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- I find that two of my personal Discourses do actually conflict. I was raised at my home (Primary Discourse) to be, among other things, a very inclusive person. I have always found myself as a person of great fortitude when it comes to things important in my mind, such as respecting the feelings of others. “Some people experience more overt and direct conflicts between two or more of their Discourses I’ve found that here at the University of New England, one of my Secondary Discourses, many people come from less inclusive backgrounds and thus have a certain apathy and lack of sensitivity towards some things I have always considered important. Not to say it is anything I cannot handle, however, but it is a noticeable shift from my home and I find worthy of the label of a certain “tension or conflict.”
- I believe on of the most important concepts for discourse to use as a lens for the case of June Jordan is the presence of a “tension or conflict between Discourses,” which in this case are very strong. Jordan references how the “White standards control our official and popular judgements of verbal proficiency..” (Jordan 364) This is a direct link to the tension between English and Black English Discourses, where the White standard of English is the one that gets taught in schools, is the main language, etc. That is why often other cultures struggle to survive at many schools in America, sure we push diversity, but many instructors are unequipped in the ways of supporting all the cultures. Gee writes, “I argue that when such conflict or tension exists [Between two of one’s Discourses], it can deter acquisition of one or the other..” (Gee 8) Because of this, of course we see major points of conflict between student and teacher. And, as we see in the text, this problem is not always external; “I wanted not to make them self-conscious about their own spoken language—not whole they clearly felt it was ‘wrong.’” (Jordan 364) Unfortunately this shows how often and how many are unaware how they have been systematically made to not support or indulge in their own culture, and in some cases, even live against it.
- In Jordan’s piece, when her and her students “translate” the piece from The Color Purple, it is indicative of a bigger problem. The Standard English is something that is/was taught primarily in schools and other secondary Discourses. Gee writes that “These [Secondary Discourses] may be local stores and churches, schools, community groups, state and national businesses, agencies and organizations, and so forth. Each of these social institutions commands and demands one or more discourses..” The problem is that these discourses appear to contradict one another in nature, such as the English and Black English discourse, whereas the former is used and taught across many secondary Discourses, the latter is thus in a struggle to be present.
