What Language Obscures: Exploring the politics of “proper” English

I once overheard an older family member talking to someone else his age. I don’t remember the exact context, but he was trying to explain that he wasn’t pointing the finger of blame at anyone. What he actually said was, “We’re not trying to finger anyone here.”

This is a pretty harmless example of a time in which the way I use language differed from someone with a different identity; specifically, that of age. Many people my age would never have used that term in that way. In this case, it turned into a lighthearted argument about the appropriate use of language; I laughed and told him that he just can’t use that phrase.

But what happens when the accusations of the “appropriate” use of language are more serious? What happens when those making the claims hold particular positions of power over the accused? What happens when they begin to link the use of language to notions of intelligence? And what underlies these claims?

Recently, a fellow student expressed to me his belief that being intelligent means being able to speak well. I asked him to expand, and he went on to say, and I paraphrase:

“We go to an elite school, and if people don’t know these rules of language, then maybe they shouldn’t be here.”

I know every other person on this campus has most likely heard some overt or subtle, direct or passive comment about someone not being smart or good enough because of the way they speak and communicate. And when people do this, they are using the cover of language to enact biases.

Next time you say or hear something that assumes connections between language and intelligence, question where that idea is coming from. Question how you are measuring intelligence. Question your standards of the “right” way of speaking. Because many understandings of the “right” way to speak English are drawn from the same standards that determine the “right” nationality, the “right” race, the “right” class, the “right” ability status, the “right” education level, and so many other categories.

These categorizations of the “right” way of speaking and how they reflect the “right” form of intelligence reflect a very particular structure of power which excludes people who do not hold power in that structure and discounts many articulations of intelligence. It’s a centuries-old, colonial, racist, classist, ableist, xenophobic understanding of the “right” way of being. And our peers are operating within these assumptions and expectations of language and power every day.

On speaking English as her second language, Ellie Kim ’15 expressed:

“When I open up my mouth and let words come out of it, I feel as though every word I say would be evaluated; for its pronunciation, meaning, idiom, grammar, etc. This fear of being wrong, of being not proper, of coming across as inadequate makes the very act of speaking anxiety-provoking.”

Intentionally or not, hierarchies of language and the belittling of “improper” uses of English serve as tools to silence our peers.

Metika Ngbokoli ’15, in discussing her experience as a first-generation American, stated that her parents understood that “those who speak the ‘proper’ way have so much more power than those who do not.”

Because of the connections between English and power, and more specifically between “proper” English and assumed intelligence, her parents “were so focused on making sure that we spoke English the ‘right’ way, that they failed to teach us their native language, and because of that, I often feel as if part of my identity is missing.”

Gigi Gonzales ’15, also a first-generation American student, also discussed part of her parents’ experience as immigrants and the “right” way of speaking English. She remembered that “they could tone down their Filipino accents whenever they felt they needed to,” but, “over the years, I noticed they ceased this practice as an unapologetic act of defiance against those who infantilized them.”

When someone makes a claim about another’s intelligence based on the way the person speaks, their definition of intelligence reflects the intelligence of those who hold power. The accuser is likely not taking into account the students who feel they are forced to focus more on the words themselves rather than their content, for fear of appearing uneducated. They are not taking into account the intelligence of speaking multiple languages, or of the modes of intelligence and thought that cannot be articulated in English.

They are not taking into account the intelligence of resistance through language and modes of speech despite the attempts at repression by the force of the dominant standards of English.

These three experiences in no way represent the experience of every other student who may share elements of the identities or backgrounds expressed. They do not represent all the countless ways that power is constructed through language, or all the ways that language has been used on this campus as code to devalue particular identities and experiences. There are many ways students on this campus are navigating these limited, imposed categories of “right,” “intelligent,” and “proper” language from the position of accuser and accused.

But it is clear that those who make assertions about someone using the “right” kind of English do not account for how the “right” form is constructed and maintained. They do not account for how accusing someone of “improper” English is a tool to silence not only the form, but the content of the words.

When you next hear someone draw the connection between use of language and intelligence, challenge that claim and challenge what it is grounded in. To accept only a limited understanding of what constitutes “intelligence” and to accuse others’ language of falling short of that limited expectation is what is truly unintelligent. •