In this paper, I will examine teaching Standard English in the classroom. Essentially, Standard English is White Mainstream English (WME). For my purposes, I will use those terms interchangeably. April Baker-Bell, author of Linguistic Justice: Black Language, Literacy, Identity, and Pedagogy acknowledges that WME can be used interchangeably with Standard English to emphasize how the white way of communicating often becomes the unlabeled norm. (Baker-Bell 31-32) This is in part due to what is called the “white public space”. Essentially, the white public space has to do with the fact that whites are the dominant race in the sense that they are society’s main beneficiaries. Any other race’s way of doing things other than the white way is seen as “other” and calls for labels and categorization. Overall, people of color are seen as “other” in a space catered to white people. (Hill) White Mainstream English is seen as the professional and scholarly form of English that people aiming to appear intelligent should speak. Because of that, African American English is often discouraged and even penalized in the classroom. Educators feel societal pressure to teach all students Standard English and to promote the idea that African American Language is for home usage and that Standard English is for academic settings. This is a major contributing factor as to why Black students feel the need to code-switch. Code-switching involves changing the way you speak depending on who you’re talking to and what setting you are in, (Baker-Bell 71) In the case of the classroom, Black students may only use African American English at home since they are encouraged to speak Standard English in school. There is debate over whether or not teaching Standard English in the classroom is beneficial or detrimental to students of color. Does teaching Standard English really increase life chances for African American students? In this paper, I will argue that teaching African American students Standard English promotes white supremacism and is an unnecessary and harmful practice. This is because White Standard English forces students to disregard preferences to use African American English, it pushes code-switching as a survival strategy, and it leads to internalized racism for both Black students and teachers. A potential solution for the system that currently promotes white supremacism is code-meshing as it allows African American students to use the dialect they are most comfortable with, regardless of what the norm is.
Firstly, promoting Standard English over African American English involves putting down a perfectly good way of speaking in order to promote a white way of doing things. This causes students to abandon their mother tongue. Baker-Bell discusses how Black Language is a valid language and should not be viewed as an inferior language. “In the face of Anti-Black Linguistic Racism, it is not only necessary for Black students to know that they are communicating in a valid linguistic system, but it is just as important for them to be able to pinpoint and name the features of their own linguistic system.” (Baker-Bell 131) It is important to note that African American English has its own patterns and grammar just as White Mainstream English does. While the two languages may differ from a linguistic point of view, they are both equally valid ways of communicating. Many students are unaware of this fact. It may be beneficial to incorporate African American English in the early years of childhood education to get students and educators comfortable with multiple dialects. We incorporate and oftentimes mandate studying languages such as French and Spanish. Why not incorporate AAE into schools right off the bat? Students of color are taught that they should not use African American English if they are to succeed academically. From the moment they start school they are told to abandon the way of speaking their families taught them and convert to speaking White Mainstream English. Because of this African American Students tend to view African American English as a problem they need to correct. To demonstrate this, I will include a quote from a student named Chasse as used in Baker-Bell’s book:
““I did not know it was good definitions to Black Language. I always thought it was bad.” Chasse wrote: “I never knew that it was legitimate. I also didn’t know that it was connected with a history of oppression.” Other comments included: “I thought the way African Americans talked could be considered street talk or slang, but I also noticed that different races used this type of language also.” The students’ comments illustrate that Black Language is not acknowledged as a valid, rule-based linguistic system in their curriculum nor is it treated as a linguistic resource that is necessary for their language and literacy development, to maintain relationships with family and community, to feel assured in their sense of self, or to express their identity.””
(Baker-Bell 131-132)
Standard English is a mere preference. It is only the standard because it aligns with White American norms. Forcing African American students to abandon their language negatively impacts their self-esteem and disconnects them from their heritage. Punishing and dissuading students from speaking African American English and asking them to only use White Mainstream English is overtly pushing the white agenda and is a form of white supremacism.
In many cases, Black students are taught to code-switch. While this practice may not be explicitly taught in schools, it is pushed onto students through microaggressions and at home. For example, in schools students are penalized for using African American English causing them to feel the need to code-switch to succeed academically. Parents often teach their children to code-switch as they feel it will better their life chances in the classroom while still allowing their children to hold onto an important part of their heritage. As I mentioned earlier, code-switching, in this context, involves African American students using White Mainstream English in the classroom or with authority in general while reserving AAE for their personal lives or other informal settings. However, this is merely promoting code-switching as a survival instinct. Moreover, it is a survival instinct that doesn’t actually work. Preaching that African American students must code-switch in order to curb or dismantle white supremacism is just another form of racism. (Baker-Bell 59) Students should not fear for their grades, safety, or life chances just because they are choosing to speak another form of language other than White Mainstream English. Using code-switching as a reaction to white supremacism, especially in the classroom creates a hostile environment for students of color. Students of color feel the need to abandon their way of doing things, a valid way at that, in order to succeed academically. Even if students do code-switch, they are still punished. Claiming that students must code-switch in order to succeed is a white supremacist solution to a problem of white supremacism.
