Black English in American English
‘Speak properly.’
Nobody says that to Prince Charles because he is the official language spoken in colonies his forefathers stole from indigenous people in Africa and other continents.
We, the stolen people speak the master’s language with an accent. It’s frowned upon in Europe and North America. It was regarded bad for slaves then, it is still regarded as such for African Americans.
Some black people in America do not go on a cruise. It reminds them of ancestors stolen from Africa, bound in chains and stored in the basement of ships, close to sharks. What African Americans brought to the U.S. was their beautiful skin and languages whipped to death, but lived on miraculously.
That resulted in how they speak English. Plantation owners in Alabama, Mississippi, Virginia, Texas, Georgia and other slave owning states did not like it. Wall Street doesn’t like it. Corporate America doesn’t, until they silently embrace it.
Thanks to African American writers, I fully understand what they call code-switching. Educated black people assess the situation they find themselves in. They ‘speak properly’ using standard American English, if the situation demands it. After the interview or business presentation, they go home and switch back to how their parents, neighbours, friends and pastors speak.
Like all things stolen from African Americans, how they speak finally becomes accepted in white America, but not acknowledged. If it’s black, it’s free, no copyright. Black music is now called rock and roll and country western. How pastors preached in little churches they built for themselves in former slave states, is now big business for white pastors on television.
Corporate America will never admit that African American language is right there in their boardrooms, when the speaker says: Are we on the same page? Or, when they see a sign like this parking sign. OPEN 24/7.
By: Nonqaba waka Msimang.
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