I need some help

[Perry Winkle]

I'd get shot for 'nigga'. I've run into a group of pretty ghetto kids at school that _hate_ the in-group 'nigga'ing they believe it engenders disrespect so they prefer to use the tried and true 'brotha' which is the same thing without the negative connotations.

The good vibes are starting to get around more and more. Hopefully in a couple hundred years we'll have a few more things ironed out.

[Trilby]

Originally Posted by grant

I'd get shot for 'nigga'. I've run into a group of pretty ghetto kids at school that _hate_ the in-group 'nigga'ing they believe it engenders disrespect so they prefer to use the tried and true 'brotha' which is the same thing without the negative connotations.

The good vibes are starting to get around more and more. Hopefully in a couple hundred years we'll have a few more things ironed out.

You're school friends might be a little more EDUCATED than the people in my particular group. See? Education brings about enlightenment which is then expressed by people having and using BETTER COMMUNICATION. Wow.

[Queen of the Ryche]

dare I say it?
...............like a Tanzanian irrigation ditch?
oooohhhhhh - I am evil.............

[Queen of the Ryche]

Actually I've found a large portion of the Cellar to be very bright, well educated, and open minded. Just becasue their opinions differ from yours, and they may not have taken as many linguistics couses as recently as you, does not indicate anything to the contrary - It just emphasizes your narrow mindedness for not accepting that yours is not the only version of the truth.

[Perry Winkle]

Originally Posted by mrnoodle

Okay, I get the idea that people have different accents and speech patterns and such based on the subculture they grew up in. I do, too. But those things don't have an accepted written form. We spell them phonetically, or as apostrophe'd English. I tell people I'm "fixin' to" do things all the time. But when written, colloquiallisms like "fixin' to" are obviously shoddy and unacceptable for anything more important than instant messenger chat.

It's racism to say that Trevor from Compton should be entitled to have written tests and schoolwork translated from "Jack and Jill went up the hill" to "Jack be runnin up dat hill ovah deah wit Jill" just because that's how they say it in his neighborhood. If some white kid from the Ozarks wanted every vocal inflection and mispronunciation he uttered written down so he wouldn't have to learn that nasty grammar stuff, the debate would last all of 2 seconds.

Exactly.

This entire thread since we hijacked it has been about spoken english. There's nothing "wrong" with your language as long as your intended audience/social-group understand what ideas you're trying to convey.

[Perry Winkle]

Originally Posted by Queen of the Ryche

Actually I've found a large portion of the Cellar to be very bright, well educated, and open minded. Just becasue their opinions differ from yours, and they may not have taken as many linguistics couses as recently as you, does not indicate anything to the contrary - It just emphasizes your narrow mindedness for not accepting that yours is not the only version of the truth.

I've been trying to put my perspective, the perspective of the level of linguistics I'm familiar with, across so that someone can say "Yes that makes sense from that perspective".

• Use of Ebonics/AAVE has negative social connotations.
• Ebonics/AAVE is used primarily by those of lower socio-economic levels.
• Ebonics/AAVE has a strong cultural and historic background.
• Ebonics/AAVE is as valid a language, from a theoretical linguistics perspective, as Standard American English or Hoch-Deutsch or Martian or whatever.

Those are the four points I wish everyone could understand. This thread got kind of out of hand, I'm not even sure where we started out, and I apologize for getting pissy and insulting folks.

[Trilby]

Originally Posted by grant

• Use of Ebonics/AAVE has negative social connotations.
• Ebonics/AAVE is used primarily by those of lower socio-economic levels.
• Ebonics/AAVE has a strong cultural and historic background.
• Ebonics/AAVE is as valid a language, from a theoretical linguistics perspective, as Standard American English or Hoch-Deutsch or Martian or whatever.

Pretty much my point. You want to call it a language, go ahead. Just don't mind if I call you a dumb jerk for speaking it. THAT was my point!

[OnyxCougar]

Get this:

For African American students whose primary dialect was Ebonics, the Oakland resolution mandated some instruction in that dialect, both for "maintaining the legitimacy and richness of such language [sic]... and to facilitate their acquisition and mastery of English language skills." Teachers were encouraged to recognize that the "errors" in standard American English that their students made were not the result of lack of intelligence or effort, and were not "errors," but due instead to the fact that the dialect which they normally use is grammatically different from SAE. Rather than teaching standard English by proscribing non-standard usage, the idea was to teach standard English to Ebonics speaking students by showing them how to translate expressions from AAVE to standard American English.

