At one point, the distinctly white actress Heidi Gardner utters: “If he keeps leaving us on read, he’s gonna catch these hands on gang.” How did Gen Z lingo become so distinctly African American? One consequence of the internet age is the fast-spreading of linguistic style, forms and vernaculars, and African American Vernacular English (AAVE) seems to be one of the bigger targets of this phenomenon. A problem with this is that those who use AAVE do so inappropriately and with syntactic error. Taking a language that one does not speak and using it without appreciation and knowledge is the basis of appropriation, and many Gen Z speakers are engaging in this, often without realizing that, far more than just netspeak, the forms they are appropriating belong to a full-fledged community of speakers, with grammatical rules and cultural nuances.
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Language has the power to reinforce harmful racial stereotypes and to determine how marginalized groups navigate American society. These groups whose speech differs from standardized English, specifically Black communities, are viewed as lacking grammar and speaking a less sophisticated language. Despite these misinformed perceptions of AAVE, many people on social media platforms, including Twitter and TikTok, appropriate AAVE words, phrases, and stylings, claiming these features as part of Internet speech.
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Most of the influencers examined here have significant differences (see Figure 1) in AAVE usage between humorous and non-humorous contexts, which confirms our hypothesis that influencers choose to change their styles for social benefits. Sexuality and gender expression also appear to have an effect on the instances of AAVE usage. LGBTQ+ influencers, especially men, tended to use AAVE to index a “sassy” persona, based on the stereotype of the “sassy Black woman.” On the other hand, non-LGBTQ+ men tended to use AAVE to index a “tough” or “masculine” persona, based on the cultural masculinization of Black people. Influencers use AAVE to index a funny, sassy, or edgy persona because of cultural stereotypes around Black people and their language. These stereotypes date back to minstrelsy in which Black people were treated as entertainment tools for white people. Today, this derogatory cultural lineage lives on in the appropriation of Black people’s language as an entertainment tool for non-Black people. These public figures’ influence leads to further spread of these speech patterns, indexed in these ways, without acknowledgement of the source and the price paid by Black people who have native fluency in AAVE.
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People tend to feel inappropriate when they incorrectly use grammar in a language they do not speak or are just beginning to learn. However, that does not appear to be the case for when non-speakers of AAVE misuse its grammar. This further contributes to the myth that AAVE is not, in fact, seen as a legitimate vernacular language of its own, and helps fuel extreme cases where people actively discredit AAVE entirely
- No location available
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It is not inherently bad that the internet is shortening gaps between different cultures and as a consequence, languages. However it is the due diligence of every responsible internet user to ensure that they are not just passively absorbing all the information that is available to them and mindlessly replicating them. When the majority uses (and misuses) the language spoken by a minority only to express particular ideas, they, at best, contribute to the viewpoint that the variant is not legitimate, and at worst, reaffirm the racist ideologies that exist to oppress Black people (see Figure 5). When Black people use AAVE, people assume that they don’t know Standard English. However, when non-Black people use AAVE, people assume that it’s a choice—one to appeal to humor. These double standards further propagate racism towards Black people and devaluation of African American Vernacular.
- No location available
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At one point, the distinctly white actress Heidi Gardner utters: “If he keeps leaving us on read, he’s gonna catch these hands on gang.” How did Gen Z lingo become so distinctly African American? One consequence of the internet age is the fast-spreading of linguistic style, forms and vernaculars, and African American Vernacular English (AAVE) seems to be one of the bigger targets of this phenomenon. A problem with this is that those who use AAVE do so inappropriately and with syntactic error. Taking a language that one does not speak and using it without appreciation and knowledge is the basis of appropriation, and many Gen Z speakers are engaging in this, often without realizing that, far more than just netspeak, the forms they are appropriating belong to a full-fledged community of speakers, with grammatical rules and cultural nuances.
- No location available
-

Language has the power to reinforce harmful racial stereotypes and to determine how marginalized groups navigate American society. These groups whose speech differs from standardized English, specifically Black communities, are viewed as lacking grammar and speaking a less sophisticated language. Despite these misinformed perceptions of AAVE, many people on social media platforms, including Twitter and TikTok, appropriate AAVE words, phrases, and stylings, claiming these features as part of Internet speech.
- No location available
-

Most of the influencers examined here have significant differences (see Figure 1) in AAVE usage between humorous and non-humorous contexts, which confirms our hypothesis that influencers choose to change their styles for social benefits. Sexuality and gender expression also appear to have an effect on the instances of AAVE usage. LGBTQ+ influencers, especially men, tended to use AAVE to index a “sassy” persona, based on the stereotype of the “sassy Black woman.” On the other hand, non-LGBTQ+ men tended to use AAVE to index a “tough” or “masculine” persona, based on the cultural masculinization of Black people. Influencers use AAVE to index a funny, sassy, or edgy persona because of cultural stereotypes around Black people and their language. These stereotypes date back to minstrelsy in which Black people were treated as entertainment tools for white people. Today, this derogatory cultural lineage lives on in the appropriation of Black people’s language as an entertainment tool for non-Black people. These public figures’ influence leads to further spread of these speech patterns, indexed in these ways, without acknowledgement of the source and the price paid by Black people who have native fluency in AAVE.
- No location available
-

People tend to feel inappropriate when they incorrectly use grammar in a language they do not speak or are just beginning to learn. However, that does not appear to be the case for when non-speakers of AAVE misuse its grammar. This further contributes to the myth that AAVE is not, in fact, seen as a legitimate vernacular language of its own, and helps fuel extreme cases where people actively discredit AAVE entirely
- No location available
-

It is not inherently bad that the internet is shortening gaps between different cultures and as a consequence, languages. However it is the due diligence of every responsible internet user to ensure that they are not just passively absorbing all the information that is available to them and mindlessly replicating them. When the majority uses (and misuses) the language spoken by a minority only to express particular ideas, they, at best, contribute to the viewpoint that the variant is not legitimate, and at worst, reaffirm the racist ideologies that exist to oppress Black people (see Figure 5). When Black people use AAVE, people assume that they don’t know Standard English. However, when non-Black people use AAVE, people assume that it’s a choice—one to appeal to humor. These double standards further propagate racism towards Black people and devaluation of African American Vernacular.
- No location available
-