#ihartBlackHistory: Ebony Donnely Teaches Us About Language, AAVE, and Institutionalized Racism

“The language, only the language…It is the thing that Black people love so much — the saying of the words, holding them on the tongue, experimenting with them, playing with them. It’s a love, a passion. Its function is like a preacher’s: to make you stand up out of your seat, make you lose yourself and hear yourself. The worst of all possible things that could happen would be to lose that language.”

— Toni Morrison in an 1981 interview in The New Republic

In a series called, “Black People Tell Black History,” Eb Donnelly, Ericka Hart, and friends are dedicating the entire month of February, Black History Month, to share Black history and culture. Community members are encouraged to listen, learn, share, and use the hashtag #ihartBlackhistory (yes with a capital B). Hart emphasizes to always cite your source, as well as to go deeper and expand your own knowledge past these short vignettes of Black history education.

Today is Day 2, and Eb discusses AAVE (African American Vernacular English) and says, “What’s important to note even about the term ‘African American Vernacular English,’ it presupposes that there is another English, a standard English — which linguists call ‘Standard American English.’ The only problem is that SAE is not…