Threw out this article I couldn't help but go back to and think of the other articles about code switching and how women are the teachers and the ones that are softer spoken. In this article it starts off with saying that African American women were often overlooked. This study looked at African American teachers and how they communicated with their students. Also how they used code switching and metaphors both in teaching and interviewing.
When they taught the used the word performance when it came to have class discussions. Foster almost wanted you to feel like you were reading something like a play or a movie. He went into great detail how at the start of class everything was very structured and the teachers did all the talking but when they got into the performance stage of the class everyone was equal. The teacher wanted the students to feel comfortable speaking and giving them plenty of chances to speak. Foster even states that The teacher spoke 296 and the students spoke 211. This tells me the teacher played close attention to the students and wanted to hear them. The teacher also put things in metaphors to help the kids understand and help them relate to what the teacher is teaching and trying to tell them.
During the interviews it went into code switching and how the teachers in one group didn't code switch until later in the interview when they felt comfortable or just couldn't keep up the "proper english" anymore. But how in the other interview group they pretty much started off code switching from "proper english" to "African American english" depending on what they were trying to say and what the conversation was covering.
I chose a clip of students and teachers talking about why they talk the way they do and what it says about them. Also how they feel like talking tells a lot about a person. It tells how they were taught and who taught them. They express how that it brings them closer to old African American language. Their dialect helps identify them and who they are.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQrtB7cZDrA&feature=related
I also found myself thinking about other articles we have read previous to this one. The code switching concentrated on in the clip you provided made me think of the article in the first half of the semester when students switched back and forth to establish their separate identity and solidify their community. I agree with you in saying that it was interesting that the focus was on a female teacher as well, because that, I feel, fits into our discussion of gendered performances we have established.
ReplyDeleteThe last paragraph of the article very clearly states the purpose of this work: "it reveals that in even in the relatively formal context of interviews and classroom discourse, African American middle-class women do codeswitch into Black vernacular forms. I believe that their codeswitching behavior is an expression of solidarity and shared identity through which they express their power and challenge the hegemony of public discourse" (347). Here, it is further supported that speaking in this way is thought to work in a certain way for participants.
I agree with your comments, and think the video did a nice job of tying it together. For me this article was attached to gendered performances and codeswitching we focused on earlier.
I think this YouTube video is perfect in relating to Foster’s article. The video shows how African Americans use vernacular and through African American discourse index a social identity. They choose this way to talk because they affiliate with the African American community and its values. In the video, a woman explains how using African American vernacular can be used to express identity, which is very similar to what Foster is getting at. Foster explains how codeswitching and using African American vernacular can express identity and influence social relationships. Foster explains how retaining African American vernacular invokes solidarity, power, and community. I think this YouTube video expresses such solidarity by showing how African American language can bring people together. The clip shows how it is very important to retain the vernacular, specifically in the school system.
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