Linguistic snobbery, elitism, and slavery

Confession: I’m rather elitist.

(I haven’t blogged in a while, so I’m not sure whether it’s generally bad form or simply cliché to start out a post with “Confession: Something-Moderately-But-Excusably-Bad-About-Myself.” It’s accurate, though, so it’ll have to do for now.)

If you’ve ever tried to get help finding something at a supermarket in the less prosperous area of a city, you’ll be well aware that “American English” is hardly a clear, homogenous language, perfectly able to communicate abstract ideas between any two fluent speakers. That is to say, people from a slightly different subculture likely have a terrible time trying to understand what most of us would see as normal speech.