Developing Work 1b

"This chapter shows that AAE possesses numerous features that distinguish it from Standard English and combine to make it a unique way of communicating. With remarkable inventiveness, AAE speakers have forged their own vocabulary, especially by endowing Standard English words with new pronunciations, new meanings, and sometimes new spellings. Meanwhile, they have created a grammar that is, on the one hand, more streamlined and , on the other hand, more context dependent and more "verbally" complex. In addition, they have developed rhetorical strategies that are interactive and narrative, direct and indirect, musical and visual."

-Quoted from "Redd and Schuster Webb"

This whole paragraph is a summary about how AAE is distinguished from Standard English by analysing three vital components of these two languages: Phonology, Semantics and Syntax. And this is also the approach that I would use to construct my own literacy autobiography. Moreover, since there are so many similarities between how AAE differs from Standard English(SE) and how my hometown dialect differs from Standard Chinese(SC)(when doing the research and reading, this result surprised me the most), some of ideas from the quote match with my ideas exactly and others help me to complement my thesis. For example, as the quote proposed that AAE speakers create their own words by endowing SE words with new pronunciation, meaning and spelling, which is the similar way that my local people do. Especially the adjustment of pronunciation I forgot to mention in DW1a, is the most frequent one to be applied. Additionally, the quote also stated that AAE speaker have created a grammar, which is more streamlined and yet more context dependent and more "verbally" complex, while I argued in DW1a that my local people always omit the predicate and tense indicators to make sentences shorter so are to express their opinions more efficient and convenient. Thus, it is not difficult for us to find that these two ideas are highly interrelated.

On the other hand, although my ideas and the quote share so many similarities, there are still some differences between them. For instance, we usually concentrate on altering the meaning and pronunciation to create our unique words instead of sharply change the spelling(there is a very strict rule in words spelling of my country, people can not change spelling due to their will. Even though you change it, other people will naturally reject this change. Because most of our Chinese words' existence can trace back to thousands years ago, it is deeply ingrained in people's mind). In addition, regardless which region of my country you belong to, we generally share the similar rhetorical strategies with each other(I know most of you would confused about how could different regions' people share the similar rhetorical strategies, this seems to be impossible under common sense. However, this special literary phenomenon is generated by the unique history and cultural situation of my country. My country experienced many different kinds of dynasty, and there were so many cultural revolution such as literary genres' merge and split accompanied with it. And the whole process is a long story, I can not tell you in this only 500 words paragraph).

Finally, I want to say that all cultures are united and yet unique, which means they share similarities with each other while demonstrating their unique point no matter whether it is obvious or not. Language is equal to each other, no extraordinary and no priority.