@jefinley1 I definitely see where you are coming from. I suppose my POV is different as a family of immigrants. We didn't want to lose our heritage (we still speak our native language as a family, and my parents have accents) but we took great lengths to learn proper grammar. We didn't have much money either, so I just don't see an excuse for people at least not learning (if they want to) when they have more control over their situation. My mother regularly makes grammar mistakes and then works very hard to learn the proper words. Our home country has 6 official languages and it is a nightmare. It makes me sad to think that down the road, because one universal form of English isn't taught here, that people won't be able to understand one another.
Don't stone me for saying this, but I feel like people who speak Ebonics (for example, but enter any strong/hard to understand dialect here) separate themselves. As children, I get it, they can't always help it, but after that? I suppose I just think you can celebrate your heritage and still learn and challenge yourself to speak in a way that people can at least understand you. Especially if English is your native or only language.
@jefinley1 I definitely see where you are coming from. I suppose my POV is different as a family of immigrants. We didn't want to lose our heritage (we still speak our native language as a family, and my parents have accents) but we took great lengths to learn proper grammar. We didn't have much money either, so I just don't see an excuse for people at least not learning (if they want to) when they have more control over their situation. My mother regularly makes grammar mistakes and then works very hard to learn the proper words. Our home country has 6 official languages and it is a nightmare. It makes me sad to think that down the road, because one universal form of English isn't taught here, that people won't be able to understand one another.
Don't stone me for saying this, but I feel like people who speak Ebonics (for example, but enter any strong/hard to understand dialect here) separate themselves. As children, I get it, they can't always help it, but after that? I suppose I just think you can celebrate your heritage and still learn and challenge yourself to speak in a way that people can at least understand you. Especially if English is your native or only language.
This is a really interesting perspective and I'm really sorry if I came off as jumping down your throat. I get where you're coming from. Race relations in the US are so complex, and so deeply rooted in the American psyche, but in different ways depending on your background, that it can take a lot of time to thoroughly understand every facet. Including for me, to understand the outlook of more recently immigrated families. Ironically that has been the next thing that I've been trying to wrap my brain around more, so I should have tread more carefully.
I think, per the reading and studying that I've done, that the African American (speaking mainly of those whose families have been in this country since being brought here in the 17th-19th centuries) experience here continues to be a separate, complex, and many who understand better than I would argue a more difficult one, than any other minority group. There is definitely a perception that AAVE speakers (along with which often comes many other cultural attributes) separate themselves. And I'm not even sure that I can argue that this isn't true. I started trying to understand why they would do that, and why they would so defiantly cling to a culture that is so obviously detested, and I found the more I learned the more it actually gave me enormous respect for that choice. It's kind of like a giant F you to the culture they have lived separately, but along side for centuries that is suddenly saying they can have everything they should have in the first place, so long as they toss out any sign of the culture that is just as rich and relevant to American history (if not more so) as the dominant culture's. I guess my point, is if it's hard to understand, why aren't we the ones trying to learn? Then again, personally I feel like I only ever had a hard time understanding when I refused to try because I was so intentionally blinded by prejudice and fear of the "other." When I let that go, it was a lot easier. At the end of the day, we still (mostly) all speak English.
@jefinley1 I definitely see where you are coming from. I suppose my POV is different as a family of immigrants. We didn't want to lose our heritage (we still speak our native language as a family, and my parents have accents) but we took great lengths to learn proper grammar. We didn't have much money either, so I just don't see an excuse for people at least not learning (if they want to) when they have more control over their situation. My mother regularly makes grammar mistakes and then works very hard to learn the proper words. Our home country has 6 official languages and it is a nightmare. It makes me sad to think that down the road, because one universal form of English isn't taught here, that people won't be able to understand one another.
Don't stone me for saying this, but I feel like people who speak Ebonics (for example, but enter any strong/hard to understand dialect here) separate themselves. As children, I get it, they can't always help it, but after that? I suppose I just think you can celebrate your heritage and still learn and challenge yourself to speak in a way that people can at least understand you. Especially if English is your native or only language.
