African American English Language Analysis

Within the episodes mentioned above, and in nearly all episodes, the use of African American Vernacular English or AAVE can be heard. AAVE is defined as “is a variety dialect of American English, spoken by urban working-class African Americans and largely bi-dialectal middle-class African Americans” (Edwards). In “Strike,” you can hear Penny say “I been gettin’” and “Gimme dat” (S1 E2). The use of AAVE is important because it as a common form of speech for many African-Americans. Often criticized as just “made up” or just written off as improper english, AAVE is something that comes under fire from the white majority. For TPF to use it very regularly is important for children of color to hear that their culture is valid and theirs to use.

In her piece “Pride and Prejudice: Pervasiveness of Colorism and the Animated Series Proud Family,” Steele argues that show uses colorism, or, the preference for lighter skinned black’s, regularly (p 57). She uses the example of the Gross sisters, and their blue skin, and how it represents such dark black skin that they are blue (p 60). In a Buzzfeed article “26 Reasons Why ‘The Proud Family’ was Awesome” by Heben Nigatu, a woman who clearly used to watch the show, states that she was mostly confused to why the sisters were blue, but her final her interpretation of the Gross sisters had blue skin was because they were so ashy (p 1). The comments on this article offer perspectives of other TPF viewers. One commenter concludes the same thing about the Gross sisters, that their blue equates ashiness. (Nigatu). Another comment on the article, states “his show was a treasure and deserves more recognition!” and another comment reads a simply stated word “DIVERSITY!!!!” (Nigatu). The majority of these comments are very positive and the Buzzfeed’s facebook post of the article has around 2,000 likes. From this information we can gather that when reflecting back on this show as one they watched, most viewers recognize it as diverse and