties can be aided in their learning of the standard variety by pedagogical approaches which recognize the legitimacy of the other varieties of a language. From this perspective, the Oakland School Board’s decision to recognize the vernacular of African American students in teaching them Standard English is linguistically and pedagogically sound. This was from this [site](http://www-personal.umich.edu/~jlawler/ebonics.lsa.html) ---
**Author:** ![Gundy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/b782af/32.png) [@Gundy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gundy)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2000, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-english-blacklish-as-explained-by-a-black-man/41489/70 "2000-11-20T16:49:09Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Lamia \* > It’s not grammar mangling. African-American Vernacular English (it was called Black English Vernacular or BEV in my Philosophy of Language class) follows perfectly sound grammatical rules, they are simply not the same grammatical rules used in Standard American English (SAE). See, I _understand_ that it has its own rules. But - and please do correct me if I’m wrong - do those rules not have their foundation in incorrect applications of standard American English rules? > [@](#): > > It may sound bad to your ears, but that’s a reflection of your own personal prejudices and not the validity of the dialect. This _is_ about opinion, is it not? Hence my comment. MY ears, not yours. So, I freely admit that I harbor prejudices against people who don’t know when to use the right _dialect_ at the right time. I don’t presume to think that anyone would take my word as validating a dialect, for criminy’s sake. ---
**Author:** ![Stuffy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f17d59/32.png) [@Stuffy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stuffy)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2000, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-english-blacklish-as-explained-by-a-black-man/41489/71 "2000-11-20T17:19:09Z")
> [@](#): > > See, I understand that it has its own rules. But - and please do correct me if I’m wrong - do those rules not have their foundation in incorrect applications of standard American English rules? No it doesn’t try this [article](http://www.cal.org/ebonics/ebfillmo.htm) ---
**Author:** ![VileOrb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/9e8a1a/32.png) [@VileOrb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VileOrb)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2000, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-english-blacklish-as-explained-by-a-black-man/41489/72 "2000-11-20T17:35:20Z")
OK, I’m back after a weekend hiatus. stuffinb - I assume the thing you said you haven’t heard of happening, is a black person who cries racism when not hired after speaking in “blacklish” in the interview. I have seen this happen personally. As the senior bartender who happened to be around, I sat in on an interview for a bartending job. I had hopes that we would hire this guy partially BECAUSE he was black. The job included a lot of catering and maybe 50% of the big jobs were black weddings and other mostly black events. We didn’t currently have a black bartender (there were 9 total bartenders all white males) and I thought it might be good PR policy to have one. The application the inerviewee submitted included some good experience and the only problem with it was that he hadn’t held any one job for more than a year. As this is fairly typical of bartenders, we had hopes that he would be a good choice. He arrived with his pants halfway down his butt and talking in extreme dialect. The secretary almost threw him out because she couldn’t understand him enough to figure out that he had an appointment. My boss never said the things that I suggest in my post asking for an exhibition of standard english, but as often as she had to ask the guy to repeat himself you’d think he would have gotten the idea that she didn’t like the way he was talking and couldn’t understand it very well. She ended up giving him the standard “we’ll call you if we need you” line. A week later we were being sued for racist hiring policies. I think the company won the case but had to pay a lawyer. I say that this is a clear example of a guy putting a lot of effort into separating himself from mainstream culture and complaining that the mainstream culture doesn’t treat him equally. I submit that as much as he complains about it, he doesn’t really want to be accepted by the dominant culture. What I think he wants is to be rejected and then to take advantage of our laws to get some free money. I do not think that this extreme case is typical. I do think that similar cases happen ocassionally, maybe often. It is pretty hard to find any kind of statistics on this, supporting or refuting. I can only offer that I have heard hearsay stories of many similar events. Every time something like this happens it hurts the future of every black person in America because more people are going to be less sympathetic to black problems. It makes people think that blacks are not willing to cooperate. Now, stuffinb, if what you were saying you never heard of was the interviewer asking for a demonstration of standard english, then I must admit to never hearing of that either, but wouldn’t it be a good idea? It was an aside and not directly answering the OP. ---
