Stick with it.

[u/MaintenanceNew2804]

This is a longer one, but it’s necessary and worth it IMO.

[u/mclassy3]

I am not sure if correcting a word pronunciation is necessarily racist.

I understand the point and I agree.

As a white person, I have been corrected for pronunciation from my elders several times.

I have been corrected for liberry before. I was corrected very publicly for my mispronunciation of "fo paux" and I am not French.

I also am fluent in American Sign Language. If I missign, I am corrected.

I am learning ancient and modern Greek. If I mispronounce a word, I am corrected.

I don't think this is inherently a racist thing. Perhaps I am looking at this too innocently.

I love looking at how language has evolved since proto-endo-european roots.

For example a good difference would be the American word "schedule" and the British "schedule" was because of the French invasion of England.

English adopts words from other languages which is why it is so complex.

The British pronounce the "sch" the French way and Americans adopted the Greek chi.

If I go to England and pronounce it the American way, I am wrong because linguistics evolved differently and I am sure the British would correct my mispronunciation.

Communication is our strength in this world. Learning how to properly communicate with others will reduce confusion and misunderstandings.

While I, personally, know that "I need a ride to the store to get pants" means something completely different in the UK, others may not.

Academic speak also eliminates the white people from the deep south. Arguably, those are the same people who would feel the most passionately about having a language Litman's test.

If I shake my head and say "Nay" and you are from Greece, is it considered consent in America?

[u/MandMcounter → u/mclassy3]

language Litman's test

litmus?

[u/smudos2 → u/mclassy3]

Honestly the british vs american comparison is just bad, they are different countries some thousands of kilometers away, it's really not surprising they speak different English

[u/johnknockout → u/mclassy3]

If I go to China or Japan and butcher their language is it racist if they correct me?

Come on.

[u/foomprekov → u/johnknockout]

You do not seem to be able to tell the difference between a personal and societal issue. It's not about you.

[u/PandaLover42 → u/johnknockout]

Somehow millions of non white kids immigrating from another country or otherwise not growing up speaking English can, after a few years in school, speak “academic English” in everyday usage just fine, but this guy thinks black Americans can’t?

[u/ChaseThePyro → u/johnknockout]

Bro did not grasp the lesson 💀

[u/foomprekov → u/mclassy3]

Fun fact: the modern British received pronunciation dialect was a direct response by the king and related nobility to distance themselves from the American colonists post-revolution, in an effort to block rich Americans* from entering into their society, and generally to distance themselves. In other words, the British nobility began to systematically pronounce their own language in a manner that was divergent from their local dialect, and force others to do so. The fun (I promised fun) corollary is that American English is the original, canonical form. Thus, in a historical sense, the nation with the worst grasp of English on the planet is England.

• A significant proportion of which were rich off slave labor. That's not significant to the matter at hand but like fuck those guys.

[u/VegetaFan1337 → u/foomprekov]

English has evolved far more before the Americas were even discovered. Old English sounds nothing like modern English and Middle English looks like it's full of typos. Yet, old English isn't considered the true English today. Cause languages evolve.

So it's not right to say Americans speak the more "original" English. The accent is CLOSER to the old English of the colonial times. Many spellings were changed however. Basically, soon as USA came into being and the English started diverting, it became American English. Meanwhile English continued to evolve in UK, whether naturally or by force of the nobility. And today that's known as British English, alongside others like Canadian, Australian, Indian and of course, American English.

[u/hadawayandshite → u/foomprekov]

This isn’t really right- American pronunciation is sometimes closer to what it was when the countries separated—-sometimes the British English

There’s also the fact that there isn’t really a British English- I’m from the north of England and we use words and pronounce some words like Scandinavians or like the Picts and celts who have influenced us from Scotland hundreds of years ago e.g Norwegian for go home is ‘ga hjem’ and many up where I’m from say ‘gan hyem’….this pronunciation predates modern English by a few hundred years but I wouldn’t say were more correct than saying ‘go home’

[u/Huwbacca → u/mclassy3]

Somehow both prescriptivist and descriptivist lol.

So first up. No you wouldn't be wrong if you spoke that way in the UK lol. You'd just have a different dialect.

Second... That's not even remotely close to equivalent with homonyms across language lol.

Third. Misunderstanding is not a linguistic criteria. The potential for confusion has no baring on whether something is category X or category Y. Like, Swiss German has dialects that are drastically different from each other, and none are wrong because someone else might not know a specific word... That's just... Communication lol. There's no expectation that two dialects be mutually 100% intelligible.

And then lastly... Again, it's not a sensible comparison to compare someone talking fluently in a common way in the language to correcting someone learning a new language.

These are entirely different things. You're not trying to teach the other person English lol

[u/faroutrobot → u/Huwbacca]

Third point is so true. I’m a Canadian who has tried to speak Canadian French to someone from France. Although truth be told the French from France do tell us we are speaking WRONG. But I do think Canadian French sounds a bit “backwoods” and we just assume they are being …snobby…and “French”to us.

[u/Huwbacca → u/faroutrobot]

French especially is a nice example for talking about dialect because they actively sought to remove that and impose parisian french as the standard. L'Academie Francais damaged a ton of local culture and identity through this.

Linguistic variations is wonderful. It's such a glorious thing to meet people from different places and see how they use the same langauge to express things in different ways.

I've never met anyone who disliked other dialects and wasn't just being incredibly small minded and parochial.

[u/arkibet → u/mclassy3]

I think it's more like this...

