BLACK AND WHITE ADOLESCENT AND PREADOLESCENT ATTITUDES TOWARD BLACK ENGLISH

Abstract

This chapter discusses the attitudes of black and white, male and female, middle and lower class adolescents and preadolescents to tape-recorded samples of Standard English (SE) and Black English (BE). To achieve as natural a simulated casual speech sample as possible, the speech sample of a male high school senior was recorded. Because it was evident from the preliminary study that some students regarded outsiders with suspicion, particularly when biographical questions were asked, it was decided that more reliable results would be obtained if the stimulus materials were presented as a regular classroom activity. Thus, the classroom teachers presented the stimulus material in their own classes for the main study. The main effects of sex, social class, race, age, and guise and the interactions thereof were analyzed by a separate analysis of each rating scale. The ANOVA of these separate rating scales revealed that black students regarded BE more favorably than did white students and that black preadolescents regarded BE more favorably than did black adolescents.