From: kutsuwamushi	Date: July 2nd, 2004 11:45 am (UTC)		(Link)

As someone who studies linguistics, that makes me like Bill Cosby even less. He's buying into the myth that some dialects are inferior to others.

(By the way, AAVE, or African-American Vernacular English, is a dialect, and it follows grammatical rules just like the English you and I speak does. The rules just differ on some points.)

	From: tviokh	Date: July 2nd, 2004 11:55 am (UTC)		(Link)

Yeah, and there's a dialect here.

Know what?

In professional settings, I don't use it. I use proper grammar and proper wording.
There's no excuse not to other than ignorance or laziness.

	From: tviokh	Date: July 2nd, 2004 11:57 am (UTC)		(Link)

If you'd like to learn about the local dialect here, check the book "How to Talk Minnesotan"

Yes, I'm aware I'm not in Minnesota and yes, I'm aware that it's meant to be a comedy book.

However, it's really quite true; we do speak in that fashion.
In fact, I sound a lot like that away from work.

At work, or really in any place where I need to make a decent impression, I put forth the effort to speak properly.

And "AAVE" as you call it, is not proper English.

	From: siren_of_psych	Date: July 2nd, 2004 12:25 pm (UTC)		(Link)

I certainly don't want a doctor treating me who's calling me a "biatch," telling me, he needs to go get a consult with another "nigga," but to sit tight because this "ho" right here (nurse) would hook me up with some "good shit."

I've had RNs treat me who use double-negatives, and do you know what I think? "Where did you go to school that you don't know how to speak properly in a work setting? If you want me to trust you, don't toss "ain't's" and "don't got no's" around!"

My husband is the most intelligent person I've ever known, but "ain't" is an acceptable colloquialism in the area of Iowa where he did much of his growing up. He'll use it around the house sometimes to really drive home a point such as: "There ain't no way I'm spending my vacation time with your parents!" (And, yes, I still grit my teeth every time he says it because I grew up in a home where it simply wasn't used....ever.) But he knows damn well to never use it outside the home or conversation with his own family. Why? Because "ain't" carries with it a negative connotation with many people.

	From: kutsuwamushi	Date: July 2nd, 2004 12:48 pm (UTC)		(Link)

Well, if your point was that you don't know anything about AAVE or linguistics, then you've certainly proven it.

Why does the word "ain't" carry a negative connotation? Think about that for a while. It carries a negative connation because, traditionally, groups that use it were looked down upon (and still are). People make jokes about how rednecks speak, still; not too long ago, they were jokes about how niggers spoke.

Now, I find it rather offensive to look down on someone because of where they were raised or how much money their family had, so I have no reason to look down on the way that they speak. It's different, not better or worse.

It's an interesting double-standard, from a sociolinguist's point of view. If people are prejudiced against women who wear veils, the typical response is to combat the prejudice, not to ask the women to remove them. However, when it comes to dialect, the prejudices are so widespread that the typical response is exactly the opposite.

	From: tephra	Date: July 2nd, 2004 04:13 pm (UTC)		(Link)
	Why stop there? Invent street-mathematics next!

AAVE? Oh, so now lazy sloppy uneducated non-grammar has an acronym too. And here I thought it was just confined to fake disorders like ADD. How nice that education is no longer necessary as long as you can claim that you're a Persecuted Minority.

Sorry, but a "dialect" is no more a legitimate language than a tabby cat is a different species from an orange one. Next please!

From: erythros	Date: July 2nd, 2004 04:26 pm (UTC)		(Link)
Re: Why stop there? Invent street-mathematics next!

Actually, that's an initialism.

An acronym is formed by taking the initials of the cardinal letters in each word, and then pronouncing that word formed. NASA and WAMU are acronyms. IRA, CIA, ADD, and AAVE are initialisms.

I think that ladybirdsleeps's point is that being Persecuted because of using a particular dialect is wrong; you two are talking at cross-purposes, as your point seems to be that persons speaking dialectally are worthy of persecution, inherently. Tell me, how many hours a week do you spend at tutoring sessions for those Challenged By Speaking The Queen's English?

t¬

	From: kutsuwamushi	Date: July 2nd, 2004 04:41 pm (UTC)		(Link)
	Re: Why stop there? Invent street-mathematics next!

You don't seem to be interested in a serious discussion, but I'm willing to give you the benefit of the doubt.

Would you like me to recommend some basic introductory texts to linguistics so you can argue from a position of knowledge, rather than ignorance, or are you just here to be offensive?

	From: siren_of_psych	Date: July 2nd, 2004 11:48 am (UTC)		(Link)

Yeah. Brent showed that to me last night as I was falling asleep. I sat right up. He's fantastic. We saw him down in Eau Claire a few years ago (He used a girl's cell phone to call her parents!) Everyone knows he's intelligent, but, damn, Bill, GO!

	From: anne_jumps	Date: July 2nd, 2004 01:51 pm (UTC)		(Link)

Yeah, I agree with you.

From: narcissusblack	Date: July 2nd, 2004 02:06 pm (UTC)		(Link)

Thank you!

