"My" Language vs "Your" Language

Christina McVay clearly speaks of the different terms and "languages" of people, especially "Black language." As my colleague, Sequoia Boone rightly says "by allowing students to incorporate “Black language” into a formal English class, McVay taps into their inner being and pulls from that to mold them into writers and speakers that society recognizes."  After reading Sequoia's blog, I thought about one major aspect of language, our inner voice.


Each person has a voice when speaking and when writing.  In the Black community, so many factors play a role in your voice.  When I was in middle and high school I learned about the Harlem Renaissance.  I felt many connections to poets, such as Langston Hughes, and this connection could only be made within "our" community.  I mean, anybody can read his poems, but it is something special about the way "we" say things.  We, as African Americans, tend to speak with a voice of our time yet so strongly connected to our ancestors.  We have a weep, a longing, a since of pride to the way we speak and what we mean.


However, coming to Spelman, "we" realize that there are so many different ways to say the same things.  Over a thousand Black women, and not one of us have the same voice or say the same exact thing all the time.  Moreover, some of us do speak alike depending on where we are from, but "my" language could be more vivid than "your" language.

"My" language is not the same as Oprah Winfrey.  She is role model that has a "voice" when it comes to speaking and writing. Thankfully, "we" go to school to learn to communicate and still maintain our own identity.  Therefore, "my" language or voice shines in my writing, while Oprah's language shines throughout her writing.  We all come together with certain rules and standards to form "our" language.


-Keiwana Glover