Is Black Slang a Negative or Positive Representation of Black Language?

I grew up in the United States where there is usually only one form of English spoken.

This is the Standard American English in which I was taught from kindergarten until now, my

final year of university. It wasn’t even until my second or third year of college that I started to

understand the depth of African American Vernacular English (AAVE). It is impossible in this

country to not have any interaction with AAVE. Since I’ve acquired a better understanding of the

history and dynamics of AAVE, there are certain things which I once thought be true, that are no

longer valid. I remember when I was high school, and my mother, whose mother tongue is not

English, was telling me that one of her coworkers said her shoes were “bad”. My mom wasn’t

sure what her coworker meant when she said “those shoes are bad”, but I understood the term. I,

ignorantly but innocently, explained to my mom that it was slang meaning her shoes were nice.

From this experiences and what I’ve learned about AAVE, it is hard to determine whether Black

Slang is negative or positive part of Black Language. The fact of the matter is that Black Slang

on its own is a neutral entity. Slang, in general, is merely a function of language that reflects the

culture of a specific group during a specific time. Black Slang is simply a part of Black

Language which means that the slang itself is neither negative or positive; however, the whole

notion of positive or negative is very much dependent on who you ask.

If you ask anyone who is uneducated or unaware of Black Vernacular what they think

about it, you will more than likely encounter someone who says it’s slang. I would argue that

confusing AAVE with slang would be a mild misinterpretation, because many would argue that

AAVE is ignorant, uneducated, illogical, and many other negative interpretations. They would

argue this because mainstream society refuses to acknowledge that African American culture and

language is different from mainstream, white culture. This misinterpretation and sometimes
downright erasure of AAVE is a result of a society that perpetrates white supremacy, even

decades after the Civil Rights Movement. The common argument that AAVE is not a real

language, is improper, ignorant, or uneducated is one example of the perpetration of white

supremacy. After all, it is silly to classify a language deeply rooted in the Atlantic Slave Trade as

merely slang. It is even sillier to argue that one language is superior to another, because it sounds

more “educated”. What sounds educated or uneducated is human perception; because, as many

have argued in the past, language is merely a slippery slope of meaning.

The idea of language as a slippery slope of meaning seems absurd considering language

is our only means of navigating our world, but many have come up with theories about the

unreliability of language. Theories around language are often complex and divisive, but I want to

discuss one theory, Deconstruction. This a theory proposed by the French linguist and

philosopher, Jacques Derrida. Deconstruction says that “language is not the reliable tool we

believe it to be, but rather a fluid, ambiguous domain of complex experience in which ideologies

program us without being aware of the” (Tyson 235). The notion of deconstruction relies on the

structuralist ideas of sign, signified, and signifier. The sign is the actual word, the signifier is the

written or pronounced letters as a unit, and the signified is the concept or image of the word

(Tyson 237). Deconstructing language requires a person to find the ambiguities of language. For

example, to a deconstructionist, the signified is somewhat mythological. What I mean when I say

that the signified is mythological is that concepts are merely chains of signifiers. Chains of

signifiers are signifiers that we associate with other signifiers, and so on and so forth, so that we

never truly reach a signified/concept. Deconstruction claims that language “refers neither to

things in the world nor to our concepts of things but only to the play of signifiers of which

language itself consists” (Tyson 238). The theory of deconstruction can often leave a person
disillusioned about language, but ultimately language still defines our reality. With all this said,

how does the positivity or negativity of Black Slang and Black Language relate to the theory of

Deconstruction?

I brought up the theory of Deconstruction to highlight the absurdity of society’s

downgrading of Black Language simply because it isn’t Standard English. While Deconstruction

is merely a theory on language, there is also little that suggests that Standard English is the most

logical and correct form of English. What form English we deem logical and correct is belief not

fact. We cannot separate ourselves from our language because it colors our understanding of the

world, but that doesn’t make one form of a language superior to another. The simple fact is that

language is a tool that is shaped by experience and ideology. Black English functions no

differently than Standard English, as they are both methods of communication that are formed by

ideology and experience. To demote Black English to something as fleeting as slang is to erase

an entire history and tradition. Black English is deeply rooted in history of oppression, and Black

English was formed as survival tool for slaves to speak freely in front of their masters. Black

English is often characterized by oppositional meanings to English words which a form of coded

language used by slaves to discuss their business openly. With this coded language, an entire

clandestine, culture developed. Black English is a culmination of centuries of oppression, and the

culture that arose from this oppression. This is the ideology and history that shaped Black

English, so it is asinine to deem Black English as slang. It is asinine to deem Black English as

illogical and uneducated, because this language is a language of survival. It was created to

exclude slave masters and unify slaves. Sure, many African Americans weren’t literate in

Standard English, but they used the language they had to survive. Given the deep history Black

English, it is far too established to be “slang”.

 Slang has a very negative connotation in our society, but it is neutral. Black slang is both

a negative and positive representation of Black Language. Slang captures a moment of language

and culture, and Black Slang is positive because it reflects Black culture. Slang captures what

was important in culture at the time. If you look at Black slang in the 1920s and compare it to

slang of today, the culture of the time is reflected. This helps build an overarching narrative or

history. Black Slang can be negative, not necessarily with the slang or language itself but with

the way that language is perceived. The belief that Black Language is slang can be incredibly

damaging. Economic success is dependent on standard literacy, and literacy in Standard English

often comes with rejection of Black Language. In order for African Americans to be successful

in society, they must become literate in Standard English and risk losing their language and

culture. Black slang, which is almost always perceived negatively, can make Black Language

look bad by further fueling the belief that Black Language is illogical or uneducated. Despite this

downside, Black Slang is still not a negative representation of Black Language, but the

conflation of Black Language and Black Slang is negative. Black Slang as a representation of

Black Language is both good and bad. There are many positive functions of Black Slang like

preservation of culture, and there are bad things about Black Slang like poor perception by the

dominant culture. Ultimately, Black Slang is only one part of Black Language.

Works Cited
Tyson, Louis. Critical Theory Today: A User-Friendly Guide. 3rd ed. New York: Routledge,

2015. Print.