Heather S. McIntosh
Spring 1999
Engl 390

 
Dialect Differences and Social Prejudice


After administering our edition of Maxine Hairston’s study, several important data patterns emerged; men and women showed very slight percentage differences in their responses to "errors", and the generations become more "error-tolerant" as the years go by. Most interesting, though, is the confirmation that people of all ages and sexes are significantly bothered by the use of nonstandard dialects. What linguists have argued, and what I find supported in the results of our survey, is that this response is not so much due to actual language inferiority as social prejudice.

Of the 28 people who responded to our survey, 78% of them stated that they were "bothered a lot" by sentences containing the use of a nonstandard dialect. This is an astronomical figure given the 12% that were only bothered "somewhat", the 4% that saw the "error" but were not bothered by it, and the 7% that didn’t acknowledge the "error". In all categories, this type of grammar deviation was least acceptable to readers, of all the polled "error" types.

Surprisingly, men and women seemed equally opposed to the use of nonstandard dialects--79% of females were heavily bothered by it, compared to the 76% of males that were. Given today’s statements regarding the verbal abilities of women being naturally greater than men, this is pleasantly surprising; the differences are not at all great between them. What these numbers ultimately tell us is that we don’t need to worry much about "gender" influences on the survey; this is fortunate, because it eliminates a variable that could affect the survey’s results.

The resistance to nonstandard dialect usage is also present throughout the generations; 88% of those who are 55 and above were very bothered by such usages, whereas 76% of those the ages of 35-55 were. Most tolerant of nonstandard dialect usage were those between the ages of 18 and 35; although still very high, only 75% of those polled were very bothered by this type of sentence "error." However, it is a comfort noting that although intolerance for this type of deviation is high for all of the generations, it decreases from generation to generation.

Further supporting the idea that nearly all classes of people react negatively to the use of nonstandard dialects is the data that explains the responses of the respondents according to profession. There are very small differences in the degrees to which professionals of various types were bothered by this "error". College professors seemed the most disturbed by it at 82%, while 77% of business people, 76% of high school teachers, and 70% of middle school teachers were. While college professors do seem a good deal stricter than the other occupational groups, the differences are only relatively significant; members of all of the polled groups rate this "error" extremely bothersome.

As is seen, lack of acceptance of nonstandard dialects is widespread—no one people group is involved. Interesting, though, is the aforementioned idea that this lack of acceptance may not be so much due to communication of concepts as communication of social status—a line of thinking which seems born out in our survey results. J. R. Edwards supports this idea with the following:

Two studies by Giles and his colleagues…suggest that judgements of the quality and prestige of language varieties are dependent upon a knowledge of the social connotations which they possess for those familiar with them. Thus…we consider that evaluations of language varieties—dialects and accents—do not reflect either linguistic or aesthetic quality per se, but rather are expressions of social convention and preference which, in turn, reflect an awareness of the status and prestige accorded to the speakers of these varieties. (Edwards 21) With thought, this statement makes a good deal of sense. What about a person’s dialect could possibly be bothersome, provided that communication was successfully completed? It is true that some writing styles are said to be nicer to read, but these preferences are very subjective. Whether one prefers one writing style over another is a matter of education and experience, much like other types of "error", and is not a function of the language itself. Our survey results seem to support Edward’s theory; while so many respondents reacted very negatively to the use of nonstandard dialects, not nearly so many responded as strongly, or as negatively, to the types of "misuses" that could contribute to the dialect. For example, our respondents had not nearly as many issues with informality of style, dialect evolution, or spelling. These were noted as being bothersome, but not nearly to the same degree as nonstandard dialects. The strength and negativity with which respondents reacted to the use of nonstandard dialects compared to every other kind of "error" seems to indicate that something else is indeed going on.

In True Grammar, Johanna Rubba further clarifies the idea that what makes repondents react so negatively to nonstandard dialect is not language, but rather the socioeconomic position indicated by the use of the dialect:

Linguists have studied the social status of different dialects in many countries; a consistent pattern emerges: the dialects of disfavored classes such as rural people or those of lower socioeconomic status are universally disfavored and become the ‘bad’ form of that country’s language, while the dialects of the urban, wealthy, well-educated and politically powerful groups are favored as the ‘good’ form of the language. (Rubba 113) What Rubba is effectively saying is that users of the standard form of English respond negatively to nonstandard forms of English because the "dialects" indicate a lower class of person. It is commonly the person that is reacted to, and not the way that they are communicating.

Given that we polled only those who are expected to know and teach the standard dialect of English, it seems logical that these people would be more adamant about maintaining its "correctness"—their job simply depends upon it. But what should be a teacher’s job? Is it to maintain a grammar standard over the ages, or to equip our children with the necessary tools to succeed? Because the standard dialect of English is that of the upper, educated classes, usually only those who speak it have a fair chance of succeeding. Those who do not speak it will not be given the same preferences that are given to those that society perceives to be intelligent, or empowered. Therefore, it seems to makes sense that all children should be given the opportunity to learn this standard dialect, so that they will not be socially and economically penalized for the way that they speak. Lisa Delpit, in "Other People’s Children: Cultural Conflict in the Classroom", argues this very point:

All students deserve the right both to develop the linguistic skills they bring to the classroom and to add others to their repertoires. While linguists have long proclaimed that no language variety if intrinsically "better" than another, in a stratefied society such as ours, language choices are not neutral. The language associated with the power structure—"Standard English"—is the language of economic success, and all stduents have the right to schooling that gives them access to that language. (Delpit 68) At the same time, though, children should be taught that their use of nonstandard dialects is not inherently "wrong". As Delpit again points out, "teachers need to support the language that students bring to school, provide them input form an additional code, and give them the opportunity to use the new code in a non-threatening, real communicative context" (Delpit 53).

It is a teacher’s job not to put the students down or frustrate them, but to encourage them in what they already know and add that which is not present which is necessary for their success.

This survey, and the research that I have done as a result of it, has changed many of my initial opinions regarding the use of nonstandard dialects. The most profound effect has been that my brain seems to be going back and pulling all the files in which I judged someone unfairly because of the way they spoke. As I suspect is true with many, such occasions are many. I have since thought of all kinds of the television shows and movies and jokes told in idle moments that caught a laugh because of the association made with the way someone spoke to gang-banging or inbreeding. I didn’t know before that dialects are formed systematically, or that errors made by humans, in general, are not at all illogical. While these new ideas have encouraged me to let children speak in their own dialect in class without judgement, like Maxine Hairston, "I think that we cannot afford to let students leave our classrooms thinking that surface features of discourse do not matter" (Hairston 799). We cannot overlook the fact that not everyone is aware of these things, and that, as evidenced by the results to our survey, the majority of society still comes down very hard on those who do not know or refuse to speak the standard dialect. To avoid these problems, I too feel that children should be accepted for who they are, praised for what they have already accomplished, and given additional tools to secure further success. For all the problems and discussions that this topic has caused, it is odd to me how simple the solution seems.

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