Persecution Against An Unchartered Jargon Essay

Currently, there are over 6,000 living languages spoken in the world. Even with these many languages spoken, people are still discriminated in America. Language is a part of many cultures and daily life, for example in Amy Tan's "Mother Tongue", Tan says "I've heard other terms used, 'limited English,' for example. But they seem as bad, as if everything is limited, including people's perceptions of the limited English speaker." Language should not be a border where people today are still treated as "broken".

In “Mommy, What Does Nigger Mean?”, author Gloria Naylor explains throughout her piece that reality shapes language and language can shape reality. Naylor explains this, “chicken or the egg dispute” (Naylor 1) through her experiences with the word nigger. Gloria explains how she starts on one side of reality and shaping her language, then comes to another understanding from the boy in her third grade class. Language can be how words are used, what their meaning is and the purpose behind that selection of words. Reality is everyday life and experiences. When in third grade Naylor encounters nigger as a racial derogatory when a boy said “nigger” to her while receiving graded tests back. To Gloria it was anything but a racial put down since

Color-blind racism has a linguistic style which forms when dominate groups speak about subordinate groups without sounding racist. The author describes it as using “thread to join pieces of fabric into garments.” (Bonilla-Silva, Pg.53). “If the garment is being assembled in an open forum (with minorities present or in public venues), dominant actors will weave its fibers carefully (‘I am not a racist, but…”) and not too tight (I am not black, so I don’t know”). If, in contrast, the needlework is being done among friends, the cuts will be rough and the seams loose (“Darned lazy niggers”). (Bonilla-Silva, Pg.53). The idea is relative to the social change due to the result of the civil rights moment era, which no longer permitted blatantly racist speech in public settings. Contemporary racial discussions are done in a subtle way that allows these individuals to express their views and preserve their racial neutrality image. This chapter discusses color- blind racism and the five components avoidance of racist speech, semantic moves, projection, diminutives, and rhetorical incoherence.

Speech has always been important; yet being judged by how to speak on a daily basis is what many go through. Not everyone speaks the same, which is why each person is unique. The author Allison Joseph of the poem “On Being Told I Don’t Speak Like a Black Person,” has an precise frame of mind on how people believe that all black people speak differently than others. There is not a certain language that people should speak; it is passed down or learned while growing up. Allison states in the texts “Now I realize there’s nothing more personal than speech that I don’t have to defend how I speak, how any person, black, white, chooses to

Racism is still alive in America. It is not as overt but its presence is still felt. I believe there is power in words. The Bible says there is death and life in the power of the tongue. Words can either be used to edify, uplift and encourage or they can be used to tear down, demoralize and debase. Which do you choose? In this essay I will attempt to analyze how African Americans have reclaimed a term that has been used for numerous years to negatively characterize their race and them as people. By changing the spelling of nigger to nigga and using it to express positive attributes such as brotherhood and inclusion it has aided

Abstract The purpose of this book review is to critically inspect Lisa Delpit and Joanne Kilgour Dowdy ’s book The Skin that We Speak: Thoughts on Language and Culture (2008). The majority of the essays compiled in the book aim to deconstruct the negative effects of Standard English or “right” language in the classroom and how that can affect the identities of the students in that environment. Contributors offered their anecdotal experiences as well as recommendations for ways in which the approach to language in curricula can shift to be more inclusive.

We created it, we change it, we turn it into different way, we control every aspect of what language is and what it will be. We have the power to speak, and add our own way of speaking to any language we speak which is where we get black english from. Humans are the reason there are so many different dialects and ways we speak because we have the power to change or recreate words, phrases, sound etc. People have control over their language, even if they speak the same language as the people around them everyone has their own way of saying a word or phrase . People create their own slangs, and manipulate their language so that it best fits them. Which also brings up the question of proper language which in this case there really isn't a proper way of saying something, because there is just so many way of saying things it's hard to say what is proper. This is why I believe language belongs to the people, because we create it and manipulate it to fit to our own

It camouflages other prejudices. Considering that the way a person speaks a language is 100% linked to who s/he is (her/his culture, social class, environment, etc.), when we exclude a person because of the way s/he speaks, we exclude a person because of who s/he is. The problem is not on “what is said”, but “who said it”. When we say that a particular dialect is “wrong” or “ugly”, we are ignoring the fact that there is no wrong way, according to Linguistics. We were led to believe that there is a best way to speak. When we reinforce this idea we push millions of people that have no access to education to the periphery of the world, we take away their voices. When we say “s/he talks this way because s/he is probably ignorant, poor, probably came from a poor culture” we are again practicing linguistic prejudice.

