Talking Black in America is a beautifully crafted 66-minute documentary from the Language and Life Project (LPP) Footnote ¹ exploring the sociocultural implications of speaking African American Language (AAL) across the United States. Like other linguistic documentaries, Talking Black in America focuses on the breadth of several topics as opposed to the depth of one or two. The film, divided into eight smaller units, examines topics such as what it means to talk ‘Black,’ the systematicity and regional variation of AAL, and the historical origins of AAL. The film is narrated by linguists, many of them African American and speakers of AAL, but the documentary is easily palatable and useful for current linguists, aspiring linguists, and those who have never heard of a linguist.

Unlike other linguistic documentaries that include just one or two segments on AAL, Talking Black in America is the first full-length linguistic documentary that focuses solely on AAL and its varieties across the country. The film skillfully shapes a narrative of the push-and-pull relationship, the double consciousness that speakers of AAL often grapple with and that researchers often examine as James Baldwin articulates in the opening lines of the film's introduction, ‘It's that tone and that sound, you know, just which, which is in me.’ While the film can easily be watched in one sitting, it can also be viewed in small bits with each of the 8 sections and the introduction used as supplemental teaching or discussion aids.Footnote ² Each section ranges from 5 to 13 minutes, with the entire film running 66 minutes.

After the brief introduction, Section 1 poses the question of what it means to talk Black. Linguist Sonja Lanehart articulates that sounding Black and talking Black is less about words and structures and more about cadence and tone. One of the most poignant takeaways of this section that can be easily missed is the notion that AAL, like any other linguistic form, is not monolithic. In layman terms, linguists such as Lisa Green and Arthur Spears speak to the regional variation of AAL, and this is critical as only until recently was this notion of variation in AAL explored. Because the notion of talking Black is very subjective, this section of the film may feel unfulfilling for viewers who want a concrete description to the abstract ideals presented here.

Section 2 and Section 3 are complements: Section 2 discusses inclusion, access and authenticity for speakers of AAL while Section 3 examines how AAL can exclude or marginalize speakers in spaces such as the educational arena but give them an open door to the entertainment industry. The 1996 Ebonics controversy is one of the main turning points in the public perception of AAL. On December 18, 1996, the Oakland School Board signed a resolution to recognize Ebonics as the primary language of African American students; this was done to provide educational interventions to lessen the achievement gap between the African American students and their white counterparts. Unfortunately, the actions of the Oakland School Board became a point of contention and castigation in the media, and the negative connotations and misunderstood interpretations of the Oakland resolution escalated (Rickford & Rickford, Reference Rickford and Rickford2000; Green, Reference Green2002). One strength of the film is the use of actual footage showing the 1996 Oakland controversy on CNN and C-SPAN, but having a little more background information on why the footage is important would be helpful, since this moment shifts the narrative from calling AAL Ebonics due to the negative connotations from the 1996 Oakland debacle.

Another strength of the film is the presentation of the positive, celebrated aspects of AAL balanced with the negative and belittled facets of the language. This balance is shown beautifully in Sections 2 and 3 as linguists refute the notion of substandard communication by discussing the systematicity of AAL, providing illustrations of grammatical and ungrammatical sentences. Rickford sums up the complementarity of inclusion and exclusion as well as the balance of negative and positive thinking throughout film, ‘The language is vibrant, it's fulfilling, it's enjoyable, and on the other hand, you have African Americans dealing with the larger society. Getting pushback, getting misunderstanding.’

The longest section of the documentary is Section 4, which outlines the hypotheses surrounding the historical origins of AAL. While the film highly favors the Creole hypothesis, there is discussion of the English hypothesis (Wolfram & Schilling, Reference Wolfram and Schilling2016) as well. Linguists Tracy Weldon and John Rickford explain the historical ties of AAL to Gullah and Caribbean English creoles, and to keep the viewer's interest and further explicate the historical ties, there are passages of Gullah woven throughout the explanation. To further understand the spread of AAL after the journey of English spoken by Africans across the Atlantic Ocean during the slave trade, Section 5 addresses how migration of African Americans from the South to the North affected the spread of AAL within the United States. This is the first time in the documentary that the notion of AAL's divergence from mainstream American English is discussed. Although complex concepts like this are introduced throughout the film, the presentation of the concepts is kept simple and at most times concepts are described in digestible, layperson's terms.

The most celebratory and culturally revealing part of the film is Section 6, which highlights the linguistic dexterity and skills that AAL speakers have. From hip hop ciphers to soulful preaching, Talking Black in America presents various genres to show how useful and nimble AAL is. The transition from hip hop to the Black church is woven together cleverly by showing how both arenas have a duty to provide moral compasses for the community, including through the use of language.

The section on transformation (Section 7) centres around language change without talking formally about processes and the influence of peer groups. This section reiterates the fact that AAL is not monolithic, and to make the conversation legible, much of it focuses on lexical change and how that change is seen through music and dance on a more abstract level (Smitherman, Reference Smitherman1977; Reference Smitherman2006).

The film ends on a high note by presenting the negative arguments put forth about AAL and then presenting a positive rebuttal in Section 8. The connection to community and culture is manifested through language, specifically the use of AAL. Dahlia the Poet articulates this most succinctly: ‘Some people may feel like the things that they're saying regardless if it's considered, you know, improper English, that's what may make them feel the closest to home. So it's almost, kind of like, a special legacy.’

The film skillfully presents and celebrates a linguistic variety that has been often belittled, but there are two noticeable omissions from the film: a direct mention of codeswitching and its importance in one's communicative repertoire, and a discussion of Black American Sign Language (ASL). Ultimately, Talking Black in America is a gripping piece of art that articulates and celebrates the cultural importance of this ethnolinguistic variety while at the same time presenting larger social and political issues that must be continuously addressed to create awareness and to combat the notions that AAL is substandard and nonstandard compared to Mainstream American English.

Throughout the film, a train is constantly moving forward on its tracks, and linguist Renee Blake concludes the film by likening people of African descent to that train, always moving, interacting and transforming. Thus, the film urges the viewer to accept, embrace and appreciate AAL on its own terms and as a legitimate linguistic form and to allow it to move forward like the train.