4 ms·

Regardless of the school board debating the potential validity of AAVE, I think it's misguided to experiment with asserting such "correctness" to teach kids tha

by jeromec 17y ago

Regardless of the school board debating the potential validity of AAVE, I think it's misguided to experiment with asserting such "correctness" to teach kids that will grow up in a world that doesn't regard it as such. Save such philosophy for later academics, where the author/speaker can make a conscious choice of use - similar to the stylistic, but "incorrect", use of 'But' or 'And' to begin a sentence.

jfarmer 17y ago
Why should dictionaries and grammar books be any more authoritative than the way people actually speak? AAVE isn't correct or incorrect any more than gravity is correct or incorrect. They both exist; it's our job to study them. Putting AAVE into a box labeled "incorrect English" is just a way to avoid the hard work of understanding our world. And yes, the "academic" understanding of AAVE includes the sociolinguistic aspects denoting class, race, education, etc.
- jeromec 17y ago
  > Why should dictionaries and grammar books be any more authoritative than the way people actually speak? Simple, because of perception. Whether you like it or not perception matters. If I perceive your car as worth your selling price, a deal happens - doesn't mean my perception over yours is any more "correct". Same happens with stock prices, or hiring decisions. In other words, the things that matter in the day-to-day life in which we currently function include dictionaries and grammar books.
  - loup-vaillant 17y ago
    Are you actually saying that our perception of the world is actually bending the world? I agree that perception matters. For instance, a bad perception could mean you buy a worthless car, or make a bad hiring decision. It doesn't mean, however, that the car was worth your money, or that the bad employee was worth hiring. Same thing about AAVE. If it has been proved that this is a dialect of English, it is a dialect of English. No matter how delusional the majority of the population can be.
    - loup-vaillant 17y ago
      META: Why the dowmod? This is a genuine question. Apparently, my post was unacceptable, but I am unable to see how. Did I make a factual mistake? Was my tone Inappropriate? Was I off Topic? How did I cross the line?
  - jfarmer 17y ago
    Of course perception matters. But it's the difference between recognizing AAVE as its own thing, sociolinguistic warts and all, and labeling it as "broken English." Linguistics isn't just about grammar (in fact, in linguistics "grammatical" is basically synonymous with "understood by a native speaker"), it's also about the signals we send when we speak a certain way (semantics and sociolinguistics). Labeling AAVE as "broken English" is just a way of dismissing it and giving ourselves an excuse for not understanding it. For example, I know plenty of successful people who have poor grammar. But nobody goes around saying they speak "broken English," and if I pointed that out everyone would think I'm an asshole. Why don't people react the same way when we say someone speaking AAVE has "broken English?" Why is it ok to point out how "poorly" they speak? Anyhow, all I mean to say is that the proper study of AAVE includes the idea that speaking it signals certain things about the speaker, not just its syntax, morphology, etc. I recommend reading the research of William Labov, who has ton of work in studying the various dialects of American English.
loup-vaillant 17y ago
This is not philosophy at all. This is purely technical. The differences between AAVE and standard English (or should I say American?) are consistent. They are spoken by a lot of people. They follow precise rules (a grammar, actually). They're not erratic. So you can't call them "errors". The only other choice is to conclude that AAVE is a language —or a dialect. Telling that to kids can only have good effects. First, it is telling them that they're not retarded —and neither are their parents. Second, it makes a clear separation between AAVE an standard English. They are two separate dialects, so, students should learn both. Third, if speaking standard English is "correcting errors", it may be percieved as a loss of Identity, "acting white" or whatever. If it is "speaking another language", this can't really be seen as such. For instance, I don't lose my French identity by writing English. If the entire world sees AAVE as incorrectly spoken English without investigating furter, the entire world is simply mistaken. Kids should learn to correct the entire world's mistakes, not to do them.
- jeromec 17y ago
  > Telling that to kids can only have good effects. I disagree. I think the mistake you are making is the focus around what is or is not "error". It's not about that. My friend from Argentina constantly strives to improve his American English, rather than his AAVE, regardless of your insistence of the validity of AAVE. He now works in an office on the 17th floor where he hires people, and I knew him when he knew no English. Like it or not it does makes a difference.
  - kjhgftgyui 17y ago
    Yes - if he had chosen to improve his British English he would be on the 20th floor. Or doomed to always play the villain in Holywood movies
    - jeromec 17y ago
      > Yes - if he had chosen to improve his British English he would be on the 20th floor Quite possibly, especially if he had the accent to match, considering the success of James Bond movies in America.

