scholarly journals Removing obstacles for African American English-speaking children through greater understanding of language difference.

2013 ◽  
Vol 49 (1) ◽  
pp. 31-44 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barbara Zurer Pearson ◽  
Tracy Conner ◽  
Janice E. Jackson
2014 ◽  
Vol 57 (4) ◽  
pp. 1383-1393 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brandi L. Newkirk-Turner ◽  
Janna B. Oetting ◽  
Ida J. Stockman

PurposeThis study examined African American English–speaking children's use of BE, DO, and modal auxiliaries.MethodThe data were based on language samples obtained from 48 three-year-olds. Analyses examined rates of marking by auxiliary type, auxiliary surface form, succeeding element, and syntactic construction and by a number of child variables.ResultsThe children produced 3 different types of marking (mainstream overt, nonmainstream overt, zero) for auxiliaries, and the distribution of these markings varied by auxiliary type. The children's nonmainstream dialect densities were related to their marking of BE and DO but not modals. Marking of BE was influenced by its surface form and the succeeding verbal element, and marking of BE and DO was influenced by syntactic construction.ConclusionsResults extend previous studies by showing dialect-specific effects for children's use of auxiliaries and by showing these effects to vary by auxiliary type and children's nonmainstream dialect densities. Some aspects of the children's auxiliary systems (i.e., pattern of marking across auxiliaries and effects of syntactic construction) were also consistent with what has been documented for children who speak other dialects of English. These findings show dialect-specific and dialect-universal aspects of African American English to be present early in children's acquisition of auxiliaries.


2016 ◽  
Vol 1 ◽  
pp. 13 ◽  
Author(s):  
Grace Catherine Sullivan

In February 2012, Trayvon Martin was killed by George Zimmerman, who, after a month of highly-publicized trial, was acquitted of second-degree murder. In this paper, I examine the testimony of Martin’s childhood friend and witness for the prosecution, Rachel Jeantel. I investigate the ways in which the intertextual strategy of voicing another, that is the representation of not only their words, but also the characteristics of their language variety, may effectively eliminate the witness’s credibility. This work is motivated by the literature on the interaction between intertextual strategies (Bakhtin 1981, Becker 1994, Tannen 2007[1989]) and language ideologies (Matoesian 1999, Tannen 2010), especially as they relate to institutional discourse of courtroom interactions (Conley and O’Barr 1990, Conley et al. 1978, Magenau 2003, Cotterill 2003). My analysis shows that the prosecuting attorney standardizes Jeantel’s African American English (AAE) and excuses the supposed lack of clarity of her testimony as due to her upbringing in a non-native English-speaking household. The defense attorney voices Jeantel in a much more adversarial manner and reflects her AAE as itself evidence for her testimony to be considered non-credible. And finally, the ways in which the court reporter, the “neutral” language authority of the court, requests clarification of Jeantel’s testimony may actually be effectively discrediting the witness as it further highlights Jeantel’s variety as non-standard and marked for the courtroom.


English Today ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 31 (4) ◽  
pp. 53-60 ◽  
Author(s):  
Simanique Moody

One of the most widely researched language varieties in the field of sociolinguistics is African American English (AAE), a term used to describe a range of English dialects, from standard to vernacular, spoken by many (but not all) African Americans as well as by certain members of other ethnic groups who have had extensive contact with AAE speakers. Most linguists agree that AAE developed from contact between enslaved Africans and predominantly English-speaking Europeans (who spoke a range of English vernaculars) during the early to middle period of colonization of what is now known as the United States of America. Consequently, research on the development of AAE is traditionally framed in terms of the degree of contact with white English vernaculars, both during and after AAE genesis, with white vernaculars playing a primary, if not exclusive, role (McDavid & McDavid, 1951; Mufwene, 1996; Poplack, 2000; Poplack & Tagliamonte, 2001). Though some analyses of AAE allow for substrate influence from creole and/or African languages in its development (cf. Winford, 1997, 1998; Rickford, 1998, 2006; Wolfram & Thomas, 2002; Holm, 2004), many studies place a particular focus on Earlier African American varieties or Diaspora varieties, such as the Ex-Slave Recordings, Samaná English, and Liberian Settler English rather than contemporary AAE varieties spoken within U.S. borders (cf. Rickford, 1977, 1997, 2006; DeBose, 1988; Schneider 1989; Bailey, Maynor, & Cukor-Avila, 1991; Hannah, 1997; Singler, 1998, 2007a, 2007b; Kautzsch 2002). This research has helped further linguists’ understanding of AAE yet does not reflect its full history in the United States.


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