The class has been centered around topics of AAVE such as it's use and history in a academic viewpoint. For my last project I'd like to bring a lot of information learned from the paper we've just finished. The topic will be the use of AAVE in education of certain students from and AAVE background and the ignorance to how beneficial to a educational system this could be.

My audience for the project will be parents of students from both AAVE background and the standard white background. This audience won't be too broad and it makes sense to produce evidence to teach the people of this audience about AAVE and it's potential use in school.

Some of the sources that I will use for the project are:
1.Jessica, Whitney. "Five Easy Pieces: Steps toward Integrating AAVE into the Classroom ". JSTOR. 4-6-09 .

2. Nembhard, Judith. "A Perspective on Teaching Black Dialect Speaking Students to Write Standard English". A Reader for Writers. McGraw-Hill, 2008.




I will set the overall design template as a packet for the audience so that they can get a general understanding of he information contained.

DW3b

For this assignment I am using a reading from JSTOR. The title is "Five Easy Pieces: Steps toward Integrating AAVE into the Classroom" by Jessica Whitney. At the beginning, we are immediately told that the author is a white teacher with a slight obsession with the AAVE controversy within schools. She says that she is in the same boat as the rest of her fellow teachers that have problems teaching AAVE users in the classroom. She explains that the general opinion about AAVE is just as confused on the topic as it has always been. She believes everyone has an opinion on the matter but the truth is that it is a problem in today's education system that needs to be dealt with. The point of this article is to provide steps for other teachers in her position trying to properly teach students that use AAVE at home and in the classroom.

The author cites quotes and ideas from both sides of the argument of letting AAVE in schools. She cites Bill Cosby, Geneva Smitherman, Rickford, and other linguists and high profile individuals. She also cites the Linguistic Society of America with it's support of the linguistic system of Ebonics.The opinion of the society is that it is "systematic, the result of regular rules and restrictions; they are not random error." While others on the other side of the opinion spectrum call it a "debunking of Western Culture".

The article supports the use of AAVE in the process of educating in the classroom. "Working with student's home language instead of against it, is crucial to ensuring student's success." The author states that the main problem that AAVE has against it is just the ignorance of the educators toward AAVE. They lack understanding and reject what could potentially help them with their goal to properly teach the students that they have deemed slow or unable to understand.

This article effectively puts out an argument supporting the use of AAVE in America's education system. The steps that the author is creating are there to help the educator better their student's Standard English in the classroom by implementing AAVE in the educating process.

Summarize the author's main idea, supporting evidence of that idea, and how you think it discusses scholarship of AAVE/AAL in composition studies. What does the reading seem to say about AAVE/AAL? Does it effectively make an argument about it's role in composition studies? If so, how? If not, what's missing?

For this assignment I chose to use "A Perspective on Teaching Black Dialect Speaking Students to Write Standard English" by Judith Nembhardt. Basically, she is writing about how teachers in our schools are constantly being trained to teach kids how to write more effectively in workshops and meetings, but they don't know how to effectively work with a child with an AAVE background. Students that speak AAVE at home are labeled as "nontraditional", "culturally different", or "linguistically different". She answers the question of: "Can black students be carried along on the wave of improvement?"

The author believes just by dropping the labels, and even though it'll be a hard task, it is possible to make effective writers of the AAVE students. This writing approaches AAVE scholarship as unacceptable. The students must adhere to the standard English that they are taught in the school. "Children without standard American English are handicapped directly." Not so unacceptable as to destroy it, just to enhance the school language but also let them speak the way they'd like to culturally. The idea of teaching students how to write effectively is a more appropriate strategy then to uproot their cultural habits of language. It is more effective to teach them to write their ideas more creatively then to make students adhere to rules that they don't understand.

This reading successfully makes an argument about the use of AAVE in composition studies. The topic dealing with composition studies is education in the schools of America. What she is talking about is a possible situation where the teachers were more confident and were not intimidated by the fact that it would be tough to teach these sorts of students. She even outlines her own eight essential components of a teaching plan. She uses quotes and information from linguists such as P.A. Ramey, Joan Baratz, Roger Shuy, and WIlliam Labov.

IAR2

"Taking Black Technology Use Seriously: African American Discursive Traditions In the Digital Underground" -Adam J. Banks

What is invention?
-research on AAVE (history and analysis)
-writings and opinions of known sociolinguists such as the Rickfords, Smitherman, Gilyard and Crawford
-sites and popular culture related to AAVE
-how AAVE is used personally with users

What is being invented?
-technology dismisses the possibility of different cultures
-technology is used as an outlet for african americans to reveal culture
-no need for just a "white" culture on the internet
-develop online communities where users can relate with culture
-AAVE is a legitimate idea used with technology

What is being arranged?
-research to actual use
-examples of AAVE
-"underground culture" vs. mainstream
-real culture vs fake mainstream

What is arrangement?
-use of examples from users
-quoting research and explaining further
-lists of how to master development

What is being revised?
-technology should grow to help understand equal representation of different cultures
-the idea of policing to "white" standards
-idea of a digital divide
-somewhat of an underground even though it is well known, but still not fully accepted

What is revision?
-users opinions from websites that support the writers opinions
-use of information from sociolinguists
-easy to relate with real examples of what he is writing about

DW2.b

DO they represent AAVE similarly or differently in these spaces? In what ways?

For my first blog, I used the blogs that I found in the news section of bet.com. The examples that I found of AAVE being used are similar what the article written by Knadler explains. The people that I used and their quotes are located in a comfortable environment where they are not judged by what they look like or anything like that. Clearly they can be themselves and bring out their cultural differences against the "norm" without the fear of being ridiculed such as if they would bring it out in an office or school. Knadler says that in his writing, he will:

"examine—through a close analysis of student Web-based portfolios—how African-American women, who often must mask their “Blackness” within white workplace or school settings, hold onto sets of experience, memories, and cultural signs when they present themselves online, appropriating e-space as a site of resistant memory."

