On Ebonics and Language Hierarchy

Today I'd like to talk about how superiority and discrimination can make themselves sneakily apparent in language and linguistics.

Full disclosure: I used to be obsessed with not doing anything at all ever that would potentially slightly disparage the image of black people. I had to be a "good black girl." Because I thought it was up to me to make black people "look good" in the eyes of other folks. Speech was part of that. I used to get furious at black people who didn't speak "proper English" because "it's not that hard" and "it just gives others more ammunition against us." But I have come to realize that it's not black people's fault that certain other people have problems with us. Just like rape is never the victim's fault, discrimination is never the target's fault. The only way to end discrimination is to demolish stereotypes, not by constantly contradicting them, but by teaching people that not all black people are gangsters and crackheads - some black people are Presidents! Or that not all Asian people are math geniuses - some Asian people are artists! Or that all white people are racists and bigots - some white people are good people!

More disclosure: I "talk white," meaning with "proper" grammar and word usage, etc. And that's the problem: applying words like "proper" or even "standard" to some aspects of American English. Because inherent in the word "proper" is the notion that anything arbitrarily labeled "improper" by the reigning socio-political hierarchy is wrong and therefore "lesser." And because to an awful lot of people in this country (black and white), from Idaho to Florida, saying "ain't" is, in fact, standard.

This is my issue with "ebonics" as an "academic area of study": according to Merriam-Webster Online, the word comes from somebody mashing the two words "ebony" and "phonics" together. The trouble with this is that it inherently associates "improper" English with black people, when plenty college-educated white folks "don't write well" or "can't spell" or "don't use English right." (That was intentional.) Yes, every language has its rules, but at the same time, languages simply cannot exist petrified in strict conformity with all their criteria: languages evolve, and the products of that evolution must be acknowledged not as the pet project of some university scholar pursuing a fellowship and not as a missile to be launched at black people's intrinsic worth, but as vibrant part of American history and contemporary society.

Many black people feel that they have to code switch, or talk two different ways, depending on the situation: in the office or in an interview vs. at home or with friends. (For a great take on black code switching, see Janelle Harris' article for Clutch online.) This needs to become unnecessary. "Ebonics" has evolved as a distinct form of American English, and must be treated as an acceptable, legitimate one, regardless of what the current linguistic doctrine demands.

So I challenge you to stop thinking of "black talk" as a marker of crudity, low intelligence, lack of sophistication, and/or lack of education, and by extension of all of those, brutality. This is one of the most fundamental components of how anyone (black or otherwise) views black people: it is a major aspect of how the social value of an individual black person is judged. Make that association, and then change your way of thinking, and, more importantly, your way of acting.