To Protect and Serve Nonstereotypical Attitudes of Black Students

African-American females have been conditioned to “protect and serve” in the various communities that they have been in. We have been socialized to be the mother figures of classrooms and in other social contexts that makes everyone feel comfortable and at ease. According to “To Protect and Serve”, we are commissioned by teachers to be enforcers of discipline and we also befriend children of all backgrounds, acting as a surrogate mother for those who may or may not be able to have the social interactions to be able to make friends. The article also spoke about Black students not being able to speak to teachers for help in areas they may have trouble in for fear of deficiency. I can speak personally to this experience because for so long I was afraid to go to my teachers for assistance because I was afraid they would think less of me. On many occasions when I was younger I would go to a teacher and in my opinion, I would think that I was being chastised because I didn’t know enough. I would leave the classroom knowing that I did not fully grasp a concept that I was trying to learn, but because of fear of a negative reaction from my teacher, I would shy away and try to learn on my own.
The article also talks about “code switching”, using African American Vernacular English in one setting and Standard English in another. It goes on to talk about African American females who are successful in the classroom and that “work hard, silent, and when they vocalize, they speak’ in a different voice‘”. It was also said that thes type of students act in this manner in order to cast off low expectations and not to be labeled as “loud Black girls’. I had my personal bout with the stereotype of quiet girls who were academically intelligent. I was thought of as ‘not black’ or ‘not black enough’ when I was younger because I didn’t use the slang that many of my classmates did, didn’t dress the same way they did, and did not listen to the same music that they did. I would caution that not every Black student is comfortable using vernacular and adapting to the culture that many Blacks identify with. I appreciated the culture, but I wasn’t accepted by people of my own skin color that according to the parameters of the Black community, I am supposed to identify with. Blacks should learn to appreciate their Black culture and the vernacular associated with it, but we should also appreciate those who are not as exposed and consider themselves equally as Black as those who do express themselves in that manner.
Jasmine Bryant