Sunday, February 3, 2013

Cultural Deficit/Cultural Difference Theory

After reading the text explaining what Cultural Deficit and Cultural Difference Theory are and watching the two videos, it became clear which side of the argument each video landed. The Fox News video very obviously supports the Cultural Deficit Theory. Garrard McClendon is trying to eradicate the African American Vernacular English in a Chicago city school. The purpose of his instruction is to get his students to stop speaking in this way because he says they "won't be accepted professionally". Cultural Deficit Theory is exactly this, seeing a culture as inferior and trying to change it.
The What Matters video represents the Cultural Difference Theory. This video focused on the acceptance of different dialects and the need for using variations of dialect at appropriate times. The term codes-switching refers to the understanding that we will speak to in different ways depending on the situation. For example, while speaking to our friends we will speak differently than if we were speaking to the Dean of a prominent university. This video really concentrated on understanding what is OK and when not on changing or eradicating a dialect all together. 

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