Darlene tryin to teach me how to talk. She say US not so hot ...
peoples think you dumb. What I care? I ast. I’m happy. But she say I
feel more happier talkin like she talk ... Every time I say something
the way I say it, she correct me until I say it some other way. Pretty
soon it feel like I can’t think. My mind run up on a thought, git
confuse, run back and sort of lay down ... Look like to me only a fool
would want you to talk in a way that feel peculiar to your mind.
(Walker 1982)“I done my homework. You already seen it,” Shoni said.
“I did my homework. You already saw it,” LaKeesha said.
“That too,” Shoni said. Both sisters laughed. “Why you all the time
be trying to get me to talk white?”
“It’s not white; it’s correct.” She didn’t feel as sure as Esther and Mrs.
Clark were when they said it. Sometimes she was a little afraid that
she was talking white, that she could lose herself in the land where
enunciation was crisp and all verbs agreed. And at home, especially
on weekends, it was hard to hold on to that language of success and
power ... “When you go to work, you have to know the right way to
speak,” she added, looking in Shoni’s eyes as if she was sure of what
she was saying, even though she wasn’t.
(Campbell 1994)Pressure to assimilate to *SAE norms originates from outside and from
inside the African American community. In both of these excerpts, Black
girls and women encourage each other to acquire the white language, a
language, they are told, which will bring them not only success and power,
but happiness (“But she say I feel more happier talkin like she talk”). To
accept this proposition in the face of direct personal evidence to the
contrary is the challenge that these fictional characters, like all AAVE
speakers, must somehow meet.
Evidence of real resistance to linguistic assimilation is hard to find
outside of fiction. The most cited example is surely James Baldwin’s
moving editorial “If Black English Isn’t a Language, Then Tell Me, What
Is?” (New York Times, July 29, 1979). The writings of June Jordan call
clearly for the recognition of the validity of AAVE. Another rare instance