Yet for some reason, they dont have a special grading curve for students in Hill-town, Tennessee, who speak, ... what language again?

I dont understand this.....

[Perry Winkle]

Originally Posted by OnyxCougar

Get this:



Yet for some reason, they dont have a special grading curve for students in Hill-town, Tennessee, who speak, ... what language again?

I dont understand this.....

Yeah, pretty fucked up, they wouldn't want to hurt anybody's feelings.

I hear that the next initiative is to have Ebonomatics for those that make errors in mathematics because it's not in terms they use at home (no I won't give any of the tasteless examples that pop immediately to mind, involving dime-bags and crack rocks).

[Queen of the Ryche]

wow. I finally agree with Grant for agreeing with Noodle. Well said bof y'all.

[mrnoodle]

Why does everything have to be "validated" these days? The reason AAVE (any patois, for that matter) is frowned upon is because it's lazy English. I commonly use "fixin' to" when talking about an action I am imminently going to perform. That's because I'm in the habit of doing so, and everyone in my family said the same thing when I was growing up. But if I go to Minneapolis, Philly, or NYC and tell someone "I'm fixin' to go to the Wal-Mart for some peanuts," I would be immediately labelled as a hick.

Guess what? That's okay. I don't care. You sayin you don't want none a these peanuts? Aight.

But if I ever get to the point where my well-being is threatened by some yankee's opinion of my fixin to do's, just take me out and shoot me like a dog.

[Perry Winkle]

Originally Posted by mrnoodle

Why does everything have to be "validated" these days? The reason AAVE (any patois, for that matter) is frowned upon is because it's lazy English. I commonly use "fixin' to" when talking about an action I am imminently going to perform. That's because I'm in the habit of doing so, and everyone in my family said the same thing when I was growing up. But if I go to Minneapolis, Philly, or NYC and tell someone "I'm fixin' to go to the Wal-Mart for some peanuts," I would be immediately labelled as a hick.

Guess what? That's okay. I don't care. You sayin you don't want none a these peanuts? Aight.

But if I ever get to the point where my well-being is threatened by some yankee's opinion of my fixin to do's, just take me out and shoot me like a dog.

I speak the same way my family does in rural Missouri when I'm back there. I've been in NY for 8 years so I speak, largely anyway, the way they speak here. It helps that since elementary school I've been pretty strongly pressured to develop a Region-Neutral Dialect.

Language is one of the most beautiful things in our world and it sucks to see people shit on the way people tell each other things like "I love you" and "Pass 'da peanut buttah I'm'a fixin' ta' have a sammich".

I'm sorry Mr.Noodle I think I caught an early revision of this post in one of my other replies. Still...good message.

[Queen of the Ryche]

Originally Posted by Mr.Anon.E.Mouse

Someone in my office just commented that there are "significantly more wars now than ever before." Is this true? I seem to recall reading tat there are fewer "wars" now...

Got any idea? I can't find any information stating whether or not the number of armed conflicts is increasing or decreasing.

Should we add the AAVE/Ebonics War, and call a truce?

[Perry Winkle]

Originally Posted by Queen of the Ryche

Should we add the AAVE/Ebonics War, and call a truce?

I think that's a good idea. I've got an idea for a new thread though so keep your eyes peeled.

[OnyxCougar]

http://www.blogthings.com/amenglishdialecttest/

What kind of american english do you speak?

<table style="color: black;" width=400 align=center border=1 bordercolor=black cellspacing=0 cellpadding=2>
<tr><td align="center" bgcolor="#A8FFB3">
<h3>Your Linguistic Profile:</h3>
</td></tr><tr><td bgcolor="#D9FFD8">
65% General American English</td></tr><tr><td bgcolor="#A8FFB3">
20% Dixie</td></tr><tr><td bgcolor="#D9FFD8">
10% Upper Midwestern</td></tr><tr><td bgcolor="#A8FFB3">
5% Yankee</td></tr><tr><td bgcolor="#D9FFD8">
0% Midwestern</td></tr></table>

<div align="center">
<a href="http://www.blogthings.com/amenglishdialecttest/">What Kind of American English Do You Speak?</a>
</div>