Analysis Of Baldwin's Essay 'If Black English Isn' T Language

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In James Baldwin’s eloquent essay, “If Black English Isn’t Language, Then Tell me, What Is?” (1979), he claims that the language has nothing to do with itself, but the role of language is what reveals who a person is, whether it’s who they are or aren’t. The author uses common knowledge of languages, and historical allusions to slavery to elaborate his thesis. Baldwin’s purpose is to explain how the role of language reveals who a person is in order to be judged accordingly by the way they speak. This essay is intended for an audience of people who speak differently than the common language and for those studying different languages. When I read the text, I was confused with what he meant in relation to language, but as I kept reading I started …show more content…
Baldwin argues that the role of language is to define someone. He uses the common knowledge of people from different areas all knowing French, but “each has paid, and is paying, a different price for this “common” language, in which, as it turns out, they are not saying, and cannot be saying, the same things” (Baldwin). Baldwin fails to clarify or give evidence when he says, “to speak a certain language could be dangerous, even fatal” (Baldwin). He gives this statement, but no evidence if provided to prove why he says that language is fatal. He uses historical allusions of slavery throughout the text when referring to Black people and their language. An example he uses is the word jazz as a sexual term for Black people, “but white people purified it into the Jazz Age” and made an interpretation of the phrase (Baldwin). He calls the people who reworded the phrase as descendants of the late Nathaniel Hawthorne (Baldwin). He gives another of the many allusions saying that it’s too late to try and “penalize black people for having created a language that permits the nation its only glimpse of reality” (Baldwin). Referring to the way Black people created a language that they can understand and makes them who they are. Baldwin uses a disheartening tone throughout the text when he says that “people evolve a language to describe, and thus control their circumstances” (Baldwin). His reasoning to infuse this tone is to further persuade his audience that language plays a role in people’s
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