**Author:** ![Gundy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/b782af/32.png) [@Gundy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gundy)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2000, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-english-blacklish-as-explained-by-a-black-man/41489/73 "2000-11-20T18:21:03Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by stuffinb \* > \*\* > > > [@](#): > > > > See, I understand that it has its own rules. But - and please do correct me if I’m wrong - do those rules not have their foundation in incorrect applications of standard American English rules? > > No it doesn’t try this [article](http://www.cal.org/ebonics/ebfillmo.htm) > \*\* Thanks, stuffinb. I read the article, but I didn’t read anything supporting the assertion that they do not have their foundation in American English rules - he just _said_ they didn’t, repeatedly. Have I missed something? ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2000, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-english-blacklish-as-explained-by-a-black-man/41489/74 "2000-11-20T18:46:07Z")
**Gundy:** \*See, I understand that it [AAVE] has its own rules. But - and please do correct me if I’m wrong - do those rules not have their foundation in incorrect applications of standard American English rules? \* You’re wrong. Linguistics researchers now seem to think that AAVE is creole in origin, that is, it is descended from attempts to combine the grammar and vocabulary elements of two or more mutually incomprehensible mature languages into a common means of communication. This is not the same thing as trying to follow standard American English rules and inadvertently screwing it up. If you want to see a real discussion of hypotheses for the origin of AAVE, I recommend an on-line article called [The Creole Origins of AAVE: Evidence from Copula Absence](http://www.stanford.edu/~rickford/papers/CreoleOriginsOfAAVE.html). If a few hundred sentences such as > [@](#): > > Moreover, the copula absence pattern which Poplack and Sankoff took as their baseline creole pattern–a higher Ø rate before adjectives than before Verb+ing, for instance (based on Jamaican and Gullah data in Holm 1984)–has been shown to be spurious, the result of analytical errors in Holm 1984 (see Rickford and Blake 1990:261, Rickford 1996:359) and the result of reliance on copula patterns in Caribbean creole basilects rather than its mesolects or intermediate varieties, which are more similar to those of AAVE synchonically and in terms of possible diachronic derivation (Rickford 1974:93, Winford 1992a:23). don’t kill you outright, 🙂 they should end up convincing you that AAVE is a genuine historical dialect that is much more linguistically complex than can be explained by mere “mangled pronunciation and faulty grammar” in attempts to use standard American English. And **VileOrb** , I sympathize with the company in the incident you described which does indeed sound like an attempt by a con artist to scam either your employer or the courts or both; I’m glad it didn’t succeed. But I must point out that though this individual doesn’t seem to be much of a credit to his race (or to the subset of people with their pants half off their asses or any other demographic category he may happen to belong to), people should not allow their opinions of blacks **as a whole** to be diminished because of him: that’s bigotry. Consider this: if a white guy had come in with a similarly uncooperative attitude and barely comprehensible speech, you probably wouldn’t have hired him either, but would it have crossed your mind to complain that his behavior reflected poorly on white people as a group? It’s not right to evaluate whites (or Christians, or men, or people over thirty, or whoever) strictly as individuals while allowing yourself to criticize other groups on the basis of some individuals’ behavior. ---
**Author:** ![Gundy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/b782af/32.png) [@Gundy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gundy)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2000, 7:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-english-blacklish-as-explained-by-a-black-man/41489/75 "2000-11-20T19:00:10Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Kimstu \* > Gundy: \*See, I understand that it [AAVE] has its own rules. But - and please do correct me if I’m wrong - do those rules not have their foundation in incorrect applications of standard American English rules? \* > > You’re wrong. Linguistics researchers now seem to think that AAVE is creole in origin, that is, it is descended from attempts to combine the grammar and vocabulary elements of two or more mutually incomprehensible mature languages into a common means of communication. This is not the same thing as trying to follow standard American English rules and inadvertently screwing it up. > > If you want to see a real discussion of hypotheses for the origin of AAVE, I recommend an on-line article called [The Creole Origins of AAVE: Evidence from Copula Absence](http://www.stanford.edu/~rickford/papers/CreoleOriginsOfAAVE.html). If a few hundred sentences such as > > > [@](#): > > > > Moreover, the copula absence pattern which Poplack and Sankoff took as their baseline creole pattern–a higher Ø rate before adjectives than before Verb+ing, for instance (based on Jamaican and Gullah data in Holm 1984)–has been shown to be spurious, the result of analytical errors in Holm 1984 (see Rickford and Blake 1990:261, Rickford 1996:359) and the result of reliance on copula patterns in Caribbean creole basilects rather than its mesolects or intermediate varieties, which are more similar to those of AAVE synchonically and in terms