This is a really interesting perspective and I'm really sorry if I came off as jumping down your throat. I get where you're coming from. Race relations in the US are so complex, and so deeply rooted in the American psyche, but in different ways depending on your background, that it can take a lot of time to thoroughly understand every facet. Including for me, to understand the outlook of more recently immigrated families. Ironically that has been the next thing that I've been trying to wrap my brain around more, so I should have tread more carefully.
I think, per the reading and studying that I've done, that the African American (speaking mainly of those whose families have been in this country since being brought here in the 17th-19th centuries) experience here continues to be a separate, complex, and many who understand better than I would argue a more difficult one, than any other minority group. There is definitely a perception that AAVE speakers (along with which often comes many other cultural attributes) separate themselves. And I'm not even sure that I can argue that this isn't true. I started trying to understand why they would do that, and why they would so defiantly cling to a culture that is so obviously detested, and I found the more I learned the more it actually gave me enormous respect for that choice. It's kind of like a giant F you to the culture they have lived separately, but along side for centuries that is suddenly saying they can have everything they should have in the first place, so long as they toss out any sign of the culture that is just as rich and relevant to American history (if not more so) as the dominant culture's. I guess my point, is if it's hard to understand, why aren't we the ones trying to learn? Then again, personally I feel like I only ever had a hard time understanding when I refused to try because I was so intentionally blinded by prejudice and fear of the "other." When I let that go, it was a lot easier. At the end of the day, we still (mostly) all speak English.
Believe me I would LOVE to learn to understand it! The AAVE (is that the proper term for Ebonics?) speaking people in my area (both where I grew up and also where I live now) mostly hate anyone who doesn't also speak and follow their culture (even if they are black), so they pretty much avoid any other populations, thus having very very very few opportunities to speak to them, I can't learn. This is partly what I mean by the separate themselves.
Beyond that, why should majority (language wise, not race) strive to learn to understand minority dialects (again referring to language, not race). When we moved here we had to learn American English, not the version of English that my parents grew up with as their second language. One cannot not possibly expect others to learn all other dialects? Shouldn't majority rule here? If we want one common universal language, and not many derivatives of it, that is? It has nothing to do with fear, just simplicity. Not saying that they shouldn't speak however they want to when they are with friends, family, peers, but the many people work hard to learn proper grammar for professional use for moving up in the world and in socioeconomic status.
@jefinley1 I definitely see where you are coming from. I suppose my POV is different as a family of immigrants. We didn't want to lose our heritage (we still speak our native language as a family, and my parents have accents) but we took great lengths to learn proper grammar. We didn't have much money either, so I just don't see an excuse for people at least not learning (if they want to) when they have more control over their situation. My mother regularly makes grammar mistakes and then works very hard to learn the proper words. Our home country has 6 official languages and it is a nightmare. It makes me sad to think that down the road, because one universal form of English isn't taught here, that people won't be able to understand one another.
Don't stone me for saying this, but I feel like people who speak Ebonics (for example, but enter any strong/hard to understand dialect here) separate themselves. As children, I get it, they can't always help it, but after that? I suppose I just think you can celebrate your heritage and still learn and challenge yourself to speak in a way that people can at least understand you. Especially if English is your native or only language.
This is a really interesting perspective and I'm really sorry if I came off as jumping down your throat. I get where you're coming from. Race relations in the US are so complex, and so deeply rooted in the American psyche, but in different ways depending on your background, that it can take a lot of time to thoroughly understand every facet. Including for me, to understand the outlook of more recently immigrated families. Ironically that has been the next thing that I've been trying to wrap my brain around more, so I should have tread more carefully.
