Adam Banks on African American language use online

Adam Banks' discussion of representations of Black English in online spaces was useful becaue it helped me think more critically about how identities are formed through written language. I think he makes a very insightful observation about how much of the critical commentary that addresses Black English has to do with spoken rather than written expressions. Indeed, it seems that in writing classes many have the stance of "it's okay to talk like that, but you'll need to learn to write like 'this' in our class." What is lost when we stifle certain modes of written expression for the sake of a dominant mode of expression? Online spaces not only provide a place for different kinds of ethnic written expression to flourish but they also allow members of ethnic communities to interact via these written expressions, potentially resulting in a cultural richness both represented in the space itself but also one that feedsback to the participants themselves. Writing, of course, is more than just physical representation of thought. Expressing oneself via "unrestricted" writing, especiall when interacting with others in writing, actually creats cultural richness, both in the written products that are created and in the act of creating for the participants. While this notion of writing is something that I have given some attention to in the past, I have never thought about what impact virtual spaces might have this kind of linguistic activity.