of possible diachronic derivation (Rickford 1974:93, Winford 1992a:23). > > don’t kill you outright, 🙂 they should end up convincing you that AAVE is a genuine historical dialect that is much more linguistically complex than can be explained by mere “mangled pronunciation and faulty grammar” in attempts to use standard American English. Good god. Remind me to never ask for a reference from regarding this subject again. That was, uh, exhaustive. I’m a complete tyro when it comes to linguistics, so this has been interesting. Thanks for the correction. Anyhoo - I think that what **Reboot** was trying to say somewhere in there is that using AAVE and promoting its use via teaching in schools, etc., is undermining attempts by black youth to ‘get ahead’ in American mainstream (read: mostly white) culture. While I stand corrected about my initial assumptions about its origins, I still think he was right in that assertion. Again, I still think there’s a time and place for that form of speech, and for standard American English - and that it’s a mark of common sense (if not intelligence outright) to know when to use one or the other. ---
**Author:** ![Stuffy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f17d59/32.png) [@Stuffy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stuffy)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2000, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-english-blacklish-as-explained-by-a-black-man/41489/76 "2000-11-20T19:01:39Z")
Sorry bout that Gundy try this [one](http://melanet.com/clegg_series/ebonics.html), I used to have this at my finger tips, I can’t find most of it now, but that should be a good start. ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2000, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-english-blacklish-as-explained-by-a-black-man/41489/77 "2000-11-20T19:36:30Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Kimstu \* > \*\*I hasten to chime in that I believe **Lamia** meant “personal prejudices in favor of the sound of the standard English that you’re accustomed to thinking of as ‘correct’” rather than “personal prejudices against black people that include disliking the sound of their vernacular dialect.” > \*\* Thank you, Kimstu. After I left my room I was worried that I hadn’t made myself clear, but I was in a hurry to finish the post before going to class. > [@](#): > > \*\* > But if people are speaking a dialect of English that has different grammar rules that conflict with the ones we’re used to, it’s pointless to criticize it from the perspective of standard English. Lie back and enjoy it, says I. > \*\* I agree. I have always liked hearing different dialects and accents. Keeps things interesting. > [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Gundy \* > \*\* > See, I _understand_ that it has its own rules. But - and please do correct me if I’m wrong - do those rules not have their foundation in incorrect applications of standard American English rules? > \*\* No, that is not the case. The grammatical rules of AAVE or BEV are not simply ignorant corruptions of SAE rules. If I may refer to Pinker again (his is the only language book I have at hand), there are some auxiliaries that are usually contracted in SAE but are usually used in their full forms in BEV. BEV is also sometimes more precise than SAE. I think it is clear that BEV is not just a poor man’s SAE. I was going to mention creole languages at this point, but I see in my other browser window that Kimstu has done that already so I won’t go over it again. > [@](#): > > \*\* > This _is_ about opinion, is it not? > \*\* I do not believe that this thread is about whether or not you personally care for the sound of a certain dialect. If it is, then it should be moved to IMHO. ---
**Author:** ![system](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/original/2X/e/e489c3b7d8fce19c4b355dd4fc3f88cc39c34b87.png) [@system](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2000, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-english-blacklish-as-explained-by-a-black-man/41489/78 "2000-11-20T19:43:18Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Gundy \* > Good god. Remind me to never ask for a reference from regarding this subject again. That was, uh, exhaustive. I’m a complete tyro when it comes to linguistics, so this has been interesting. Thanks for the correction. Dandy, ain’t it? > [@](#): > > Anyhoo - I think that what **Reboot** was trying to say somewhere in there is that using AAVE and promoting its use via teaching in schools, etc., is undermining attempts by black youth to ‘get ahead’ in American mainstream (read: mostly white) culture. While I stand corrected about my initial assumptions about its origins, I still think he was right in that assertion. Again, I still think there’s a time and place for that form of speech, and for standard American English - and that it’s a mark of common sense (if not intelligence outright) to know when to use one or the other. I don’t disagree at all. While I think stuff noted some of the initial impetus of the Ebonics flap came from the idea of using 2nd language techniques with presumably black english speakers(frankly Ebonics is just a horrible name), some of it clearly was rooted in the idea of setting up black english as a competing standard. Some black nationalists. Minority I am sure, but… Frankly what should have been a technical issue got hijacked from all sides, or such is my impression. ---
