Rhetorical Analysis of “If Black English Isn’t a Language, Then Tell Me, What Is” by James Baldwin

Hameed Gado

10/21/2022

FIQWS 10111

Brenna Crowe

My intended Audience: English speakers

Throughout United States history, a controversial discussion is whether Black English should be considered a language. One may argue that it’s not as commonly spoken around the world. From this perspective, they believe that it should not be considered a language because it’s not the regular English spoken around the world. On the other hand however, James Baldwin’s an American writer known for his works to help bring awareness to racial and sexual oppression, emphasis in his article “If Black English Isn’t a Language, Then Tell Me, What Is?”argues that Black English is a language because people evolve a language in order to describe and thus control their circumstances, language is the most vivid and crucial key to identify and Black English is the creation of the black diaspora. According to his statements he believes Black English is a language but most importantly the role language has on people. In sum, I will be analyzing how Baldwin supports his argument and most importantly how he uses Ethos, pathos and Allusion/examples from history in his article to persuade his audience to agree with him.

Baldwin claims at the beginning of the piece that the black English argument has roots in American history. However, his claim on “the role of the language” is unrelated to that language (1). Furthermore, he stated that “the other is refusing to be defined by a language that has never been able to acknowledge him.” In this quotation, he makes reference to how unfairly black Americans have been treated, which is why they reject speaking conventional English. He engages viewers’ emotions by delving deeply into American history with black people.

People “develop a language to describe and thereby govern their circumstances,” claims Baldwin (2). Later on, he gives the French language as an illustration of how language may represent a person. By elaborating on how a Frenchman speaking in Paris will sound different from a Frenchman speaking in Marseille, and how none of them would sound different from a guy speaking in Quebec. And despite the fact that they all speak French, they would all have a hard time understanding a man from Guadeloupe, Martinique, or Senegal. This time, he makes use of ethos to bolster his justification and convince his listeners.

St. Paul de Vence, France, is mentioned at the beginning of the article. Baldwin spent some time in France in the 1940s (1). By saying that, he gives his use of the French language as an example credibility in the eyes of the residents of New York at the time and any audience that reads his essay. In paragraph 5, he emphasizes how vital language is to a person’s identity and offers ethos and instances to support his claim. “Language is also a political weapon, means, and proof of power,” he asserts. It is the clearest and most important key to identification (5). He continues to discuss the importance of language to identity and the political influence it has on individuals in paragraph 4. According to him, language both binds and separates people from a community or huge group. He uses France and England as examples since these two countries are well renowned for speaking the same language, yet having distinctive accents that can occasionally be harmful. This indicates that accents are quite important in terms of how individuals identify themselves.

Baldwin also examines the disrespect that white people have for Black English. by highlighting the ways in which white Americans have purged some Black terms and languages. Examples are “Jazz me baby,” which white people altered to “Jazz Ag”(5), and “Beat to his socks,” which black people used to express poverty but which white people turned to “the Beat Generation.”

By appealing to the audience’s emotions, he also leverages American history to support his claim that black language is a language. He uses the forced immigration of black people from various parts of Africa to the United States as an example to make his case. Due to need, black people had to develop their own language. According to him, slavery wouldn’t have persisted as long as it did if black people could communicate in the same language. Afterwards, he makes the observation that “the slave began the development of the Black Church, and it is within this unparalleled tabernacle that Black English began to be developed” (7).

He thinks that the fact that many black individuals, who are not acquainted, went through such suffering and produced the Black Language should support his claim that it is a language. Because of the troubled history the US has with black people, he is using pathos in this action. He later came to the conclusion that white Americans didn’t care about the education of black people unless it was beneficial to them. And given how unreliable the United States is, it could be the reason why non-white people don’t often learn from white people.

As a result, “If Black English Isn’t a Language, Then Tell Me, What Is” is a much-needed contribution to the contentious debate over whether Black English qualifies as a language. He can effectively promote his point of view by appealing to the audience’s sense of credibility and, in particular, by making historical allusions.

Works cited

If Black English Isn’t a Language, Then Tell Me, What Is? archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/books/98/03/29/specials/baldwin-english.html?source=post_page—————————. Accessed 21 Oct. 2022.