In fact, racism is a continuous cycle that will exist around us abruptly or in complete silence. Most importantly, racism can also exist in language. Racism continues to persist in the United States because of the role language has an impact on a variety of socioeconomic classes and different ethnic groups. Offensive words, phrases, accents, or any sort of mocking towards people of different backgrounds is the most noticeable form of racism found through use of language, but we can also discover another form of racism by discriminating different ethnic groups based on their proficiency in English. Based on how the person’s use of language, can we truly identify them as a true

Labov uses three key terms that need to be defined. First, NNE, which stands for nonstandard Negro English (this article was written in the 1970’s and the modern name for this vernacular is African American Vernacular English or AAVE) refers to a speech form used by African Americans that Labov and many others argue to simply be another form of Standard English. Second, the term standard English is used by Labov to depict middle class colloquial language. Third the term the deficit theory or verbal deprivation theory needs to be addressed as it is central to Labov’s argument. The deficit theory is an educational theory employed by psychologists and teachers that states that if a student displays a nonstandard speech, or differs from the middle class normal standard, they will be considered deficient and it is up to education to “correct” these “deficiencies.” The deficit theory relies on the assumption that nonstandard speech can lead to a student’s educational

Etter-Lewis explained that, “Black studies is routinely conceptualized as a fledgling enterprise too weak to stand on its own and not Eurocentric to be fully accepted within the academy” (727). She believes that it is crucial for scholars to interrogate language practice that routinely stigmatize those perceived to be on the periphery of societal norms in order for new knowledge to be revealed and old ones to be expandable. She agrees with Asante that “All knowledge must be emancipatory.”

To be sure, the bias implicit in seemingly innocent words and boorish probes may not be intentional or deliberate. Nor will the occasional use of derogatory words explode into a full-blown crisis. But the cumulative effects of ‘linguistic death by a thousand word cuts’ should never be underestimated in perpetuating racial hierarchies (Hill 2008; Sue in Fitzgerald 2015). And while it’s an exaggeration to say that language determines our reality, as an uncritical Sapir-Whorf hypothesis might imply, it certainly establishes a cultural frame of reference for defining who is important and what is valued. As Bourdieu (1991) would likely say in confirming how language transmits a meaning beyond the speaker’s intention since words possess a social context, the power of language is not in the words that hurt, but about those patterns of power perpetuated through word play and language use in everyday discourses and daily practices. This assertion alone makes it doubly important to expose how the language of words exemplified by racial micro-aggressions constitute a discourse in defense of dominant

In the United States, it has come to be by talking or acting white that one is civilized or at the very least speaking in Mainstream American English. Which is to say if a black person shows there Blackness by using their language which from many

Language ideologies are rooted in the national interests of specific social or cultural groups. For instance, nineteenth-century European colonialism established a new philology to language standardization, through codifying indigenous languages according to European literacy principles (Kroskrity 2010). Colonialism contributed to an evolution of racial frameworks in American political identity, such as the construction of “whiteness,” which stigmatized other race-based groups in the West (Di Leonardo 2004). Moreover, the institutionalization of standard English functioned as a tool of oppression against minority racial groups living in the presence of American nationalists. The imperialist culture of Europe and America has resulted in the imposition of new language ideologies, which consequently has led to the discrimination against minority language speakers worldwide.

Gilead’s use of language to influence thought has made clear the ways in which language can be used to expressed power. The reconstruction of language in Gilead emphasizes how language can restrict forms of communication between people to create control. Observing these restrictions on speech and oppressive language used in the novel assist us in identifying similar ways in which these techniques happen within our own societies. For instance, one can examine the ways in which language is used to describe individuals of different ethnicities in the media and how it can contribute to prejudices against certain cultures. One example would be to examine the language that is used to describe African Americans in the media. In the article From brute to thug: the demonization and criminalization of unarmed Black male