His Fair Lady Weds My Nigger Son

Field: Arts and Humanities (Social Sciences)

His Fair Lady Weds My Nigger Son Janine Jones The greater part of George Yancy's article, "The Social Ontology of African-American Language, the Power of Nommo, and the Dynamics of Resistance and Identity Through Language" is devoted to acknowledging the significant contributions of Geneva Smitherman to Africana philosophy through her rich analyses of African American Language (AAL), which she situates within a network of issues, including the politics of language policy, the problem of reality construction, the historical structuring of society, and Anglo-linguistic imperialism. In this article I will briefly discuss an idea suggested by Yancy's paper, namely, that a particular language spoken by human beings (e.g., AAL) could be inadequate for conveying a fully-fledged human life, regardless of whether the language is used by those in command of it or by anyone else. Going hand-in-hand with this idea is another: that a standard language (e.g., Standard American English) is capable of representing all fully human realities and expressing all fully human thoughts, feelings, and attitudes when used by masters of that standard language. Yancy does not believe this. But a white philosopher who would reassure him that he did not have to render his autobiography in that language (i.e., AAL) might well possess such a belief (Yancy 2004, 274).1 As I am not concerned only with AAL but with nonstandard languages in general and dialects, I begin this discussion with a comment made by George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion, Professor Higgins. We enter the scene right after Higgins says to Eliza Doolittle, a flower girl in Covent Square, "Woman: cease this detestable boohooing instantly; or else seek the shelter of some other place of worship" (Shaw 1953, 227) Eliza responds "I've a right to be here if I like, same as you" (227). To this Higgins replies with a speech that gives us no small insight into the politics of language and the rights and power it is supposed to confer. His words allow us to see the nature of the relation thought to hold—on a certain Anglo-imperialist view—between language and the soul: A woman who utters such depressing and disgusting sounds has no right to be anywhere—no right to live. Remember that you are a human being with a soul [End Page 311] and the divine gift of articulate speech; that your native language is the language of Shakespear and Milton and The Bible: and dont sit there crooning like a bilious pigeon. (227, emphasis mine) After reading this fine speech (and hearing it over and over in My Fair Lady, the silver-screen adaptation of Shaw's "Pygmalion") and reading Yancy's paper, I could not help but wonder whether the white philosopher who sought to reassure Yancy about the language he should use and could use to deliver his autobiography was implicitly (and subconsciously) enjoining Yancy to remember that he was a human being who had escaped a certain way of life (a subhuman way of life?), and in so doing had earned the right to truly exist anywhere (even in the academy!), as he had achieved the divine gift of articulate speech, which he could now use to describe that other life he had lived, instead of using modes of expression from that other life, where tonal accentuation might take the place of several words at a time; where rhythms contrive to hold sway over articulate speech, consequently annihilating the possibility of a language game in which genuine reference plays an essential role (Yancy 2004, 292). Yancy need not use depressing, disgusting sounds: sounds reminiscent of animal croonings, growlings, and snortings. Was this professor pleading for Yancy to lay full claim to his good luck, his hard work, his meritorious new possession, not just of language but a new kind of soul—a more fully human one? A real soul. [Higgins: I'm worn out, thinking about [Liza], and watching her lips and her teeth and her tongue, not to mention her soul, which is the quaintest of the lot (Shaw 1953, 271).] After all, given Yancy's mastery of Standard American English no one need say to him...