I hate people who won't use standard English in a professional setting. Hell, even overhearing constant abuse of the English language in passing on the street sets my teeth on edge but that's really just a personal thing. However, i was always taught that in a professional setting such as a job interview it is important to speak clearly and to avoid colloquials.

I mean, what kind of impression are you giving a prospective employer if said person cannot understand a word you are saying?

It doesn't matter if you are black, white or rainbow coloured - you should be willing to leave the slang to casual situations. Nothing pisses me off worse than phoning up the opticians for instance and speaking concisely only to realise the person on the other end is a sub-literate imbecile i can barely understand.

Harsh? Elitist? Probably, but that is how i feel.

	From: thesurvivalist	Date: July 2nd, 2004 03:03 pm (UTC)		(Link)

Of course you love Bill Cosby! We all love Bill Cosby. Bill Cosby represents all that is good in life.

And I agree with him completely. Blacks blame us for their problems all the time and I'm sick of it. I can remember one girl at my school watching students being handed awards for doing a certain worksheet over the summer and going,"They're racist cuz they ain't handin' any out to black kids! They're racist!" Well, silly girl, if YOU wanted an award, why didn't you DO the worksheet and send it in?

Not only that, but I've only known a few blacks that didn't have a MAJOR attitude problem. I watch black mothers with their kids, and I can't believe the kind of hostility they have in their families either.

And, of course, whites have their problems too, but with blacks their problems seem to be the standard, which is the problem.

	From: tviokh	Date: July 2nd, 2004 03:09 pm (UTC)		(Link)

You want hostility?
You need to see my aunt's husband's family.

I swear these people wrote the book on Italian stereotypes.
It's normalcy to have them all fighting so much that they're THROWING THINGS at each other, all storm off, slamming doors, cursing, throwing more things...then quiet...and five minutes later it's as if nothing ever happened.

It's very disconcerting the first time one sees it.

	From: snapefantasy	Date: July 2nd, 2004 04:12 pm (UTC)		(Link)

Being the daughter of an English teacher, I have to agree with Tviokh here. Even here in redneckville USA (southern Indiana) we have our local slang/dialect. And it is NOT accepted in the "professional arena". It DOES sound highly uneducated. I too cringe when I hear things like Ain't (which btw is Are IS and not, not am) and WARSH *shudder*. I made an ex of mine write out the word WASH for me and show me where the R was that we didn't cover in my schooling. Then again the schools around here (at least the one I attended) don't help much. I remember getting rather pissed and walking out of my Literature class because I was bored at having to go over and over passages of Romeo and Juliette, because, others in my class didn't understand it.
English is the EASIEST language on the planet to learn. Ask anybody who isn't from an English speaking country, who speaks several languages. I've met people from Denmark, Germany, France, and Spain, they all spoke at least 3 languages, and said that English was the easiest for them to learn. Kind of sad that people who LIVE HERE, and are surrounded by it can't won't speak it!

	From: signe	Date: July 2nd, 2004 04:39 pm (UTC)		(Link)

Odd... because ever ESL person I've spoken to disagrees. English is a completely backwards language with very little repeatable structure, especially in its pronunciation.

To quote Gallagher;

"T O M B - 'tüm
B O M B - Boom? No.... 'bäm.
B O M B BAHM, C O M B CAHM? Noo.. 'cöm" ...

	From: percy_weatherby	Date: July 2nd, 2004 04:44 pm (UTC)		(Link)

English is the EASIEST language on the planet to learn.

Get outta town! English, the EASIEST language on the planet to learn?

I don't know what you're smoking, but I'd like a nickelbag.

From: lizey	Date: July 2nd, 2004 08:42 pm (UTC)		(Link)

Sorry, it's really not, I've never heard of anyone who said it was easy. I've at least started studying Japanese, Italian, French and Latin, so that's all of those teachers plus some other people.
It's still true that if you've spent most of your life in an English speaking country you should be able to speak it 'correctly'.

	From: siren_of_psych	Date: July 3rd, 2004 11:33 am (UTC)		(Link)

Um.....English is an easy language to learn? If you're learning how to read and speak it....no. Think about this a little bit. It's a totally fucked up language. I don't envy people who must learn it as a second, third, etc, language at all.

	From: 21yo_curmudgeon	Date: July 2nd, 2004 06:31 pm (UTC)		(Link)
	rant ahead

My mother, the teacher of 40+ years, and I thoroughly agree. Not just about proper English, but about the black lower class (most of it) not taking responsibility for their failures. My mom teaches children who think learning even basic skills makes them white. White, of course, being bad, as in the insult "white bitch." No, they can't call her a bitch, it has to be WHITE bitch. The only thing that's changed since the 70s is that "honky" has dropped out of use and, as Bill said, there is no longer any "black is beautiful" sense of pride.
These kids associate being intelligent with being white. They associate having a real job, financial sense and children within wedlock with being white. And they hate the idea of being white so much that they'll refuse to leave the projects, refuse to get an education and refuse to have any worthwhile goals despite the opportunities being handed to them.

