Devereaux Code Switching

Having the insight as a former student and a present educator, Linda Christensen wrote about her views on the way English is taught to students in her essay“Teaching Standard English: Whose Standard?” Christensen

“Code switching is a strategy that helps us communicate in socially and culturally appropriate ways. As we think about how we speak to different audiences — such as colleagues, pastors, doctors, children, and service workers — we recognize our own use of code switching. This is a natural and often unconscious response to modify our use of vocabulary, sentence structure, intonation, and topic of discussion according to our audience” (O’Neal & Ringler, 2010). Code switching is helpful in the classroom when teachers are able to use the local dialect but explain why he or she is using it and when it is appropriate. For example, in research papers students need to use Standard English so that it looks professional and informational. For narratives and creative works it is okay to use different dialects and word choice because it gives readers details about the author’s voice and writing style. Teachers can also teach students to be bi-dialectal so they can know how to speak to different types of people in different places. They can do this by comparing words we use in Standard English to words that are used in different cultures that mean the same thing. By using the students’ native/home language or dialect, we can bridge the gap and achieve the target goal of students learning Academic/Standard

A high school education sets the pace for the rest of an individual's life, whether or not they attend college, receive the perfect job, or are able to function in the fast pace of society. The material taught in high school nowadays is not preparing students for life, or college, but rather feeding and exhausting their minds with tedious information they will forget in a matter of weeks. These “scholars” who are supposed to be the next generation of geniuses are not being taught the knowledge needed to be as successful as possible in our always developing and unforgiving world. In Kim Brooks essay, “Death to High School English” she explains her thoughts and personal experiences with college students who were improperly taught the fundamentals

Scholar, Gloria Anzaldúa, in her narrative essay, “How To Tame A Wild Tongue’, speaks her many experiences on being pressured on what language to use. She then expresses how the discrimination made her to realize the ugly truth--that people reject languages that aren’t their own. She adopts logos, ethos and pathos in order to appeal toward her audience who is anyone who is not bilingual. One of the perspectives she takes on in her piece clearly expresses the relationship between language and identity and how it creates a conflict between her and the world.

Code switching is a part of everyone’s daily life. Gloria Anzaldua expressed how she used code switching in her story “How to Tame a Wild Tongue.” Anzaldua grew up in Texas, near the Mexico border, to a Mexican-American family. Her family primarily spoke Spanish, but while at school and in the community, they had to speak English, the accepted language of America (Anzaldua 530). Anzaldua did not want her native language to die, so she wrote “How to Tame a Wild Tongue” to express her feelings, and to show how code switching affected her everyday life. In the story, Anzaldua expressed that depending on who she was talking to,

Next, the topic of Primary Discourse was investigated in a research article by Mays (2008). Mays articulates that the discourse, or language used in the curriculums and assessments, is so different from the primary discourse that young learners have been exposed to, that minority and ELL students are overrepresented in “at-risk,” “developmentally delayed,” and “not ready to learn” groups. Being put in these groups puts that at a disadvantage in acquiring literacy skills. Mays cited “Discourses (capital “D”) are ways of combining and coordinating words, deeds, thoughts, values, bodies, objects, tools, and technologies, and other people (at the appropriate time and places) so as to enact and recognize the specific socially situated identities and activities. (Gee, 2001, p.71) Many teachers use curriculums that were designed from a “white, middle class, ‘mainstream’ model” and this creates challenges for ELLs from diverse backgrounds to achieve success. The role of the teacher becomes essential and powerful in this

Young instead, encourages dropping the term code switching and adopting code meshing which promotes “blendin two or mo dialects, languages, or rhetorical forms into one sentence, one utterance, one paper”(114). Young doesn’t want writers to feel as though they have to separate the way they speak at home from their academic language. Young also points out ways in which code meshing has already taken effect in tweets from Senator Chuck Grassley to President Obama and Chris Ann Cleland’s Washington Post interview (115). I believe that code meshing is an effective way to write because it makes it easier to get your point across when you’re not worrying about using large words to make your work look better. Code meshing also catches readers attention because they feel like they can relate to what the writer is

I repeatedly had to ask my Grandpa to slow down or speak English when we were conversing. This is an example of code-switching which refers to changing language or tone for different audiences. It is important to change language and tone in your writing in order to successfully engage with your audience. There is a clear change in tone when writing an essay from a prompt to writing a short story for a book. When I was in eighth grade I wrote about my first level 6 paper.

