AAVE

Nagy Levente
J71ZTV
Black English
Black English, also known as African-American Vernacular English (AAVE) or Ebonics, is sometimes
mistaken for only a slang version of English. Indeed AAVE has some slang terminology, for example, fa
shizzle, which means for sure, or the idiom off the hook, which means something is really good.
However, AAVE is more than that, it has systematic features, and from the linguistic point to view,
slang is its least exciting characteristic. Moreover, AAVE is also a sound system (it has a different
sound system as compared to standard English).
AAVE’s different sound system does not make it a substandard language variety. To mention a
sound difference, with is a worthy example. Both British and American English speakers utter with as
follows: /wɪð/. Nevertheless, the way AAVE speakers pronounce it is /wɪf/. Regarding pronunciation,
both (or all three) varieties have one sound at the end, /ð/ and /f/, which has nothing to do with the
word’s spelled version with the letters t and h at the end. Other simplified pronunciational differences
include the word, for instance, west (StE /west/; AAVE /wes/).
There are cases when AAVE’s sound system is more complex than the standard version’s. For
instance, the word bill is uttered differently as compared to standard English (/bɪl/). AAVE speakers
utter a diphthong in the middle of the word instead of simply using the /ɪ/ sound. Their pronunciation
sounds something like /bɪәl/. Other than the sound system, AAVE has its unique grammar.
In some places, AAVE grammar is less complicated than Standard English. To mention an
example, they use to be different. Instead of saying she is my sister, they would say she my sister.
There are cases when AAVE is more advanced in terms of grammar than Standard English. Be in She
be walking to the store expresses frequency; she walks to the store on a regular basis. In this case, be
is a habitual marker (but it is not common knowledge among AAVE speakers; only those know who
have some level of linguistic knowledge). When an AAVE speaker sees an unknown woman walking
down the street towards a store, they would say she walkin’ to the store, and not she be walkin’ to
the store (due to the lack of knowledge about her shopping habits). In Standard English, habitual
activities are expressed through the simple present: she walks to the store (every day).
Back in the 60s, it was believed that AAVE is an African language with some English
vocabulary rather than an English variety. Those saying it is not an English version argued that the 3rd
person singular could be omitted in AAVE: I walk, you walk, he walk, we walk, y’all walk, they walk. It
reminded scholars about the lack of suffixation in African languages in contrast with Indo-European
ones with substantial affixation. AAVE pluralization also supports it being an English version. If it were
a creole, it would not take up the English popularization system, for example, man/men,
woman/women, or foot/feet. Moreover, in terms of morphology, AAVE kept the English past
variations. AAVE speakers would not say I goed to the store, but stick to the standard I went to the
store. Despite most of the speaker’s skin color, AAVE has hardly anything to do with African
languages.
Other than whether it is English variety or not, there was a controversy about AAVE’s history.
Some scholars argued that it had started as Creole. In the case of AAVE, there is no evidence of its
origin due to the speakers’ treatment in the past. There were no scholars inclined to discuss the topic.
Linguists only became interested in studying the ways AAVE works in the second half of the 20th
century. Many academics say that AAVE was a Creole, to be more specific, Gullah. According to their
idea, where AAVE is spoken today, their ancestors spoke Gullah, which would be their native
language. To examine this theory’s accuracy, linguists checked where African-American ex-slaves
were sent after Emancipation. These places were: Nova Scotia, Liberia, and the Dominican Republic.
The idea was that if groups of people speaking Gullah were moved to someplace else, today, we
would find them speaking a language with Gullah features. In this case, the Dominican Republic is
peculiar because the native language there is Spanish. Therefore, the idea was that there would be
no one who could mix their language with Standard English. It turned out that those underprivileged
African-American people who live in the Dominican Republic speak similarly to those using AAVE.
Interestingly enough, AAVE might have connections with the varieties spoken in the United
Kingdom. For instance, the use of be when expressing regularity is a characteristic of Irish English as
well (Even when I be around with friends, I be scared). These similarities do not involve slang
expressions but grammar and sound systems. There is a theory that miscegenation occurred among
African-American and UK English speakers while working together. Moreover, the majority of
landowners were from somewhere other than upper social circles.

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