Flashcards on Black English as a Distinct Language
Black English as a Distinct Language: History, Impact, Analysis
Tap to flip · Swipe to navigate
African American English
10 cards
Card 1
Question: How did African American English originate, according to the text?
Answer: It originated during the Black diaspora under slavery: people from various tribes, forced to communicate under oppression, created a new language out
Card 2
Question: What role did the Black church (tabernacle) play in the formation of African American English?
Answer: Within the Black church, established under surveillance and coercion, the formation of African American English began as a social and communicative sp
Card 3
Question: According to the text, why were the rules of African American English formed the way they were?
Answer: Because the language was created out of brutal necessity: its rules were dictated by what the language needed to convey, with speed and confidentialit
Card 4
Question: What example does the author give to illustrate the communicative necessity of African American English?
Answer: That a family member needed to quickly warn another of danger posed by a nearby white person, using a language the white person would not understand.
Card 5
Question: How does the author characterize the relationship between the emergence of the Beat Generation and African American English?
Answer: He describes how the imagery of poverty was appropriated by middle-class white people (the Beat Generation) imitating poverty and 'funkiness,' while B
Card 6
Question: According to the text, why can't Black people be penalized for having created this language?
Answer: Because the language offers the nation a vision of reality and is a valuable and indispensable cultural creation; penalizing them would be unjust and
Card 7
Question: What rhetorical question does the author pose about the definition of language?
Answer: If the achievement of creating African American English does not indicate that it is a language, then what definition of language should be trusted?
Card 8
Question: How is the historical attitude of most white people towards the education of Black people described?
Answer: That they had no interest in educating Black people unless it served white purposes; there was contempt for the experience of the Black child.
Card 9
Question: What is the central problem in the education of the Black child, according to the text?
Answer: That a child cannot be taught by someone who despises them, nor by someone who demands they repudiate their experience and language to enter a cultura
Card 10
Question: What does it mean that African American English is not 'merely the adoption of a foreign language'?
Answer: It means it wasn't just taking a European language, but creating something new by transforming ancient elements in response to unique historical condi