by jeromec 17y ago

jfarmer 17y ago

Why should dictionaries and grammar books be any more authoritative than the way people actually speak? AAVE isn't correct or incorrect any more than gravity is correct or incorrect. They both exist; it's our job to study them. Putting AAVE into a box labeled "incorrect English" is just a way to avoid the hard work of understanding our world. And yes, the "academic" understanding of AAVE includes the sociolinguistic aspects denoting class, race, education, etc.

jeromec 17y ago
> Why should dictionaries and grammar books be any more authoritative than the way people actually speak? Simple, because of perception. Whether you like it or not perception matters. If I perceive your car as worth your selling price, a deal happens - doesn't mean my perception over yours is any more "correct". Same happens with stock prices, or hiring decisions. In other words, the things that matter in the day-to-day life in which we currently function include dictionaries and grammar books.
- loup-vaillant 17y ago
  Are you actually saying that our perception of the world is actually bending the world? I agree that perception matters. For instance, a bad perception could mean you buy a worthless car, or make a bad hiring decision. It doesn't mean, however, that the car was worth your money, or that the bad employee was worth hiring. Same thing about AAVE. If it has been proved that this is a dialect of English, it is a dialect of English. No matter how delusional the majority of the population can be.
  - loup-vaillant 17y ago
    META: Why the dowmod? This is a genuine question. Apparently, my post was unacceptable, but I am unable to see how. Did I make a factual mistake? Was my tone Inappropriate? Was I off Topic? How did I cross the line?
- jfarmer 17y ago
  Of course perception matters. But it's the difference between recognizing AAVE as its own thing, sociolinguistic warts and all, and labeling it as "broken English." Linguistics isn't just about grammar (in fact, in linguistics "grammatical" is basically synonymous with "understood by a native speaker"), it's also about the signals we send when we speak a certain way (semantics and sociolinguistics). Labeling AAVE as "broken English" is just a way of dismissing it and giving ourselves an excuse for not understanding it. For example, I know plenty of successful people who have poor grammar. But nobody goes around saying they speak "broken English," and if I pointed that out everyone would think I'm an asshole. Why don't people react the same way when we say someone speaking AAVE has "broken English?" Why is it ok to point out how "poorly" they speak? Anyhow, all I mean to say is that the proper study of AAVE includes the idea that speaking it signals certain things about the speaker, not just its syntax, morphology, etc. I recommend reading the research of William Labov, who has ton of work in studying the various dialects of American English.

loup-vaillant 17y ago

This is not philosophy at all. This is purely technical. The differences between AAVE and standard English (or should I say American?) are consistent. They are spoken by a lot of people. They follow precise rules (a grammar, actually). They're not erratic. So you can't call them "errors". The only other choice is to conclude that AAVE is a language —or a dialect. Telling that to kids can only have good effects. First, it is telling them that they're not retarded —and neither are their parents. Second, it makes a clear separation between AAVE an standard English. They are two separate dialects, so, students should learn both. Third, if speaking standard English is "correcting errors", it may be percieved as a loss of Identity, "acting white" or whatever. If it is "speaking another language", this can't really be seen as such. For instance, I don't lose my French identity by writing English. If the entire world sees AAVE as incorrectly spoken English without investigating furter, the entire world is simply mistaken. Kids should learn to correct the entire world's mistakes, not to do them.

jeromec 17y ago
> Telling that to kids can only have good effects. I disagree. I think the mistake you are making is the focus around what is or is not "error". It's not about that. My friend from Argentina constantly strives to improve his American English, rather than his AAVE, regardless of your insistence of the validity of AAVE. He now works in an office on the 17th floor where he hires people, and I knew him when he knew no English. Like it or not it does makes a difference.
- kjhgftgyui 17y ago
  Yes - if he had chosen to improve his British English he would be on the 20th floor. Or doomed to always play the villain in Holywood movies
  - jeromec 17y ago
    > Yes - if he had chosen to improve his British English he would be on the 20th floor Quite possibly, especially if he had the accent to match, considering the success of James Bond movies in America.