When I hear whites speak like urban blacks I assume they have the same poor English skills; it isn’t flattering to blacks that more and more whites are as illiterate as so many urban blacks.
It amazes me how embracing the sub-culture of baggy pants, over-sized sports wear, over-sized and unlaced shoes, ball caps with flat bills turned sideways, lots of gold and lazy speech patterns makes non-black people think they’re in the cool crowd. They’re trying to be members of a club that wants nothing to do with them, no matter how they dress, talk or act.
Peach
I’ve read the interesting theory that blacks in the South picked up the rather unproductive Scots-Irish culture in the rural South that still holds Appalachia back, from high illegitimacy rates and high marriage breakup rates to low valuation of higher education.
Then blacks moved throughout the US after World War 2, taking that “red-neck” culture with them while moving into urban areas where it is even less successful than in rural areas where self-reliance through family networks is beneficial when the state is weak - and switching to reliance on the welfare with an already weak valuation of marriage so they quickly descended into entrenched intergenerational welfare and the chaos the lack of married fathers creates.
***When I hear whites speak like urban blacks I assume they have the same poor English skills;***
I remember my parents, High Plains, Rocky Mountain and Hill country of Tennessee always spoke with good English.
Then they moved to the Ozarks and it grated on my 10 year old nerves that they allowed their communication skills to fall to HILLBILLY backwoods levels! They NEVER used to talk like that!
They were afraid they would sound “better” than the locals, and would be considered “uppity”.