Code Meshing is the process of speaking both formal and informal at the same time; where as code switching is the process of switching from speaking formal to informal, or informal to formal in order to fit in. I choose not to use either of those methods. I used to use code switching most of my life up until I went to high school. My parents taught me to code switch to show respect to my elders. You should not speak to elders the same way you would speak to your friends. I went to a Afrocentric school Sankofa Freedom Academy Charter School There we was taught to embrace our history and use Ebonics in our everyday language.

The southern united states also known as the American south, Dixie, or simply the south a place know for its culture, history and developing its own customs, musical styles and food. Home to two amazing writers, scholars, feminist, activist bell hooks and Gloria Anzaldua. Everyone has something that defines who he or she is by the exclusive things they do. Fashion, culture, life experiences, as well as language all contribute in creating one’s identity. Without the freedom to express your self there is no soul. The inability to speak freely is a form of suppression and without that freedom there cannot be a true reflection of a persons identity and self-concept. “How To Tame a Wild Tongue,” and “keeping close to home: class and education,” give us a glimpse of what its like to not conform and stay true to ones belief’s.

Therefore, I love that Harmon and Wilson states that “No dialect limits its speakers’ ability to express complex thoughts, to think critically, or to use a full range of linguistic functions and purpose” (154-55). As a society and as future teachers, we need to teach our students that people have different dialects, and the differences do not make anyone less smart, or less of a person just like Harmon and Wilson explain that, “Dialects are different not deficient systems” (155). Everyone wants to be treated equal and have equal opportunities; therefore, everyone needs to be more open minded and realize that everyone has their own dialect, which does not make them any less of an intellectual person than anyone else.

As aforementioned, AAVE is the most prevalent native English vernacular in America. Consequently, educators often encounter AAVE speakers and writers in their classrooms. Educators must inform students that their home language is not Standard American English and create effective classroom methods to educate non-native SAE speakers. Faced with these constant occurrences, the Conference on College Composition and Communication (CCCC) issued a statement on students’ rights to their own language. The resolution states:

In the world today, there are more and more multicultural people who can speak different languages; and they need to choose different tongues to correspond to the immediate community they belong. Language makes people remember their own cultures and contribute to their own identity. In “Mother Tongue,” a short story written by Amy Tan; she strongly narrates the stories about her different experiences and life comprehensions based on varying types of English she speaks throughout life. Wandering on two different languages; Amy discovers the importance and power of language: “the way it can evoke an emotion, a visual image, a complex idea, or a simple truth” (Tan 38). As human beings, language is the tool that contains the mighty powers; it forcefully affects people’s lives, personality, and lifestyles. Moreover, language is the “bridge” of communication between people. However, for Amy, the views on mother’s language are changing from the sense of shame into pride; as she is feeling the effects that two different types of English are giving to her as well as their respective symbols in her mind.

His fifth claim is that different forms of speech do not equate to differing levels of achievement in school. As a sixth claim, he argues that ethnographic assumptions offered by Deutsch, Bereiter, Engelmann are wrong. His final claim, is that training a child to learn the logical manner of Standard English doesn’t guarantee that he’ll succeed. Nonstandard English isn’t the problem to learning; it’s the ignorance of the language and the belief that it’s inferior.

In this world, there are a lot of languages used to communicate. Nation and cultural diversity are a source of variation in the languages. The diversity of the language used by a particular group is a factor of the occurrence of bilingualism. According to Grosjean (1984, p. 1) bilingualism is the use of two or more languages. The proficiency of bilingualism may vary depending on the exposure to the other users of language and opportunities to use the language. It is one of the factors of replacement of the language. This phenomenon known as code switching, it can occur as a whole, the incorporating elements of other languages in the language being used, or the turn of a variation of a language. Based on Poplack (1980) theory code switching is the alternation of two languages within a single discourse, sentence or constituent. Garrett (2010, p. 11) said that code switching is the most powerful feature of informal communication. Code switching happens when speakers speak in one language into another language as example when they