I think, per the reading and studying that I've done, that the African American (speaking mainly of those whose families have been in this country since being brought here in the 17th-19th centuries) experience here continues to be a separate, complex, and many who understand better than I would argue a more difficult one, than any other minority group. There is definitely a perception that AAVE speakers (along with which often comes many other cultural attributes) separate themselves. And I'm not even sure that I can argue that this isn't true. I started trying to understand why they would do that, and why they would so defiantly cling to a culture that is so obviously detested, and I found the more I learned the more it actually gave me enormous respect for that choice. It's kind of like a giant F you to the culture they have lived separately, but along side for centuries that is suddenly saying they can have everything they should have in the first place, so long as they toss out any sign of the culture that is just as rich and relevant to American history (if not more so) as the dominant culture's. I guess my point, is if it's hard to understand, why aren't we the ones trying to learn? Then again, personally I feel like I only ever had a hard time understanding when I refused to try because I was so intentionally blinded by prejudice and fear of the "other." When I let that go, it was a lot easier. At the end of the day, we still (mostly) all speak English.
Maybe part of my problem is that I have exactly zero ancestors that had any role in slavery and segregation. As immigrants we were often discriminated against until we were able to assimilate. we worked very hard on the assimilation process because we felt extremely lucky to be here and away from Africa. Africa is falling apart completely and there is so much hate - it's equally bad tribally not only black/white, etc. Even the poorest people here have it better than the vast majority of Africa and that is just a fact - I have seen it with my own eyes.
The new generations of AA and other races alike should be encouraged to let go of past transgressions rather than perpetuation of these divides. That is the only way the country can truly move past racism. Refusal to adapt to the majority perpetuates this (to me), regardless of the color of your skin or your heritage. Again, speak how you want to among your peers and family, but learn the widely accepted way too? Does that make sense? Maybe my lack of sense of responsibility to what happened in the American past plays the biggest part in my POV.
This is so challenging my brain right now in the best way . I have some comprehension of the racial and ethnic tensions right now in Africa from a couple of courses that focused on it, but my opinions by default, then come from African immigrants who are purely academics, or South African immigrant students who are strongly biased toward social justice and cultural preservation (my encounters were in upper level history courses, so insanely idealistic people like myself). I can claim no personal experience. Obviously not even to the black experience in America, aside from secondarily through white privilege, which I find to be pretty obvious.
I think what a lot of people in academia and social justice see as problematic in insisting on assimilation of the oppressed, is that it often doesn't encourage code switching, but pure erasing of other cultures. On top of that, you are right about slavery and the completely nuts racial ideology in America that supported it having a profound effect on the difference in its implications for African Americans here. After the Civil Rights movement there was a large group of African Americans who advocated exactly what you just said in your last post. They quickly found that while legally that should work, most of mainstream American culture was not on board, and stonewalled them in mainstream culture regardless of their education and assimilation. I actually think it is way worse in the North.
Which is how, while separate but equal is illegal, culturally enforced segregation occurs arguable into the present. The racist mindset that existed here for so long persists, but has evolved itself by necessity to indict black American culture as the reason for discrimination instead of simply skin color, which is obviously no longer a politically correct argument. Ideas of eugenics, anti-miscegenation, and "white Jesus" culture (western morality being sold as universal morality) are still so deeply embedded in much of white America, that even with perfect assimilation, black skin color combined with any sign of African American heritage, is still is an incredible barrier to acceptance in mainstream culture. Effectively, even if all African Americans completely denied everything that makes them culturally unique even though we don't ask the same of white Americans with regionalisms, a large portion of America would still find a way to dislike them solely based on a skin color bias that they refuse to acknowledge. And they would at least try to find some way to simultaneously deny and excuse their discrimination. So I think the problem is that while most African Americans have forgiven past transgressions, a lot of white America continues to say, "For what? I didn't apologize." What they are struggling to forgive, forget, and move on from right now aren't the past transgressions but the continued ones. But that's just my take.
@jefinley1 Such a profound way of putting things into perspective for me. It's so hard to look past personal ethnocentric ideas. Unfortunately this will never end. What is the "right way"? In reality, your upbringing has such an impact on your way of life. EVEN when you have been given tools to learn what proper English is. I can't tell you how many times I have discriminated against all kinds of cultures and not have known it.