**Author:** ![VileOrb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/9e8a1a/32.png) [@VileOrb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VileOrb)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2000, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-english-blacklish-as-explained-by-a-black-man/41489/79 "2000-11-20T19:52:46Z")
Kimstu - I do my best to not let the actions of a few individuals cause me to make judgements about the races or whatever. However, I am not entirely successful. I find myself having less trust of a random black guy dressed in FUBU than I do of a white guy in jeans and a tshirt. Intellectually, I know I should be equally trustful, and cautious, of both. Emotionally, I am much more on the defensive with blacks. Up until the age of about 18, I had limited contact with blacks other than college classmates. I had not developed this emotional bias. But, after living for 14 years in downtown Baltimore, I have had enough bad experiences with blacks that I find myself feeling animosity toward blacks regardless of my intellectual knowledge that it’s only a certain subset of blacks that I need to worry about. I haven’t developed a good way to differentiate the blacks I need to worry about, without first putting myself in jeopardy. Part of this, I think, is that the more positive blacks make it a point to emulate the fashion and dialect of the losers. I have had bad experiences with whites too, but the overwhelming majority of experiences I have had with whites have been positive or neutral. Unfortunately, blacks were running about 50/50 until I became more cautious. Now the bad experiences are more frequent but also more minor. Because, over all, there is less negative impact on me with my current attitude, I have little motivation to attempt to switch back. There is only that little nagging feeling that I shouldn’t discriminate. I don’t have many opportunities to discriminate except in very minor personal dealings, and so my ethics meter hasn’t been in the red, only the yellow. I hate to go with the “I have black friends” thing, but I think that this is relevant here. One of my three best friends is black. His daughter is my god daughter. He has drug convictions and other problems. I think he has learned that this kind of conduct is a bad idea and I trust him completely. He thinks that I should be LESS trusting of blacks. I do feel somewhat bad that my emotions are not entirely politically correct. I think that I am better than many. If I had the chance, I would never have discriminatory hiring practices or anything like that. My point is that, every time a person does something, it has an effect on all the people who witness it. We all have first impressions of people we meet, no matter how hard we try not to. These first impressions are largely based on experiences we’ve had with people in the past who remind us in some way of the current individual under scrutiny. It’s like in a work environmet when one bad salesperson, or whatever, makes customers assume that the whole company is bad. You are constantly representing your race, your family, your sex, and every category that someone might group you into. Say you give a store several chances but about half the time the sales people are unhelpful, rude, or incompetant - how do you feel about the store? Not a perfect correlation here between races and businesses, but I think you get my point about the unavoidability of preconceptions. One more thing, yes, it does cross my mind that a white individual is reflecting poorly on the race. I have on several occasions told white people specifically that I didn’t like the way they were acting because it reflected poorly on me. If the only witnesses to the incident were white guys then I would merely tell the guy he was a jerk, but, if there were others, I would make a point of saying that I didn’t approve of the guy’s actions in order to mitigate the harm done to my race and gender. The most blatant example of this happened when I was taking a class on racism in literature, one white male made several racist comments. I kept hoping for the white female professor to step in a bit but she didn’t so I spoke up and said directly to the blacks in the class that I thought the guy was uniformed and racist but that I hoped he could learn different in this class. Several other white individuals in the class then spoke up similarly. The guy didn’t learn. I pointed out to the blacks that this individual was atypical and only one individual among many. I asked that we not be judged by his behavior. As many of the dicussions in class became debates that were largely blacks against whites (except one ethiopian fellow who always sided with the whites), I used to cringe everytime the racist jerk would raise his hand. ---
**Author:** ![VileOrb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/9e8a1a/32.png) [@VileOrb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VileOrb)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2000, 8:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-english-blacklish-as-explained-by-a-black-man/41489/80 "2000-11-20T20:00:00Z")
One more effort to make my points clearly apply to the OP: Although I do criticize those blacks who are scam artists etc., the blacks who I am being more critical of in relation to this subject are the educated blacks who do not say anything to their less educated, or less ethical, brethren. I also criticise them for emulating the styles of the less ethical in the name of unity. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-english-blacklish-as-explained-by-a-black-man/41489.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-english-blacklish-as-explained-by-a-black-man/41489.md?page=5)