“In order to dismantle white supremacy, we have to teach students to code-switch!—Teacher If y’all actually believe that using “standard English” will dismantle white supremacy, then you not paying attention! If we, as teachers, truly believe that code-switching will dismantle white supremacy, we have a problem. If we honestly believe that code-switching will save Black people’s lives, then we really ain’t paying attention to what’s happening in the world. Eric Garner was choked to death by a police officer while saying “I cannot breathe.” Wouldn’t you consider “I cannot breathe” “standard English” syntax?”
(Baker-Bell 36-37)
The example Baker-Bell provides about Eric Garner is a very powerful one. It is a real-life and unfortunately fatal example of how code-switching and using standard English is not enough to dismantle white supremacy. To that point, fast forward to 2020, six years after the death of Eric Garner, George Floyd begs police officers to get off his neck repeating “I can’t breathe” over and over. Instilling the idea that code-switching is essential for survival is a myth. As we have seen, it is not always enough. It is an easy out for those who are looking for band-aid solutions to centuries of systemic racism. Just because Black students are taught Standard English in the classroom does not mean they are guaranteed the same life chances as White students.
Moreover, idolizing one language over another in the classroom, in this case WME, harms Black students both in and outside of the classroom. It causes Black students and teachers to internalize racism. As I’ve discussed, it is clear that Anti-Black Linguistic racism is present and detrimental to the lives of Black students and their education. That being said, it also causes extreme internalized racism beyond the school walls.
Richardson (2004) argues that when “Black students [are] taught to hate Black speech, [it] indirectly [teaches] them to hate themselves” (p. 161). This is the dehumanization that Linguistic Justice is concerned with and the problem that Anti-Black Linguistic Racism helps to name in an effort to show how Black children are marginalized, disdained, and disregarded in schools and educational spaces in and through their language… An anti-Black Language education not only contributes to Black students despising their mother tongue, but it also causes them to see themselves through a white gaze—“a way of looking and seeing the world that negates [their] value” (hooks, 1992, p. 3). (Baker-Bell 59-60)
This is not at all surprising to me. If Black students are taught to “correct” themselves when they are speaking African American English in class, this only adds to the idea that the way they were taught to speak by their families was incorrect. They are forced to view themselves from the white perspective and to comply with white standards. African American students have to work to hide and erase their identities and heritage. If a student were to use African American English in a classroom that promotes White Mainstream English, the student would do poorly, suggesting that African American English is wrong and invalid and therefore, must be avoided.
All things considered, I still must consider the viewpoint that teaching Standard English in the classroom is necessary because it adheres to the norm. There is this view that if African American students only know African American English and use it in class and everyday life, they will be put at a disadvantage considering the way that society is set up. It is important to recognize that in the United States especially, society is set up so that whites are the main beneficiaries. There is a question of whether or not it is beneficial for teachers to promote and teach their students White Mainstream English in order to prepare Black students for the current state of the U.S.. For example, much of what goes on in the classroom must be standardized. That being said, it is important to keep in mind that resources are limited. While teachers and students may want to diversify what can be classified as suitable language, there are many administrative and logistical challenges. Rebecca Wheeler author of “So Much Research, So Little Change”: Teaching Standard English in African American Classrooms” and Amanda J. Godley et al. author of “I’ll speak in proper slang”: Language ideologies in a daily editing activity” both touch on the obstacles to making the classroom more linguistically diverse. Godley discusses that schools must find better ways to incorporate the linguistic backgrounds of their students. That being said, Godley still asserts that in order to ensure that students are successful, they must incorporate their backgrounds to contextualize Standard English. (Godley 124) In order to make things fairer but also keep things standardized for simplicity, the best option may be incorporating more of every student’s linguistic background to make transitions smoother. Wheeler et al. also acknowledge that we need to diversify linguistics in the classroom but point to the fact that it is likely not realistic because of challenges related to standardized testing. On page 369, Wheeler et al. states “Current standards, tests, and curricular materials do not require teachers to distinguish pattern in vernacular dialect from error in Standard English. This article suggests that when the linguistic rubber meets the assessment road, if we do not have linguistically informed assessment tools in place, then dominant language ideology will continue to prevail in our schools.” (Wheeler et al. 369) It may be that research demonstrates that changes need to be made in order to be more inclusive of African American students in regard to linguistics. However, because of various obstacles relating to standardization, this may not be entirely practical.