@jefinley1 thank you for sharing those experiences. I suppose I am just ignorant to that happening, as I have never witnessed it in person. I'm sure you are right though, and know much more about it than I could begin to know. White supremacists definitely exist still (Charleston shooter for example had to learn to feel that way somewhere...my guess is at home). It's all very sad to me.
@carlymarie021 I'm constantly sticking my foot in my mouth and then trying to listen and learn when smarter people call me out on it. I'm like the kid who learns how to ride a bike by falling off repeatedly but who never gives up. Haha. But those are the times I learn and appreciate it the most.
@twogirlsandagreen I so appreciate you sharing your experience, and I'm sorry your family faced prejudice coming here. Our country is built on people who come here and make it even better. Personally I love the differences. And things are never as clear cut as I want to try to make them. Like I said above, the times I learn the most are when smart people challenge my most deeply held convictions. So thanks
"What they are struggling to forgive, forget, and move on from right now aren't the past transgressions but the continued ones. But that's just my take."
Absolutely this. I won't deny that race in America is a complex issue, but one that we are not past. Police brutality, incarceration, segregated schools, poverty. All of those things are statistically worse and it can't be blamed on language barriers and lack of trying. The numbers are just too staggering.
This has been an interesting off road adventure for this thread! Thanks ladies. I feel like i need to bust out some of my sociology book's!
Re: I'm sorry, I can't take you seriously if...
Don't stone me for saying this, but I feel like people who speak Ebonics (for example, but enter any strong/hard to understand dialect here) separate themselves. As children, I get it, they can't always help it, but after that? I suppose I just think you can celebrate your heritage and still learn and challenge yourself to speak in a way that people can at least understand you. Especially if English is your native or only language.
Believe me I would LOVE to learn to understand it! The AAVE (is that the proper term for Ebonics?) speaking people in my area (both where I grew up and also where I live now) mostly hate anyone who doesn't also speak and follow their culture (even if they are black), so they pretty much avoid any other populations, thus having very very very few opportunities to speak to them, I can't learn. This is partly what I mean by the separate themselves.
Beyond that, why should majority (language wise, not race) strive to learn to understand minority dialects (again referring to language, not race). When we moved here we had to learn American English, not the version of English that my parents grew up with as their second language. One cannot not possibly expect others to learn all other dialects? Shouldn't majority rule here? If we want one common universal language, and not many derivatives of it, that is? It has nothing to do with fear, just simplicity. Not saying that they shouldn't speak however they want to when they are with friends, family, peers, but the many people work hard to learn proper grammar for professional use for moving up in the world and in socioeconomic status.
I'm probably not making sense. I'm so tired.
Maybe part of my problem is that I have exactly zero ancestors that had any role in slavery and segregation. As immigrants we were often discriminated against until we were able to assimilate. we worked very hard on the assimilation process because we felt extremely lucky to be here and away from Africa. Africa is falling apart completely and there is so much hate - it's equally bad tribally not only black/white, etc. Even the poorest people here have it better than the vast majority of Africa and that is just a fact - I have seen it with my own eyes.
The new generations of AA and other races alike should be encouraged to let go of past transgressions rather than perpetuation of these divides. That is the only way the country can truly move past racism. Refusal to adapt to the majority perpetuates this (to me), regardless of the color of your skin or your heritage. Again, speak how you want to among your peers and family, but learn the widely accepted way too? Does that make sense? Maybe my lack of sense of responsibility to what happened in the American past plays the biggest part in my POV.
Absolutely this. I won't deny that race in America is a complex issue, but one that we are not past. Police brutality, incarceration, segregated schools, poverty. All of those things are statistically worse and it can't be blamed on language barriers and lack of trying. The numbers are just too staggering.
This has been an interesting off road adventure for this thread! Thanks ladies. I feel like i need to bust out some of my sociology book's!