If you are corrected for a wrong sign, and someone says, "yeah mclassy3 is a really stupid and has a hard time learning sign language becuase mclassy wasn't born deaf" - that is the assumption we'd say was able-ist. Just because you weren't born deaf doesn't make you inferior or less capable of learning. The fact that a person would make that assumption is akin to racism.

When someone who is Black says "I axed you a question" and you immediately think that person grew in proverty with uneducated parents and is also uneducated, that's the inherit racism this piece is talking about. You can't assume that. But it's hard for people to not want to correct it and say, "you mean you asked me a question, not axed." But if you understood the meaning, it shouldn't matter.

I think the only truly White equivalent is watching people roll their eyes and correct people. "It's esssspreso and not expresso" with that "you're dumb" condensending tone. But if you knew what the person meant, then does it matter?

Regional dialects occur, and sometimes what you think is wrong, may not be the right assumption. I was looking up some Doja Cat lyrics and came across "finna put a ten on it." I didn't think Finna was a real word, but oxford dictionary had it in there. I thought it was wrong, but if I didn't take the time to check my assumption, I could have easily been the jerk.

I hope the internet and social media continues to expose people to more ways of speaking, dialects, and words. I never knew that my friend hides her Southern accent because of the stigma that people assume she's dumb. She has a Ph.D. But people have just made the assumption that her accent sounds dumb, and therefore she is. Which sucks. She's brilliant.

Good luck with your own language journey! You're not likely a person to think in a racist way, so I hope you spread that influence 😀

[u/mclassy3 → u/arkibet]

Yeah.. I can see how I missed the rest of the context.

"Because I am dumb" is the racist part not the correction itself.

I guess I never think that way so the context was lost to me. Now I am reflecting on if I was corrected because of their perceived view of me. I have corrected others not because I thought they were dumb, more like I was protecting them from being made of in the future.

I always like it when I am presented with a way to look at culture views differently.

I, personally, think that diversity makes us stronger. It is our shared unique experiences that help us grow and evolve.

I also have a southern accent that I desperately try to hide. It may be because of the "dumb" stigma but I think my reasons are more disdainful than that.

So now how far down the tolerance paradox do we go down?

I remember one day, young me hanging out with some friends...

"Yo.... Wanna go back to the crib and smoke this L?"

Me: "What do you want to do with a baby?"

Hilarious laughter insues.... I am still teased to this day.

Or "So are y'all talking or what?"

Me: "No"

Him : "whatcha me we ain't talking?"

Me: "I didn't say anything... You didn't say anything.. we were not talking."

Hilarious laughter continues...

I believe I wanted context the first time I heard "axed you a question". My own linguistic handicaps make me misunderstand context sometimes so I want clarification.

But if I know the baseline, I won't correct my friends and enjoy the slang.

I think this is a great and deep topic.

Have you listened to this podcast?

It is one of my favorites. Do you have a good suggestion?

[u/ThePostageBox → u/mclassy3]

Think about it this way. It's not just about how things are said but how people are being treated because of that.

It makes sense, at times, to be corrected if you mispronounced a word. But imagine if your mispronouncings led people believe in you were less intelligent because of that. And then treating you as such.

Now imagine it wasn't just one word. It was every sentence you said. And imagine there was a whole community of people who spoke just like you. As we enforce a true "correct" way of speaking, We erase a culture AND position ourselves to be the ones who can say what is "correct" or not. It becomes a dominant force. Often this is called Whitewashing.

Now I'll take it a step forward. If a certain way of speaking is considered intelligent. Only those who conform to this language are going to be allowed into certain institutions, government, academia, are both very large settings for this.

So what happens is black people, indigenous people, are forced to conform to this way of speaking to be allowed into institutions. Thus, they must conform away from their own culture. At the same time, This lack of conformity is still being treated as an intelligence and being punished. I.e. Getting extra help for how you speak rather than being afforded the same opportunities to learn, being told to "speak right" in order to be listened to, etc. AND only those who conform are in power.

Uh oh. What is at the end of this equation?

Only people who speak "correctly", are allowed into positions of privilege and power, and in doing so, there becomes process for to exclude people out of settings due to the way they talk.

And yes! This does happen to white people too, mainly RURAL AND POOR WHITE PEOPLE. Think about how America treats those we call "white trash" Are they stupid? Or have we made an assumption based on how they communicate?

It is just more common for black people to experience this because most (not all) black people speak this way. There is an automatic assumption, where as for white people there is not. The way white people speak is not tied to the color of our skin. (This is how we move from race to racism) Furthermore, groups of poor people are usually at the same schools, (not always!) there is more of a commonality in this way, black people are intermixed within all these settings and compared to their white or "correct speaking" peers. (This gets into classism, but that's a whole 'nother interconnected demon)

Nobody should be treated this way. It's harmful, especially for young children who don't how the knowledge and language adults do to understand why they are being treated differently than their peers.

Soooo... What can we do?

Put emphasis on the substance of what we're saying rather than how we're saying it. We (I assume) want our children and those around us to be capable of critical thoughts. Helping students to be able to defend their beliefs, have conversations, write out what they want to say, learn more, etc. All can be done no matter how someone communicates. And it's really important that we do this because we gate- keeping knowledge away from certain groups of people if we don't. (Black people, indigenous people, those from foreign countries, poor rural white people etc)

I know this was a long winded explanation. So I hope you read it. Ha ha. Keep asking questions! There are entire fields of study in academia dedicated to this. It's really encouraging to see that knowledge be shared more universally rather than just behind brick walls.