Comments on: Ebonics and IM speak

By: Billy

Billy — Thu, 24 May 2007 09:08:08 +0000

I am African American, and I have been living abroad for several years now. I used to speak African American English as a child among friends, but I was forced to speak SAE by my parents and at school. I went through a phase where I shunned AAVE. I can still speak the dialect but it doesn’t sound natural anymore. I think people may be able to encourage widespread use of the dialect through classes for non-native speakers. Such a movement would emphasize the beautiful aspects of AAVE.

By: cherneyn

cherneyn — Tue, 17 Apr 2007 20:29:13 +0000

I think a Multi Genre lesson on IM speak would be very interesting. My lil sis could help, she tends to use IM speak in everyday life and I have caught her using it in her homework. Honestly, I don’t know how she got so good at using a computer because she doesn’t seem 16 to me, but I think that students her age would handle well to a project like that. I think they would love that and they would actually have fun with learning something new.

By: Comment Links « One Sweet World

Comment Links « One Sweet World — Sun, 08 Apr 2007 21:25:38 +0000

[...] Comment [...]

By: mandy777

mandy777 — Sun, 08 Apr 2007 20:49:20 +0000

I’m glad I found this article. It is funny because I was just reading some stuff from John Rickford because I am writing a paper about AAVE (ebonics) for my grammar class. Sadly, I must admit I used to think that AAVE was lazy and sloppy English, but thanks to college and expanding my frame of reference, I have now totally changed my mind! AAVE is just as systematic as SAE! It is 100% rule goverened! It is not sloppy. It is just different! I tried to learn it because I wanted to know what I was talking about in my paper, and I was attempting to write a short story off J. California Cooper’s novel, Family, and the novel uses a lot of AAVE. I spent days analyzing the language! It was hard, and it was frustrating. I still don’t know very much. It was a lot easier for me though when specific differences were pointed out. Studying AAVE also helped me learn more about SAE! It was an amazing experience. I don’t know much about IM language, except lol, and I still prefer “ha”, but, I can totally see where you are coming from. Why seperate the languages completely, and ignore one of them entirely? Why not look at one dialect and use it as a bridge for another?