WINTER 2008 MEETING TIME AND LOCATION
Arts 1426, TR 11:00 a.m.-12:15 p.m.
TEACHING ASSISTANT
Annette Harrison
Office: 3432M South Hall
Office hours: W 3:30-4:30 p.m.
arharrison@umail.ucsb.edu
DESCRIPTION
African American Vernacular English (AAVE) is the most studied dialect of English, and it is also the most controversial and the most poorly understood speech variety in the United States today. This course challenges the popular belief that AAVE is "bad grammar" or "slang" by examining the systematic structure, the rich history, and the culturally significant uses of this variety of English. The first half of the course concentrates on the structure and history of AAVE. We begin by exploring what counts as African American English and what it means to be a speaker of AAVE; we also consider the language ideologies that separate AAVE from other varieties of English, especially the idealized standard. We then turn to an examination of the structure of AAVE, including its lexicon, its phonology and prosody, and its complex grammatical system. This structural foundation allows us to assess the lively debate over the origins of AAVE, whether in an earlier creole or in contact with white English speakers. The second half of the course focuses on the interactional, social, and cultural uses of AAVE as well as the linguistic politics surrounding the variety. Starting with the everyday uses of AAVE and African American styles of discourse and interaction, we next turn to the crucial role of hip hop in circulating African American linguistic and cultural forms around the globe. We then revisit a number of educational debates regarding AAVE, from early racist arguments that African American children had a "language deficit" to current debates over the use of AAVE as a bridge to Standard English. Finally, we consider the broader cultural impact of AAVE, including how it has been represented in the media and how it has been adopted by non-African Americans as part of their social identities.
Prerequisite: Linguistics 20, 20A, or equivalent.
Linguistics 136 fulfills a course requirement in the major and minor in sociocultural linguistics.