This quote is significant because it quickly summarizes the reasons for the difference of speech and writing that we find in professional "white" settings compared to the cultural AAVE settings. People are expected to hold in their own experiences and culture just so that others won't judge them as inferior because of the way they really are. A quote from one of Knadler's students simply puts the opinion of most when they are writing in an internet setting. "I want the reader to feel my writing. I don’t want to sound like the Wall Street Journal. That’s not me." (LaChia 236). The quote is significant because users of sites like these that appropriate AAVE don't just want to connect with the readers' minds, they want to "feel" each other in their writings. They purposely type in a style of talking like they would with a good friend of family member, as to make their race and culture evident through their writing. Technology enables this easily because nobody has to apologize for being themselves and acting a certain way against the set norm. People can understand others, and sometimes themselves, easily because they are more comfortable to be real.

The examples found on bet.com are the opinions of people being real about the happenings of celebrities in popular culture. There is no teacher, coworker, or boss watching them and making judgements about their speech. They are basically free to do whatever they want. People can even be someone else, like someone they want to be. They can be different then how they really are in the same situations in real life. Knadler also points out that writing on the internet with AAVE gives students "an increased sense of student responsibility and empowerment". (Knadler 237) The study that he did showed that many of the students really got a lot out of writing how they felt, without the worry of a grader or following any grammatical rules.

DW2.a

As Banks started to discuss his points on BlackPlanet.com, he states that the title of the technology implies a certain thing. The name of Blackplanet.com would imply that it is a form of technology that is Black specific and not directed toward the mainstream White user. This makes it some sort of "underground community" where users can do certain things not usually acceptable with the mainstream. The website bet.com is similar to Black Planet because it is an acronym of "Black Entertainment Television" and with that title it implies that it is not mainstream and is mainly for the majority of Black people. Sites and technological things such as this provide a safe haven where nobody is judged on your grammar or how you say anything. The ideas spread around are real and you don't have to fake conforming to a higher standard of language.

Obviously, AAVE or some other forms of it will be appropriated(used) within this website when describing their topics of discussion. The website is based off of a television channel and is very popular with Black and White people. The topics of the shows range from news to music videos. While looking in the news blog section of the website, an article with some recent news about Chris Brown caught my eye.

The article was entitled "Chris Brown Finally Releases Statement..." On these articles users are able to comment and share their thoughts about whatever the article is about. I found some examples of AAVE while looking at these user comments. A user named "BRO 4 REAL" said "any man that hit a women is a ~*##$ . An would neva fite a man. so that make chris a ~*##$ ~*##$ ~*##$. AN THAT 4 REAL." These are very simple grammar mistakes in Standard English and some endings of the words are cut off, which is common in AAVE. There are tonal semantics being used with the capitalization of the ending to provide a more emotional emphasis which proves the point further. They are disapproving of Chris Browns actions earlier in the week and are venting their opinions like everyone else.

The next comment that I found was from the user kyonnis. "IM SORRY WAY YALL IS GOIN THROW.THER IZ ALOT OF RUMORS AND TELL THE TRUTH NOBODY NO WATS GOIN ON.BUT THE ONES THAT IHAVE BEEN HEARIN IS SUM SERIOUS STUFF AND IF THEY IS TRUTH RIHANNA U I WRONG……………." The whole comment is capitalized to provide more "gravity" with his/her statements. Like the last quote I used in the previous paragraph, there are a lot of endings of words that are dropped for convenience or laziness. This user is more in the middle of opinions toward the situation. While he seems reasonable in his words, because of the capitalization it seems like he is very emotional if we look at it from a “tonal semantics” point of view.

DW1.b

In Chapter 3 of A Reader for Writers Keith Gilyard explains his personal experiences with Black English further with "Rapping, Reading, and Roleplaying". Throughout the text, Gilyard provides citations and examples to further certify that Black English itself is a "legitimate linguistic system and not merely a collection of verbal aberrations arrived at by the reckless violation of the rules of a so-called superior variety of English"(Gilyard pg.25).

This idea got me thinking about the language that I was taught to use at home and school in comparison to the ideas of the chapter. I had always thought that this structure of English that I learned was the only correct form to use. Any variation of this was wrong or just had an underlying purpose about it such as nonconformity or individuality. Maybe it was peoples' reaction to years of oppression by a higher government. The differences of Standard English and Black English brought up in Gilyards essays are very interesting because he doesn't look at Black English from the angle that I see it as. He grew up around it and sees them as not the same by grammar and sentence structure, but by meaning and the people that you are around understanding what you're saying. "We will make mistakes of course, but the point is that the mistakes are insignificant if they don't interfere with actual meaning."(Gilyard pg.31). It seems to me that Black English is mostly a simplified version of the Standard English. The sounds of the vowels and past tense and such is much simpler. He goes on to say that all of the forms of English are intermingled and that it is impossible for a language to remain pure. So in theory, if language is constantly changing then there couldn't possibly be a "right" or standard English to use.

In my first writing, I provided an example of how people judge by the way other people speak. Every region of the U.S. has it's own accent and different versions of certain words that we all learn from our household language. A lot of people, while first meeting you, might find it funny and make assumptions about you based on stereotypes before they even know you. Gilyard would definitely agree and add a lot more to the idea of a different "home" language that I wrote about. He would know, from his own personal experiences, about coming to a new environment and having to learn the ability to be bidialectal and open to certain situations within that new environment.