Furthermore, America is a "good ole' boys club", so even if a black person has the same education level and experience as a white man, they will be grossly underpaid. Today, our communities and schools are severely under-resourced, widening the achievement gap and hindering many Black Americans chances at getting a good job. I have yet to see a reparation check for the work my ancestors did.
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And when slavery ended, we didn't even receive the 40 acres or mule we were promised. America has flourished on the backs of black people our labor, services, and ingenuity.
Pyramids frank ocean tick in background for free#
Black people built this country for free and were the backbone of the economy during slavery. In the middle of your hustle and striving, no person or circumstance will impede your progress or keep you from keepin' on (bonus black phrase).ĥ) Just tryna make a dollar out of fifteen cents.Īn ode to the black entrepreneurship spirit over the years. It's the black version of "the show must go on". "One monkey don't stop no show" is pretty straight forward. After a mouthful of expletives and reminders that you live in her house and are lucky to be there, she will finish it off with "I don't know who you think you are taking to, because I am not one of your little friends". At this point, your mom is slowly turning her neck around like that scene in the exorcist. Before you finish the last word, you already know you messed up and wish you could start that sentence over. Scenario: your parent storms into your room unannounced, without knocking, because why would they knock in their own house? They then give you an order such as, "take out the trash", without a single care for what you're currently doing, because why would they adhere to your schedule? You respond in a way that's logical to you, "Okay I'll do it when I'm done.". This statement will be affirmed to you with a swiftness when you seem to forget who exactly you are speaking to. And if you don't understand that the question is rhetorical, you will piss your parent off even more because they will further question your processing skills.Īnother staple for black parents. But saying, "no, you do not look like Boo-Boo The Fool" is worse than a wrong answer, because duh, the question is rhetorical. Meaning, do I like like a simpleton? Do I look that dumb? Oh, so you think I am stupid? At this point, the adolescent in question is thinking to themselves 1) "Who the heck is boo-boo the fool?" and 2) "I don't know? Maybe you do look like boo-boo the fool". The parent will promptly respond with "Do I look like Boo-Boo The Fool?". So I then tried to email you, but the message didn't send". I called the house phone, but it rang busy and I forgot your cell phone number. Instead of accepting the repercussions or come up with a believable excuse, the kid answers with, "See, what had happened was my phone restarted and changed my clock so I thought it was 10 p.m., instead of midnight. For example, let's say a kid comes home past their curfew and the parent asks the child why they are late. Black parents will read you to the heavens and make you reevaluate your entire life. Forget corporal punishment, although they are good at that too. The brilliance of black parents is that they can make you feel stupid with a few words and a glare. And in many cases, being able to fluidly change one’s speech is a form of survival. I challenge these people to ask themselves, “who exactly owns language and who has the power to assign normative ideals to other forms of expression?” Language evolves, grows and is malleable depending on the space one occupies. People with this lack of exposure to anything considered different, are quick to proclaim another person's speech improper or incorrect. One of those cultural distinctions is our language.Īmerica is highly segregated and there are swathes of people uneducated to vernacular not like theirs. Yet amid all this, Black America found a way to create a culture so distinct that it has influenced the world. And by the time of post-Reconstruction, through means of systematic oppression, community disinvestment, unequal access to public infrastructure, and political disenfranchisement, we’d been pushed to live in the margins.
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For Black Americans in particular, our heritage and native tongue were taken during the transatlantic slave trade.