That being said, promoting White Mainstream English and demonizing African American English places the burden on the oppressed and forces African Americans to address racism. It should not be on malleable students to erase their African American language and conform to White Mainstream English if they are not comfortable with doing so. Asking Black students to code-switch to fit into schools and society as a whole is ignoring the actual systemic racism, especially within the American school system. African American students already carry the burden of racism in their everyday lives. It would be inhumane to ask those same students to act white because it is simpler than addressing the root of the problem. While it may be that using African American Language in many settings may have a negative impact on success rates, that points to a systemic problem, not a problem with African American language.
In “Code-Meshing, Code-Switching, and African American Literacy” by Young et al. the authors take a different approach to the education of African American students. Code-meshing involves combining African American English and White Mainstream English in the classroom. Rather than African American students having to outright abandon their languages and identities, they are able to blend their home identity and school identity. (Young et al. 20l) Young et al. encourage code-meshing rather than code-switching because of the challenges of having students switch from one variety of English to another. (Young et al. 22) Young et al. argues that the best way to prevent sociolinguistic and educational conflicts is to have students merge their Englishes. This allows students to produce their best work from a combination of all their linguistic resources.
“As an alternative to code-switching, I argue . . . that true linguistic and identity integration would mean allowing students to do what some linguists have called code-mixing, to combine dialects, styles, and registers. Code-mixing, or what I call code-meshing means allowing Black students to mix a Black English style with an academic register. . . .This technique not only links literacy to Black culture, it meshes them together in a way that’s more in line with how people actually speak and write anyway. From this point of view, code-meshing is more natural. Writing in a form other than code-meshing creates artificiality, which might explain why some teachers can’t get some of their Black students to write lucid, vivid academic prose in the same way those teachers observe those same students communicating with each other.”
(Young et. al 22-23)
While it may be challenging to find the proper balance to make code-meshing successful, it is a strategy that honors all ways of speaking and writing. It is far more inclusive than asking African American students who use African American English to code-switch or abandon their language altogether. The code-meshing method removes some of the burden from Black students and puts it on schools and lawmakers to make the change. Code-meshing has the potential to combat white supremacism in the classroom by demonstrating that African American English is welcomed and valued.
Overall, research points to the fact that changes need to be made to make it so that African American students feel more valued in the white public space, specifically in the realm of academics. White Mainstream English being pushed as the correct and only form of language in the classroom has had detrimental effects on students of color who use African American English. Negative effects of pushing Standardized English in the classroom include putting down an African American tradition in order to promote a white one, promoting code-switching as a means for survival, and causing students and teachers of color to internalize racism in and out of the classroom. Consequences such as the ones just listed demonstrate that promoting Standard English over African American English in the classroom reinforces white supremacism. Despite research showing that change needs to be made, challenges to shifting from solely utilizing White Mainstream English are blocked by administrative issues such as standardized testing and standards of learning. That being said, a potential solution is code-meshing as it honors multiple ways of communicating and does not force African American students to adhere to the white standard. It is vital that we make changes despite foreseeable challenges. Failing to challenge the education system to be more inclusive to African American students at the systemic level is failing the Black community as a whole. We cannot continue to enforce the status quo simply because it is easier.
REFERENCES
Baker-Bell, A. (2020). Linguistic justice: Black language, literacy, identity, and pedagogy. NCTE.
Godley, A. J., Carpenter, B. D., & Werner, C. A. (2007). “I’ll speak in proper slang”: Language ideologies in a daily editing activity. Reading Research Quarterly, 42(1), 100–131. https://doi.org/10.1598/rrq.42.1.4
Hill, J. H. (1998). Language, Race, and White Public Space. American Anthropologist, 100(3), 680–689. http://www.jstor.org/stable/682046
Hooks, b. (1992). Black looks: Race and representation. Boston, MA: South EndPress.
Richardson, E. (2004). Coming from the heart: African American students, literacy stories, and rhetorical education. In E. Richardson & R. Jackson (Eds.), African American Rhetoric(s): Interdisciplinary Perspectives (pp.155–169). Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press.
Wheeler, R. (2016). “so much research, so little change”: Teaching standard English in African American classrooms. Annual Review of Linguistics, 2(1), 367–390. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-linguistics-011415-040434
Young, V. A., Barrett, R., Young-Rivera, Y. S., & Lovejoy, K. B. (2018). Other people’s English: Code-meshing, code-switching, and African American literacy. Retrieved November 18, 2022.
