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It’s Time for Asians to Drop Their ‘Blaccent’
‘Talking Black’ doesn’t make you cool. It makes you racist.
Cultural appropriation is a racist practice that devalues a culture’s history and language and thus disrespects its origins by claiming something to be your own when it’s not. It’s fairly commonplace, with non-Black people appropriating anything from clothes to hairstyles. But the appropriation and theft of African American Vernacular English, also known as AAVE, particularly by non-Black Asians, is a form of appropriation that isn’t as commonly discussed.
This year, East Asian rapper and actress Nora Lum, known professionally as Awkwafina, gained a lot of criticism for her constant code-switching. When she emerged as a public persona under her stage name, she used a blaccent (a Black accent) and a lot of AAVE. Her clothing and mannerisms also replicated the culture and style of Black women. But when she began her rise to fame in the Hollywood industry, she shed this “Black” persona in favor of her regular American accent and mannerisms. The blaccent that made her character hilarious in Crazy Rich Asians seemingly disappeared in her recent award-winning film, The Farewell.
As a non-Black person, the ability to code-switch grants Lum a unique privilege not offered to Black people in their daily lives. As Harley Wong of Wear Your Voice points out in an article about the “trend” of Asians using Blackness to gain fame, using AAVE can cost Black people jobs and high-status positions because AAVE is often not taken as “serious” speech and is therefore invalidated by mainstream, White society.
Young people in the South Asian diaspora have a collective responsibility to dismantle the systems that oppressed our ancestors and Black folks around the world.
Appropriating AAVE and putting on a blaccent is a form of historical violence that replicates itself through our actions today. Treating Black culture as a caricature or face to put on is reminiscent of minstrel shows, in which White actors painted their faces black, drew on bigger lips, and essentially degraded Black folks for sport. These types of ugly actions persist. Looking Black is seen as…
