Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community - View Single Post - Ultimate Bill Cosby Thread: Blacks can't speak English

water_boy1999 · 06-08-2004, 10:21 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by rat
As someone who lives in what's considered the "Deep South" (Texas), and has spent time in several of the surrounding states (Louisiana, Arkansas, and a couple others) as well as having lived in Chicago for 7 years, I can say that there are places everywhere I've been where people spoke such a mangled form of English that I could barely understand them.

For those of you who have seen My Cousin Vinny please recall the "two yutes" scene. In Bahstahn, it's cah pahk and bah, not car park and bar. In Texas it's "y'all git on inside 'fore I have t' lay int' y'all." I have been to some extremely "backwoods" parts of this fine state, and there are people that even I, as a native Texan, have trouble understanding unless I listen extremely closely.

Additionally, there's a guy at the local bar from London, and when he's in his pints and gets going, Ed is barely intelligible to me. I've been around quite a few Englishmen, as well as conversed with many via online mediums, and British English, Irish English, Scottish English, and American English are four very different languages when it comes to syntax, grammar, spelling and idiomatic expressions.

There is NO single English lexicon. However, BEV (Black English Vernacular) is simply a bastardization of the language to the point of being unintelligible to anyone who isn't immersed in it.

Regarding Cosby's statements, I couldn't agree more with both his words and his choice of venue to share them. This is a man who's spent his life becoming an educated and respected man, has held his doctorate for over 25 years in (of all things, GASP!) Education, and may just have some knowledge about the conditions of lower-middle class black americans when it comes to their economic/educational status in this nation.

Good points made Rat. One of my good friends and soon to be neighbors is Black. He is 23, a former college ball player, and just a cool cat all around. However, he speaks like he still lives in Inglewood. What I mean by this is he speaks ebonics. "What up yo?" "Whass checkin dog?" I know what he means because he is my friend, but I have often though about the job situation. Being IN the staffing industry, I wonder how far he wants to go or what type of work he eventually wants to settle into. I also think about the employer and what their first impression of the guy is because is the way he talks. I think very highly of my friend, but I also know he is putting up barriers for himself because of the way he talks sometimes. It isn't every day that I run into a black CTO, CEO, CIO of a company and they greet me with a, "What up E-Dawg?"