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Black people’s accent | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
 jeff_lindqvist Diglot Moderator SwedenRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6715 days ago 4250 posts - 5710 votes  Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: German, Spanish, Russian, Dutch, Mandarin, Esperanto, Irish, French Personal Language Map | Message 17 of 63 24 December 2013 at 5:19pm | IP Logged | ||
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For a second I thought you referred to their voice timbre, and not the accent per se.
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| Vārds Bilingual Diglot Newbie Latvia Joined 4716 days ago 24 posts - 41 votes Speaks: Russian*, Latvian* Studies: German | Message 18 of 63 24 December 2013 at 5:21pm | IP Logged | ||
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This thread reminded me of this Key & Peele video :)
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| culebrilla Senior Member United States Joined 3803 days ago 246 posts - 436 votes Speaks: Spanish | Message 19 of 63 24 December 2013 at 6:01pm | IP Logged | ||
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Or this one.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dd7FixvoKBw 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
 emk Diglot Moderator United States Joined 5338 days ago 2615 posts - 8806 votes Speaks: English*, FrenchB2 Studies: Spanish, Ancient Egyptian Personal Language Map | Message 20 of 63 24 December 2013 at 6:21pm | IP Logged | ||
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This is a totally valid linguistic question. The various
African American accents and the distinctive grammatical features of AAVE have persisted and even standardized over the last 50 years, even though many speakers of AAVE code switch in and out of standard English on a regular basis. Note that this doesn't just affect AAVE speakers. AAVE is closely related to southern versions of American Vernacular English. And many of its features, such as "ain't" and double negation, are widespread in northern AVE, too. Plus, half the country code switches in and out of standard English, me included. But still AAVE persists. And unfortunately, I can't explain why without briefly touching on political issues, which is a no-no here. But I'll do my best to keep it non-politcal. And please keep in mind that everything I say is an outsider's opinion, and therefore not very reliable. Within living memory, an African American who moved into the "wrong" neighborhood would have found a complex system of legal discrimination in many cities, even in the north. And if they somehow got a bank loan, they might have been greeted by mob of 200 angry people threatening to kill them and their children. So to this day, even in the north, the African American community tends to disproprotionately live in majority black neighborhoods with a wider range of social classes than the average American neighborhood. But the angry mobs and death threats had another effect: they made it necessary to know whom you could count on when push came to shove. And in a situation like that, dialect can easily become a marker of group identity. Or at least it has elsewhere. Anyway, like I said, I'm an outsider, so take my opinions with a grain of salt. But I do have some pretty cool papers somewhere talking about geographic and temporal variation in AAVE grammar that I ought to share. And if you want to know more about angry mobs, redlining, blockbusting, etc., please feel free to PM me.
I don't want to pick on you specifically here, because you're right--many white Americans would choose pretty much those phrases for their attempts to imitate AAVE. But it's still worth noticing that two of the five phrases involve a reference to drinking or drugs. I really would appreciate it if this tread could avoid going any further in that direction, especially on Christmas Eve when the moderators are busy. Edited by emk on 24 December 2013 at 6:32pm 13 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| tastyonions Triglot Senior Member United States goo.gl/UIdChYRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4471 days ago 1044 posts - 1823 votes Speaks: English*, French, Spanish Studies: Italian | Message 21 of 63 24 December 2013 at 6:32pm | IP Logged | ||
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As far as pronunciation differences, as opposed to grammatical features, I have noticed that some black Americans tend to drop final consonants a lot (even more than in other types of American English), which might make it harder for non-natives to understand (link to Wiki article section).
