Week 9, Post 1: quiz

Take-home quiz:

What is the STROL resolution? Why was it introduced? And how has it played out over the past 40 years?
What main criticisms of SRTOL?
What are the main criticism of the  the notion of "Standard English"?
In the English classroom, what tensions might dialect speakers experience when they have to write in "standard English" and what can English teachers do to reduce those tensions?
What are some of the strategies that AAVE speakers use to navigate/negotiate their identity in an environment where standard English is "forced" upon them?

The Students' Rights to Their Own Language resolution (CCCC) says that each cultural group has a right to know, study about and feel proud about its culture and accompanying dialect, and to be aware that SE is by no means superior to other dialects.

It was introduced along with the spirit of the 60s civil rights to try to ensure that the rights provided by civil rights legislation would not be Jim Crowed into meaninglessness, since it's a widely held notion that a culture's honor and dignity begins with upholding its language.

The impact over the years has been to isolate one group against the other, essentially, breeding some degree of pride for the Black community and, at the same time, much unrest within and without.

Criticisms of SRTOL say that it gives students a false sense of security, since it tends to leave uncorrected some communication behaviors that can invite future obstacles.  As far as the overall school curriculum, teaching Ebonics or any other language in the classroom, other than the standard discourse spoken by the teacher is totally unprecedented.  For example, if a student wanted to learn a computer language, he would not be permitted to communicate in a computer language of his own choosing.  Also, historically, the classroom is the place where we are corrected; this is practically a definition of the classroom; Ebonics, though says that the student is always right and is above correction.  Other criticisms hold that Ebonics shames teachers, it "dummy-down"s the curriculum, creates more stereotypes and, finally, increases segregation.

The criticisms of SE are: a) that SSE and SWE are roughly equivalent, b) standardization is possible, c) that SSE is the language of the workplace, d) that SSE is or should be the language of the classroom.

Many minority students grow up feeling conflicted about their own dialects, whether it's Jamaican patois or AAVE.  Many such students feel inferior because their family or perhaps previous teachers spoke ill to them about their speech or writing.  At the same time, many people in these peoples' communities denigrate each other for language and many other such "low class" trappings.  These neighborhoods also boost the notion that NOT speaking home dialect equals "gettin' above your raisin'," e.g. "selling out" to "the man."

By following some of the techniques in Shafer's article and by carrying out ethnographic studies, students can learn to embrace their own language and culture with pride.

Some students, sadly, subvert their own personalities or cultures, "losing" themselves in a false identity in an attempt to please teachers and other gatekeepers.  Other students, like Korie, flat out rebel against school in general, saying things like, "I don't do no book reports," even if rebel-without-a clear-cut-cause attitude has no specific agenda, even if it ends up damaging the student and his future.  Others, like Maggie, live in a kind of denial, telling themselves that they never need to speak non-AAVE, although, in fact, they do so unconsciously with teachers and other officials.  Still, other students, like Norris, adopt a kind of "camouflage," putting on a "crazy" act to deflect the heckles of his Black neighbors, befriending dangerous toughs at school, whom he uses for protection, all the while remaing true to his long-term goal of college-bound success, and speaking SE as best he can.