Analysis of “Nobody Mean More to Me Than You and the Future Life of Willie Jordan”

In my personal narrative “Nobody Mean More to Me Than You and the Future Life of Willie Jordan,” I address the topic of racism impacting the lives of African Americans and reflect on how the lives of these African Americans are vastly different from Non-Colored people. I support these claims by acknowledging when the brother of a student I taught was murdered by white cops, then I go on to mention how my students all wanted this story to be out in the public, however, it never happened because no publishing source wanted to print it. As a professor of English at Berkeley University and an activist of civil rights, I use my expertise in English by informing my audience of Black English and the unfair treatment that African Americans endure. Specifically, I talked about how I taught my class “Black English”, which is very distinct compared to standard English. The purpose of this essay is to inform my audience about how there’s a whole different English that is spoken by people of color and about the murder of a brother of my student at the hands of a white police officer to express racial bias in law enforcement. I wanted my story to reach an audience which likely consists of people with higher education as I published my essay in the “Harvard Educational Review” and not only that, I wanted to inform african american students of the injustices. Through the use of a formal tone to express my concern towards racial injustice towards African Americans, I discuss my personal anecdotes dealing with secondhand racism. 

In my essay, I compoundedly discuss black English being oppressed by non-black people and the feeling of being forced into assimilation. I mention, “As we learn our way around this environment, either we hide our original word habits, or we completely surrender our own voice.” This reflects how African Americans are led to believe they are speaking improperly and that not speaking “standard English” will lead to ostracization. Through doing this I want my audience to realize that “black English” is a concept and it is deemed improper even though it is spoken by a majority of African Americans. 

Not only do African Americans face judgment based off of the way that they speak, more apparently they are oppressed due to their skin color. Specifically, while teaching at my university, the brother of one of my well known students named Willie Jordan was brutally murdered at the hands of law enforcement. Through telling his story I wanted to inform the public about how the death was dismissed and not prioritized since it was a African American that was murdered by the police. My students’ voices needed to be heard and for that to happen they had to refrain from using black English. I questioned, “How best to serve the memory of Reggie Jordan? Should we use the language of the killer—Standard English—in order to make our ideas acceptable to those controlling the killers?” After my class came up with the piece to write in an article of choice, they discussed whether to write it in “standard English” or “black English”. Should they use their own voice or should they use the voice of the cold blooded killers. This was something that had to be decided within my class because using Standard English, it would reach the targeted demographic. Through my use of pathos, I connected my personal experiences and stories as an African American teacher to emphasize the racial injustice that African Americans handle. In order to prove my point, I wanted my audience to have an emotional connection towards Willie Jordan and the death of his brother. My students all wanted this story to be released, but it was never published since no publisher acknowledged it. When I was repeatedly turned down by these publications, this developed into another emotional moment in my essay, that would further help my audience to understand the struggles I witnessed within the African American race. This is just one of the several examples of hardships that African Americans have to endure in White America.

All black people like Willie Jordan suffer and struggle at the hands of racism. As an African American woman and educator, I have personal testimonies towards this matter. This ongoing issue revolves around the negative ideology of pointing a finger at African Americans first and viewing them not as human beings, but as animals. It remains an issue to this day and I am always reminded about those who are especially harmed by racism. 

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