Before I ignite any flames: Are these opportunities failproof, or anywhere near it? Hell no. Does racism still exist? Oh fuck yes. Do all black people refuse to make the effort to achieve? Absolutely not, and the examples I can cite only start with my boss, my mom's boss, the mayor, and several of my coworkers and friends.

But there *are*, like I said, kids who don't expect to live to 30, kids who value jewelry over a nest egg and a car over a house, kids who think that the most successful job they can get is playing ball or dealing drugs. And these are the kids who fail grade after grade and blame "white people" for it. They learned to think that way from their parents, and from the cronies in the Orleans Parish School Board who insult competent white teachers and encourage racism more than the KKK ever could. So yes, the Coz is right.

(He'd better be, he taught my dad everything he knows about raising kids) ^_^

	From: oronoda	Date: July 2nd, 2004 07:49 pm (UTC)		(Link)

I just have to throw this out. Did it occur to the people who disagree that maybe the fact there should be a "standard" English spoken in the professional setting would be so people could perhaps understand each other? I used to wait tables and once a family of rednecks came into the resturant. I could not understand a word they were saying because of their dialect. I had to ask what they meant when they said certain phrases before they varified it more clearly in standard English.

In the professional setting, speaking a standard prevents misunderstandings. Why do you think that Latin at one time became the language of religion? It is so that a bishop from England could talk to an Italian Pope. I'm sure you would not want to work with someone who would only speak French or Spanish. You wouldn't be able to understand them and likewise with you.

Maybe there is prejudice with how people speak. Even so, standard English in a professional setting is more practical.

From: lizey	Date: July 2nd, 2004 08:36 pm (UTC)		(Link)

*agrees with above*
The point of speaking 'properly' when you're not in a very casual setting is so that everyone will understand and has the added plus of keeping you out of the redneck, etc, box. And no, that doesn't mean there's an oppressive machine controlling the way we speak. It means that the mainstream way of speaking just so happens not to be, for example, AAVE.

Also, if you can't speak 'proper' English, that does bespeak a lack of education. If you go through your basic education, you learn plenty about grammar and 'correct' language. So if you can't speak correctly, as I defined above, then you are largely uneducated. Or stupid, to be frank. That would be my explanation of the stereotype.

And the 'prejudice' isn't confined to AAVE. I picked up an enormous vocabulary by the age of eleven or so for a variety of reasons, and I still have to watch my language so that everyone can understand and don't look at me like I'm some intellectual snob. Why would they think I'm an intellectual snob? Because I'm using complicated words people don't understand, which implies that I want to make them look ignorant.

Hopefully most of that made sense and isn't too long after the original post.

	From: kookaburra1701	Date: July 3rd, 2004 01:54 am (UTC)		(Link)

Ironically, the only people I've ever heard use Ebonics, or "AAVE" as it is apparently being called now, were white-white-bleachedwhite kids. And they were dumb as all fuck.

That being said, has anyone ever come across someone who uses "AAVE" and was educated, and/or actually making an effort at being educated? Not being faceitious here, I'm really curious.

	From: totorobus	Date: July 3rd, 2004 10:40 am (UTC)		(Link)

*fangirls you for fangirling Bill Cosby*

*fangirls Bill Cosby too* <3

Honestly, I agree with every word he's saying. I'm white, for background info, and particularly un-racist thankyouverymuch.

I'm glad he has the guts to speak out about how he really feels...and glad he has the head on his shoulders to allow him to speak unadultered common sense.

Honestly, I'm so tired of seeing African Americans put down white people and call them "crackers" and have absolutely no problem with it, but practically explode if they so much as hear somebody throw out the "N Bomb": "nigger." A man is responsible for making a man of himself...and the 'gangstas' among them are only disgracing themselves. But the parents are responsible too, and they have no logical reason to blame white people if they were unable to provide x, y, and z for their child.

The saddest thing is that a lot of those who do manage to live upright and to make something of themselves are also disgraced, via the joy that is imbecilic stereotypes, by their less ambitious brethren. That makes me very sad.

*keeps on fangirling Bill Cosby*

<3!

	From: grimacounsellor	Date: July 3rd, 2004 01:54 pm (UTC)		(Link)

well being a firm believer that most americans, African american nor not have no clue how to speak english, I'd have to agree with Mr.Cosby. I dont want to be spoken to in any kind of slang in, say like a doctors office. Be it African american, or Cajun or what ever you wish to call it. A rose by any other name is still bad slang.

Lets use L33t for example. I am sorry but people use that to try and make themselfs feel special and smart when all it does it make them look ignorant and childish.

And I agree. theres a difference between talking to friends or family and talking to the public.

	From: visp	Date: July 3rd, 2004 07:16 pm (UTC)		(Link)

I speak a bastardized combination of English, Russian, Spanish, Japanese, and my own slang around my family, and flatter myself into thinking that it's intelligent. Still, if I spoke it to anyone else outside my direct family, I'd be taken for a lunatic (or a pentacostal - possibly a Southern Baptist) and if I was foolish enough to assume otherwise, I would and idiot.

I also can swear like a sailor, but I do not fool myself into thinking that this is proper speaking, nor do I assume that someone who would take me for a guttersnipe if they heard it was being prejudiced against pottymouths.