Let Me Speak: Including English Dialects in the Classroom

by Jessica Jenson

There are at least 38 English dialects spoken in students' homes across the United States. As English instructors, are we doing our students a disservice by correcting their native tongue just because it varies from the standard dialect?

"Speak Now," an art piece I created for my multi-cultural education
 class, represents my hope that regardless of my students' race,
ethnicity, or dialect, their voices will be heard and valued.

My great-grandmother was a high school English teacher in a town with a population smaller than my graduating class. Her students were fresh from farm fields and oil rigs, and they spoke the dialect of their country upbringing. "Ain't" and other such offenses were the norm—except in Grandma's classroom. Her instruction became well known for cleaning up her students' English and transforming them from rough field hands to well-spoken intellectuals.

While I admire my great-grandmother and the English instructors like her, the emphasis on eradicating English dialects concerns me. As I have prepared to become an English teacher, I have come to believe that English instruction should focus on the development of the students' communication and critical thinking skills, not the destruction of their language. Teachers in today's multi-cultural setting should be more accepting of non-standard dialects. Although this shift will be difficult for many of today's educators, the inclusion of all English dialects will increase student engagement, aid comprehension, raise standardized test scores, and foster empathy between differing dialect speakers.

Validating Vernaculars: Five Theses

Each student uses letters like these to shape his or her thoughts. Should English 
educators punish them just because their letters are arranged differently?

Over the last two weeks, I have written about some of the trending topics of English education and linked them to historical and communication contexts. Today, I'm taking one of those topics—validating the many vernaculars and dialects spoken by students—and composing five claims to drive my argument.

First, a brief review. English education has largely focused on instructing students in the traditional dialect of American English, grading on "correctness" rather than actual comprehension and engagement. Researchers are now finding that when teachers accept the individual vernaculars of their students and focus on comprehension, student grades and standardized test scores rise.

Hot Spots in English Education

Validating Vernaculars

Photo by NeONBRAND on Unsplash

Traditionally, English instruction has focused on the "correctness" of students' use of language and grammar, which has marginalized every child who has mastered one of the many English dialects, such as African-American Vernacular English (AAVE) or "Spanglish," for lack of a more official term. Educators and researchers are now learning that spending precious classroom time to rid students of their native vernaculars is harming their school and standardized test performance. In classrooms that teach towards comprehension rather than correctness, students enjoy their studies more, their grades pick up, and their standardized test scores rise. (See Moving Students Towards Acceptance of "Other" Englishes, NCTE 2016)

One Language Under God

By Berlyn Flake

If we were to decide upon a universal language so that all peoples and cultures could communicate, should that chosen language be English?

The World's Flags

There are approximately 6,500 different languages spoken today, and it is estimated that just 200 years ago there were up to 10,000 different languages. Knowing that there are so many different languages and dialects spoken, is it a wonder that miscommunication often happens?

Were we to designate a single language as the official language for the world, we could decrease misunderstandings between countries and help promote a sense of unity. The only problem is deciding which language to use.

“Tell each student to turn in their homework.”

                               https://pixabay.com/en/board-school-blackboard-chalk-font-64269/

The lack of a gender-neutral third person singular pronoun is a problem that has existed since Middle English: “And whoso fyndeth hym out of swich blame, They wol come up…Chaucer, ‘The Pardoner’s Prologue’ ca. 1395 (in Jespersen)” (Merriam Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage, 1994, p. 901).

The use of the traditional pronoun he, his, him, goes back to the 18th century grammarians who boxed themselves into the position by first deciding that the indefinite pronouns must always be singular. They then had to decide between the masculine and feminine singular pronouns for use in reference to the indefinites, and they chose the masculine (they were, of course, all men) (Merriam Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage, 1994, p. 902).

Great writers from the past used they as a singular pronoun.

[It was] a normal pattern in English that was established four centuries before the 18^th- century grammarians invented the solecism. The plural pronoun is one solution devised by native speakers of English to a grammatical problem inherent in that language––and it is by no means the worst solution (Merriam Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage, 1994, p. 902).

The following examples date as far back as the 14th century.

“The righteous man … that taketh not their life in vain––Pearl, ca. 1380 (spelling modernized)

There’s not a man I meet…As if I were their well-acquainted friend––Shakespeare, The Comedy of Errors, 1593” (Merriam Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage, 1994, p. 902).

This linguistic problem could be considered one of “ad fontes” where linguists are going back to the sources to prove that the lack of a gender-neutral singular pronoun is not an issue brought to light only because of the feminist movement of the ‘70s.

The problems surrounding the invention of the printing press are analogous to our present-day problem with using they, their, and them as singular pronouns. The English-speaking world doesn’t seem to have a problem with using they when it speaks, but as soon as it goes to print, it goes “prescriptivist” and starts spouting off what the grammarians insisted on in the 18th century.

According to linguist John McWhorter(1998), “The only thing keeping us from taking advantage of it [singular they] has been the power of the prescriptivist hoax, starting with Lowth and Murray’s inevitable whacks at it back in the 1700s” (p. 124).

One Language Under God

When my parents took a month long vacation in Europe, they anticipated that they would have difficulty communicating with the various people they would come across, as they don’t speak any European languages other than Spanish. They were pleasantly surprised that with every place they visited (with the exception of one), they were met with English-speaking Europeans who were able to take their orders, show them around, and answer their questions. My parents said that this heightened their experience because they were able to effectively communicate with the locals. 

Different Countries' Flags

Whether or not English should be made the official language of the world has been under debate for some time. Heck, the issue has even been pushed against in the United States, where most of its occupants speak English. That leads to a bigger question: if not English, should some other language be made the official language of the world?

When the printing press was invented, people had access to works such as the Bible in great quantities for the first time ever. New ideas spread like wildfire and new freedoms were able to stretch their toes. However, the ideas would have oftentimes been limited to those who spoke the language that was printed. Were the world to have had a universal language at that point, unique ideas might have spread more rapidly.

During World War II, at least a dozen different languages were spoken by participants. It is doubtful that poor communication contributed to the War on a larger scale, but perhaps as people fought in smaller battles they could have worked things out a little better. After the war, Winston Churchill, in his speech Sinews of Peace, referred to the audience and others as the “English speaking peoples.” Perhaps people may have felt more united if all people could have been roped under a common language?

Image Credit: "National Flags" by Wikimedia public domain

Hot Spots in English

Hot Spots in English
English as the Official Language

• It is often argued that English is one of the most difficult languages to learn. Though this may be true, it is one of the most common languages spoken worldwide (preceded only by Chinese and Spanish). English is the most commonly taught language, so should it become the official language for the world? (See Should English be the World's Official Common Language?)

Studying Literature

• People wonder whether or not studying literature is worth the time, as the stories usually revolve around fictional people, events, or even worlds. Should this even be something that children and young adults are asked to study in the public school system? (See Why Study Literature as a Humanities Subject?) 

English as a Degree

• Many people choose to pursue a degree in English, but when asked what they want to do with it a lot of English majors either don’t know or aren’t able to say how their English degree will help them get their dream job. It’s true, that it’s difficult to get a really good job with an English degree, but does that make it useless? (See Is an English degree useless?) 

I am particularly intrigued by the first point (that of English becoming the official language). On the one hand, it would be immeasurably valuable to have one language in common for the whole world because we could trade with, learn more from, and visit any other country without a language barrier. However, I have to wonder if it’s really fair for one group of people to request everyone else to speak their own language. Plus, we could be in danger of losing specific cultural qualities by asking people to somewhat disregard their parent language.