Appropriation and Social Media: When the desire to use ‘cool’ terms becomes harmful 

The conversation surrounding social media and linguistics is one that has sparked much discourse, especially with the term ‘slang’ used to describe informal terms specifically found in online spaces. From words such as ‘lowkenuinely’ and ‘flow state’, we have witnessed various linguistic phenomena, with multiple social media accounts dedicated to dissecting these patterns. 

The focus in this article is of another aspect of linguistic patterns that has emerged throughout the years: the appropriation of African American English (AAE) by non-Black folks in online spaces and eventually during in-person dialogue, especially amongst us non-Black people who are comfortable co-opting African American English while witnessing anti-Black sentiments run rampant throughout our communities. I will speak for myself when I say it is a significant problem in the Latine community. 

I hope to use this research to increase awareness among my peers at UHD and to get people thinking about whether we really know the origins of the words we say – and not the ones you can say in front of your parents and leave them impressed with how proficient you are in English. Rather, the words you know using them in front of your parents would raise questions such as “Are you trying to be a gangster?” 

AAE is a language that would not have existed if it weren’t for slavery. African American English is a result of the various dialects that enslaved people spoke that encountered one another. To diminish any means of communicating with each other, white slaveowners purposely placed enslaved people from different regions in Africa together. As a means of survival, enslaved people resorted to creating their own language, which would become African American English. 

AAE has influenced broader American culture, contributing expressions and idioms that are now mainstream and used among non-Black people. It is evidence of the deep impression that African American culture leaves on overall American culture and history. Particularly on social media, the use of AAE words among the general population is common and referred to as slang. 

Geneva Smitherman, a renowned Black American linguist, notes how AAE’s purpose of being a “counter language,” or a language that came about the process of an oppressor imposing their language on the oppressed, becomes void once a word or phrase “crosses over into the general white mainstream.”

While many do not believe there is much malicious intent behind words from the African American English language being used by more non-Black people, there is something to be said when said words become appropriated.  

 In the digital age, people from different cultures and dialects are easily accessible to one another, making it easy to showcase those elements of everyone’s identity. While beneficial, it is an easy gateway for languages to be appropriated. Words such as ‘lit’, ‘cap’, ‘gonna’, ‘finna’, etc. etc. are now more associated with Generation Z than Black Americans.  

In a 2021 UCLA study, researchers have found a correlation within the contexts in which AAE is used by non-Black social media influencers. Each segment has been split into two categories: non-humorous (promotional content) and humorous (moments of humor within content). The study found that non-Black social media influencers are highly more likely to use AAE within humorous contexts (highest being 47 terms spoken in 37 minutes). They chose to use less AAE when making more serious content, which adds more to the concerns surrounding AAE and appropriation. 

This study shows that individuals with a considerable platform can influence their audiences to replicate their way of speaking. The kicker is that their speech patterns considerably use AAE. To a considerable amount of non-Black people on the internet, AAE is something that they’ve only begun to speak more of because of social media. Past that, not many do more research about the language.  

Beyond the usage of AAE without proper research, there are many instances in which non-Black individuals on the internet use AAE incorrectly. Phrases such as a TikTok comment reading “I THOUGHT THAT WAS ASAP ROCKY I NEED TO CHILE’ and an X publication with ‘kehlani’s fit go crazy good!!’ are a few examples. Mistakes while speaking other languages is common, but it is much more accepted to incorrectly use AAE than it is to do so with any other language. Reducing AAE to “Gen-Z lingo” or “internet speak” contributes to this, as it is a contemporary version of the cultural erasure intended by white oppressors. It is a deprivation of power. 

When words from Black English are taken and thrown in the mainstream and appropriated by non-Black people who eventually shove off any form of reprimand from the speakers of the language, it is a deprivation of power. AAE is not taken seriously enough by the education system to have its own course implemented as a language elective.

Words attributed to AAE are often seen as slang and are frequently forbidden to be written in essays and written responses in school. Even after the enormous strife that Black Americans have gone through to create their own language (power), that same language is still seen as inferior with the way it is appropriated in modern society. 

Fortunately, there has been a growing number of Black social media content creators becoming the face of speaking about negative perceptions of AAE and the harms of creating a standard language, one of them being Sunn M’Cheaux, the first professor of Gullah Geechee at Harvard University. He emphasizes that language at its core is for the purpose of communication and efforts made to set a ‘proper’ way of speaking a certain language already means the message has already been understood.  

While systems continue to oppress communities for the language they speak, it is important to value the sanctity of the languages the same communities have created for self-preservation and survival.  

When non-Black people use AAE in comedic contexts, everyone is aware that they really do not speak that way in professional settings, when the switch can be turned off. This type of grace is not granted to Black Americans, who are already discouraged from wearing certain hairstyles to job interviews and have to code-switch out of their own language to maneuver through the professional field.  

 Authenticity is something we want to see in others but are hesitant to be so ourselves. When faced with the urge to take up certain words and accents you see online, really ask yourself: am I speaking with these mannerisms for the sake of creating comedic effect? Am I saying these words to make myself sound cool to my peers? As much as language is ever fluctuating, it is also part of history.