Week 14: Rhetorics of Difference

This Tik Tok video by Bahamian comedian King Khloud touches on several aspects of this week's theme, the rhetorics of difference, but this post will focus on one - code switching. While most of the readings/recordings focused on groups in America whose voices are typically marginalized, from the Indigenous people of the United States to African American voices, there are similar points of convergence for people in other international communities, even those that are led by a majority that is non-white.

In the video above, the comedian engages in a "classroom" lesson whose aim is to identify the "correct" way to phrase a term that is, mostly, in standard English into the Bahamian vernacular. It is an inversion of the practice of code switching exercises which Vershawn Ashanti Young speaks adamantly against in the article, "Nah, We Straight." Instead of finding ways to "translate" Black English into what is referred to as a standard form of English, the comedian engages in the reverse, with comically dismal results. The issue in the video is that the Bahamian English phrase "Everything cool" is so rich in meaning; depending on the specific circumstances and intonation, it may have a variety of meanings that would only be immediately apparent to speakers of the language. Indeed, if Obama's scenario as presented in the article took place in The Bahamas, his "Nah, We Straight" could easily be replaced with "Everything Cool" with the same effect. Nevertheless, the skit reinforces one of Young's arguments, which is that not everything in African American English should be translatable, or more accurately, should be translated.

While Young argues for code meshing as a means to dismantle the racist ideology that privileges standard English over other forms, I think that a valid case can be made to recognize the Black/African American languages as distinctly separate and to be kept that way as a means to recognize their inherent value and uniqueness. After all, no one would recommend the code meshing of the language of a Spanish speaker, for example, with that of an English one due to the recognition that they are separate languages. When African American English words do become a part of the standard for whatever reason, which may be perceived as meshing, for example, as "bling" was added to the dictionary, it should be perceived no differently as when a foreign phrase becomes a part of the English corpus, like the French term Deja vu. Therefore, unlike Young, I believe there is value in maintaining a separation, but there must be intention concerning the messaging that surrounds African American dialects.

Nevertheless, the reach of the powerful is great. As sociolinguist scholar Max Weinreich repeated after hearing it from a member of the audience at one of his lectures in the 1940s, the difference between what is considered a language and what is considered a dialect is arbitrary as a language is simply a dialect with an army and navy behind it.. It is no wonder then that even in a small independent nation like The Bahamas, its dialect is considered inappropriate in formal settings in favor of standard English. However, the factors surrounding forms of English are compounded in interesting ways because of the country's former connection to Great Britain and its proximity to the United States. As a result, it's not unusual to find Bahamian students grappling with choices relating to British English or American English: Should it be written recognise or recognize? Should they write color or colour? The issue came to fore several years ago  with the headlines of two major newspapers quoting the Prime Minister's words after a devastating storm:

As Milson-Whyte, Oenbring and Jacquette explain in "Hurricanes, Colonialism and Language," (image also theirs) the seriousness of the news event was temporarily hijacked by two competing local papers using British and American spelling of the word unlivable (For more see Creole Composition: Academic Writing and Rhetoric.in the Anglophone Caribbean, Parlor Press 2021).

This underscores the need for the expansion of rhetorics of difference, where language choices made reflect the intention and identity of the communicators. Such rhetoric does not simply come about as "The Revolution Will not Be Televised" reminds us. There must be intentional choices by the state to recognize, value and celebrate languages as truly valuable and independent and not simply a non-standard form of another.