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A Bit More on American Vernacular English I am fascinated with dialects and where they came from. I like the history behind a culture to find look for clues as to why it has occurred. From McLucas’ web site that he created in 1996 I found out that there are two schools of thought as to how A. A. V. E. came about. One is the dialect and the other the Creole train of thought. We learned in class that some scholars thought that the dialect could have developed due to West African Slaves that were settled in the West Indies. These slaves developed their own form of English as they attempted to learn the language. The Creole theory involves assimilation of the grammar from the language of the conquered (the African slaves) and vocabulary of the conquerors (the slave traders). “To be able to communicate in some fashion they developed a pidgin by applying English and some West African vocabulary to the familiar grammar rules of their native tongue. This pidgin was passed on to future generations, and as soon as it became the primary language of it's speakers it is classified as a Creole” (McLucas, “African American Vernacular English”). As the years have gone by, per McLucas, the pidgin has slowly been replaced with a more standard sounding form of language close to Standard English. I found his the link to the syntax of A. A. V. E. easy to read and quick to understand. I have heard several of these used by co-workers during my former employment. Syntactic Features 1. Copula Deletion, or Variation 2. They Possessive 3. It Expletive 4. Gon 5. Multiple Negation 6. Aspectual Verb -s Suffix 7. Pronominal Apposition 8. Perfective, or Completive, done 9. Stressed, or Remotive, been 10.Aspectual, or Immutable, be 11.Future be 12.Future Perfective be done 13.Aspectual steady
The easiest example I can remember from class was “He be steady working at the store” which in Standard English would be spoken as “He has been working at the store for some time now.” I have heard at work in the break-room, “You be com’in to the party?” which would be spoken in Standard English as “Are you coming to the party?” I did not question this form English growing up in Lima. It could be due to the African American friends I have known for years and my early exposure to this way of speaking. I find it more musical to listen to than Standard English. Works Cited McLucas, Bryan. African American Vernacular English. 1996. University of Georgia. 10 December, 2008 <http://bryan.myweb.uga.edu/AAVE/>.
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