The history behind African American English has a long-lasting effect on not only its speakers, but to all members of modern-day society, where the dialect continues to remain culturally relevant.
But what is African American English (AAE)? AAE, also known as Black English, is a dialect spoken by African Americans, which is very different from what someone may refer to as Standard English. AAE has been around for centuries and is tied hand-in-hand with the history of slavery and communication between slaves during that time, and continues to be prevalent as it is a dialect we hear spoken around us every day.
There are clear phonological differences between African American English and Standard English that are important to note here. AAE is very systematic in its pronunciation and verbiage. For example, there is a common omission of the present tenses of "is" and "are," where the phrase "they are walking" in Standard English would be pronounced "they walkin'" in African American English. In recognizing these differences from Standard English, AAE can be viewed as not only rich in history, but unique in terms of linguistic structure.
These ideas are further explained and related back to cultural and modern-day relevance in many scholarly articles. In a chapter written from a book by April Baker-Bell, she proves to her audience how there is a need for African American English to be incorporated more into the education system, as she shows that African American students are not at all educated on the dialect and the long-lasting effect it has on our society. The students that were involved in the study and were analyzed in this chapter shared that they wish that they were taught more more about their culture in school. Similarly, in her article, Lisa Green discusses the relevance of the dialect in the 21st century through including descriptions of the language used by African American characters in the film industry. These two articles touch on some of the many ways that African American English is shown to have a lasting relevance on the modern-day world, and will continue to grow to become even more so incorporated in all other aspects of our society.
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| Quote by Toni Morrison; author of best-selling novel, Beloved |
Finally, the relevance of African American English is highlighted through and through in the novel Beloved by Toni Morrison. This novel follows the story of the main character, Sethe, who is an escaped slave and suffered the most horrific forms of savagery, in the form of what many critics call a slave narrative. In a scholarly article by Sheldon George, he discusses the specific approach Morrison takes to incorporate this hard-to-talk-about topic of slavery into the novel. Sheldon makes an effort to break down every character from the novel in their entirety to reveal the deeper meanings to slavery and what aspects of it they represent. Beloved is among a group of many famous novels that are based on the premise of slavery.
Overall, African American English and the history that is associated with it has a long-lasting effect on society and the speakers of the dialect. Whether it is through the education system, pop culture, or literature, it is a prevalent in that it is seen everywhere and spoken by many citizens of the country we live in. If everyone recognized this prevalence and became educated on African American history, perhaps there would be less prejudices and biases in our world and all cultures would be accepted and celebrated.
I really enjoyed your post. I also really like the very closing paragraph in reference to that if more people would become educated about Black English then there would be less prejudices and biases in the world. It made me think more about what I wrote because too often people use Black English and do not know the history behind it. I actually learned in our class from one of the articles that the word "hoodie"came from Black English. The original term for that was called hooded sweatshirts. But now everyone calls them hoodies regardless of race. Something new that I learned from your post was that Beloved by Toni Morrison is based on the premise of slavery. I love Toni Morrison and I am still finding that there is just so many different pieces she has done that I still am not 100% knowledgeable on. I think that is a great example of learning about Black English as well. We use it, we hear it, we see it in every day television and media. But for some reason it is looked at in a very negative light when there is so much rich history behind it.
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