Synthesis Essay Final Draft
Working on this synthesis essay it really opened my eyes to how deep languages bias goes and how much it connects to my own life. I caught myself remembering moments from school and work where teachers corrected me based on how I talk. I didn’t expect research to hit me emotionally but it did. Just seeing students and people advocating for AAVE it made me want to speak about it even more
The way people talk can say a lot about where they come from. In this country language is often judged through the lens of race. African American Vernacular English (AAVE) is perceived as slang or “broken English”, but it is a real dialect with history, culture and meaning behind it. Still, people who speak AAVE are mostly judged unfairly in schools, workplaces and online and perceived as less educated. Language bias is just another form of racism that people do not always recognize, but it continues to harm how Black people are seen and treated in everyday life. In school some students who spoke in AAVE would get corrected by teachers or laughed at by other students
In the article “Neighborhood Effects on Use African American Vernacular English” author John Rockford and his team explain that AAVE is a big part of the cultural identity of black Americans especially for those who have grown up in Black communities. The way one speaks can definitely causeothers to stereotype them as less intelligent or less professional. Rickford’s study connects language to one’s environment and culture, but it also just shows how language becomes a resort for discrimination. This is clear in classrooms where teachers may correct students who speak AAVE or in job interviews where applicants are told to “sound more professional.”
This same bias shows up online too. In “Voicing the Other: Mock AAVE on Social Media!” Smokoski looks at how people on social media use fake AAVE to sound funny or cool. She gives examples of users typing things like “finna” or “ion” and exaggerating the spelling to mock the way Black people talk. For instance, a meme on twitter once showed a white user writing “I’m finna go” as a joke with replies calling it “ghetto English”. Even on TikTok there are videos shown where nonblack creators use AAVE terms for clout, but when a Black creator talks the same way, they are looked at as being “uneducated” or even “ghetto” or “ratchet.”
For me, this topic hits very close to home. As a young black woman in today’s society, I have had several moments where I have had to talk differently fearing I will be judgedbecause of the way I talk. Whether it is at work ringing up a customer, in class, or even on the phone. I always been pressure to “switch up” the way I speak. At this point, I see how wrong it is. Nobody should have to change who they are just to make someone else comfortable. AAVE should never be consideredbroken English. It is a language with rules and history that connect us back to our ancestors. It carries the same value as any other dialect, and people should treat it that way. It is all about identity. The way we Blacks speak is part of our culture and how we express ourselves. Instead of shaming people for sounding different in schools and workplaces, we need to start understanding the origin and meaning behind those differences.
I have been working in retail since I was 16 years old and I have had túo code switch throughout my day just being in the environment of my past jobs being in Times Square and Hell’s Kitchen that is a white and tourist dominant area. Working in big corporations like Footlocker and Target they expect theircustomer experience to be up to par to their store expectations.
Recently I asked my team leader on how she would feel if I spoke to customers in AAVE saying things like “How ya doing,”“What up,” and etc and she said as long as your being respectful then there is no issue. Even though my team leader said it was okay I still fear that some people will take it the wrong way.Since I do work in a white and tourist dominated area they might take it the wrong way.
The movie “Sorry to Both You” just shows how the main character LaKeith Stanfield is literally told by his coworker to use his white voice at his telemarketing job. The movie itself is about “a satirical critique of how racism and capitalism are interconnected, often forcing marginalized people to adopt a “white voice” or code switch to succeed in a system built on explosion” this particular clip just shows how the movie uses humor to expose the pressure black people feel to switch their natural way of talking to seem more professional. Watching this clip just made me think how real that is and how I must do that in my own personal life. I feel as though the movie is exaggerated on purpose, but the message is real situated will accept our words properly if they sound like they are coming from a white person.
I came across a TikTok where this guy works as a bank teller. He states this day was regular day a guy came in wanting deposit cash into his account nothing unusual the customer asks him a question, and the bank teller proceeds to say yes and then customer basically states that’s not proper not to mention the customer is white and the teller is white. If this does not scream language discrimination I do not want does. This is a primary example of how language bias happens in the workplace.
This particular Guardian article Janet Hills and Tre’veilAndersons book about black language in the article it essentially talks about how AAVE has shaped the American culture for decades, but people still treat it like it is not a real dialect. Just reading this article something that stood out to me was when they they said people love using AAVE online, but they do notrespect the communities it comes from. That connects to exactly what I’m seeing on TikTok everybody wants the slang but not the struggle behind it. It also explains how language is tied to identity and how mocking AAVE is just basically mocking people. This source helped me see that AAVE is not just something to correct or hide it is something to understand and respect.
Another video I used was “Talking Black in America” watching this opened my eyes to his deep AAVE is misunderstood. Different people break down how black English our natural way of speaking, but it gets dismissed as “wrong” English when really it is a structured dialect with its own rules and patterns. In the video they show examples of everyday speech that gets judged unfairly. This source supports my argument that the issue is not about slang it is about respect identity and how society decides whose voice counts as real English.
After reviewing all my sources, the articles, the TikTok’s, the YouTube videos, the movie clips and even my own experiences. It is obvious that AAVE is more than just a way of talking it is a whole culture, and part of who we are. Instead of it being respected it gets judged, mocked, ignored, even stolen. My research shows that language biases shows up everywhere in schools, workplaces, and online. The sad part about it is that a lot of us learned how to code switch just to survive in these spaces none of this means that AAVE is wrong it just means that society hears us wrong. I hope that people start educating themselves and start seeing AAVE as a real dialect. Our language deserves to be respected and so do we.
Citations
Rickford, John R., et al. “Neighborhood Effects on Use of African-American Vernacular English.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, vol. 112, no. 38, 2015, pp. 11817–22. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1500176112.
Smokoski, Hanna L. Voicing the Other: Mock AAVE on Social Media. CUNY Academic Works, 2021. https://academicworks.cuny.edu/gc_etds/708/
Kraus, Michael W., Brittany Torrez, and Jun Won Park. “Research: How Speech Patterns Lead to Hiring Bias.” Harvard Business Review, 13 Mar. 2020, https://hbr.org/2020/03/research-how-speech-patterns-lead-to-hiring-bias
Clayton, Abené. “‘Our language is real’: Jarrett Hill and Tre’vell Anderson’s New Book Is an Education in Black Communication.” The Guardian, 3 Oct. 2023, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/oct/03/black-language-new-book-jarrett-hill-trevell-anderson
Ayanna, Adia. “TikTok Language: What’s Up with the Misuse of AAVE?” The Comeback of Culture, 27 May 2021, https://medium.com/the-comeback-of-culture/tiktok-language-whats-up-with-the-misuse-of-aave-e1f19c6c75b3
Chemerinsky, Erwin. “A Major Step Backwards for Civil Rights: Comcast v. National Association of African American-Owned Media.” ACS & The Law, 2020, https://www.acslaw.org/a-major-step-backwards-for-civil-rights-comcast-v-national-association-of-african-american-owned-media/
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