美国黑人英语　

美国黑人英语　 1.1 The Derivation of Afro-American thThe history of Afro-American can be traced back to the 16 century thwhen America was still a colony of European. From 16-19 century , the European captured many black slaves from west Africa, Congo and Angola and selled them to American . Most of those slaves were brougght to the United States and forced to work in cotton fields, sugercane fields and mines in the southern of the U.S.A. At the same time ,they suffered from brutal exploition and abuse by the white racist. With the development of industry, many blacks moved to the north and northwest states from south. After the Civil War which happened in 1861-1865,slavery was annulled legally,but the Negro were still suffering under racial discrimination and oppression from racist. The blacks couldn’t be treated equally as white in many aspects , such as in politics , education, employment,etc. According a survey made in 1970, in the United States , twenty percent of the families under poverty line were white while eighty percent of them were Negro. Unemployment in black was four times even six or seven times higher than that in white , and the salary of black workers was only half even one third of that of white workers. The black were in the bottom in American society and they were constantly be threatened by unemployment, poverty, diseases and death. So they have been in the fight with racial discrimination and oppression for more rights for many years , and their action are suppored by the progressives in the world. 1.2. Definition of Black English Because many black slaves were from different rigions of Africa and they spoke different languages, in order to comminicate with each other and with the slave owner they had to find a common language. But they couldn’t learn right pronunication and grammer rules of Engkish without normal education and the English they used also be influenced by their own dialect. So sometimes Black English is also called Pidgin. In the United States, the term Black English usually refers to the everyday spoken varieties of English used by African Americans, especially of the working class in urban neighborhoods or rural communities. Linguists generally prefer the term African American Vernacular English, although some use the term Ebonics, which was widespread used in the late 1990s. It is an error to suppose that Black English is spoken by all African Americans regardless of their background. In fact, the English spoken by African Americans is highly varied-as varied as the English spoken by any other racial or ethnic group. Sometimes Black English is used to refer to other varieties of English spoken by Black people outside of the United States, as in the Caribbean and the United Kingdom. 1.3 The Development of Black English The origion of Black English can be traced to the period of slavery and the slave trade . So the history of Black English started from about 1619 when a Dutch vessel landed in Jamestown with a cargo of twenty Africans. During the slave trade , the colonists collected slaves from different parts of Africa,so the slaves cannot communicate with each other and it was impossible for them to overthrow the colonists.In 1744, a caption of a slave ship , William Smith said :“The safest way to trade is to trade with the different nations, on either side of the river, and having some of very sort on board. There will be no more likelihood of their success in a plot, than of finishing the Tower of Babel.”At the same time, all the slaves had to communicate with their masters to some degree. So they had to learn some elementary English vocabulary. Then English became the commom language that all slaves knew and they gradually developed a Pidgin language with the simple English vocabulary they had learned . After the children of the slaves were born, they must be taught this African- English Pidgin . It was necessary that they were able to communicate with other saves and their masters . thThere was very littleevidence the speech of slaves from 17 century, however, in 1692, Justice Hathorne recorded some words of Tituba , who was an African slaves from the island of Barbadosin the British West Tndies . His words were “He tell me he God.” The vocabulary of the sentence were English , but the grammar rule and structure were congrous with that of West languages which was identified by Simtherman . In the th18 century , more records of slaves’ were produced by some writers and linguistist . J.L.Pillard said that “By 1715 there clearly was an African Pidgin English known on a worldwide scale.” He proved this claim by quoting Defoe’s words in his work in his work The Life of Colonel Jaque. “Yes , yes ….me know , me know but me want speak , me tell something . O! Me no let him makee de great mastr angry. ” A Viriginia slave said in the book. Just like Tituba’s statement the grammar rules and structure of this statement were belong to the west African language . Other evidence in tracing the development of Black English were lied in newspapers which repored runaway slaves . The speech of runaway slaves played a very important role in helping the master to locating and identify a runaway slave . Those slaves who could runaway successfully were likely to be thoes who knew well standard Enlish. During the Civil War period , writers such as Harriet Beecher Stowe and Thomes Halliburtone produced many works that showed their knowledge of the exitence of Black English . It was really safe to assume that those Blacks who did speak Black English far outnumbered those who spoke Standard English . Under this condition , it is certain that Black English will continue to flourish . 2.1 Analytsis on Black English Compared with Standard English In people traditional view , that Black English has been considered as second-class or loe-level of language variation , which in linguistics is different from the Standard language of the United States of America . The difference showed that Black English is same with Standard American English that has complex structure , system , grammar rule and its own characteristics in pronunciation and vocabulary .