My housemate and I had an odd conversation about the Trayvon Martin case and the state of racism in the US today.  It was strange, mainly because we occupy very different perspectives.  My housemate is a humble, genuine, and deeply compassionate man who self-identifies as an ultra-conservative that likes Sean Hannity.  In comparison, I tend to be the more critical and argumentative member of the household, often pressing him on political perspectives from my position as center-left leaning NPR addict.  He is Caucasian and I am Chinese-American, and we are both Christians (Presbyterian even!) living in a mostly black inner-city neighborhood.
The conversation began with a discussion on an article defending a critical witness’s use of “Black english” as perfectly legitimate:
Jeantel’s English is not any more or less grammatical than the Standard American variety spoken by Zimmerman’s attorney, but unlike the defense attorney, she did not have the advantage of speaking the dialect that is sanctioned by America’s dominant social stratum…
Perhaps it should come as no surprise that the Trayvon Martin case, which thrust the persistence of racism in America uncomfortably into the spotlight, has continued to clumsily illustrate the structural disadvantages encountered by millions of black Americans. African Americans are victim not just to gross racial profiling, as was Trayvon Martin, but also to linguistic discrimination, a little-understood prejudice that springs directly from linguistic prescription…
Our discussion became an argument over the distinction between racism and discrimination. [Read more…] about Where are you FROM?