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| kanewai Triglot Senior Member United States justpaste.it/kanewai Joined 4695 days ago 1386 posts - 3054 votes Speaks: English*, French, Marshallese Studies: Italian, Spanish | Message 22 of 63 24 December 2013 at 6:51pm | IP Logged | ||
The Great Migration - the mass movement of African Americans from the deep south to the north - happened in the 1930's and 1940's. It hasn't been that long, and social segregation is still bad, even in the big liberal cities. We had a similar thing where I grew up in Michigan, but with poor whites from Appalachia. They moved up to work in the bombing factories in WWII, but had their own culture and churches (Baptist and Pentecostal]. They still have the "Ypsitucky" accent (Ypsilanti + Kentucky), even though the kids from every other immigrant community developed a Midwestern accent. Edited by kanewai on 24 December 2013 at 6:52pm 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| aokoye Diglot Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5347 days ago 235 posts - 453 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Dutch, Norwegian, Japanese | Message 23 of 63 24 December 2013 at 10:47pm | IP Logged | ||
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I think it's very important to note that AAVE is not spoken by every black person in
the US. I think it has to do more with economic class (which then often correlates with education as a byproduct) and the amount of cultural capital one has than anything else. Pierre Bourdieu wrote a lot of a lot of interesting things about cultural capital and how it relates to linguistics and linguistic capital and the theory of all of this. That said, I don't know any black person, myself and my family included, who uses AAVE. That probably has more to do with where people grew up (there likely aren't a whole lot of people using AAVE in Portland, even the lower SES area), my interests, and where I've gone to school. Lastly, I think this picture taken at my Uni's library is apt http://www.flickr.com/photos/ad amokoye/8617906662/ Edited by aokoye on 24 December 2013 at 11:25pm 5 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| kujichagulia Senior Member Japan Joined 4653 days ago 1031 posts - 1571 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Portuguese | Message 24 of 63 25 December 2013 at 1:20am | IP Logged | ||
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I think emk was quite accurate on his assessment of the situation. And as a Black American, I do take exception when people use the subject of drugs and alcohol when referring to the American Black vernacular. I don't do drugs, and I drink less than anyone else I know - which are mainly Whites and Asians.
The fact that Blacks in the U.S. have a different accent and in some ways a different vernacular is not that surprising. The U.S. has come a long way; people of different races now have the same rights according to law, and people of different races work together and interact in everyday life. However, Whites still have mostly White friends, and Blacks still mostly have Black friends. Social communities are still somewhat segregated, and although Blacks have moved from the South to all parts of the U.S. over the last 200 years, Black vernacular still has its roots in the American South, because Blacks tend to spend their social lives with other Blacks (and it's the same for other races, too). I was talking with my Japanese wife the other day about how the last remaining, truly segregated part of American society is the Christian church. Churches for the most part are all-White or all-Black or all-Hispanic or all-Korean, etc. Let me tell you... you haven't heard AAVE until you've been to a Black church. But again... not too surprising. You mean to tell me that in Brazil, Blacks and other races speak the exact same Portuguese in their everyday lives, with their families and close friends, that Whites do? In such a big country, I would be surprised if there is not a difference. On a personal note, when I was a 9-year-old boy in Alabama, I made a concerted effort to get rid of all traces of African-American Vernacular English in my own speech. I wasn't embarrassed of AAVE, but I thought it would be easier to make myself understood by any American if my normal speech was standard. I still have tiny traces of AAVE in my natural speech, but I was successful, and it has helped me out in daily life. (It especially helps me out here in Japan, where I am an English teacher.) But - especially as a boy - some Blacks (even ones in my family!) were shocked at my accent, saying that I "sound White." I never thought races had a "sound". I guess some Blacks thought I was turning my back on the community by speaking standard American English. But then, other Blacks were proud of me. I remember my mother introducing me to some of her friends, and when I spoke, they said, "Wow, you speak such proper English! You must be smart!" What in the world? But yeah, there's that image in the Black community that if your English is standard, you must be intelligent. Relatedly, I had a few cases where I talked on the phone with someone, and then I would meet them in person and they would say, "Wow, I didn't think that you were Black! You didn't sound Black on the phone!" I didn't know if that was a compliment or what. 20 persons have voted this message useful |
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