Anti-racism and the comma splice

Should composition instructors teach Standard Written English to students of color?

Apparently, there is a faction within the field of Rhetorical Studies that holds we should not. Standard Written English is a white language, the thinking seems to go (I have this secondhand) and should not be imposed upon POCs. People of color have their own language, which we instructors should respect and embrace. 

I dissent.

I dissent for the simple reason that I teach writing, not talking, and black and Hispanic students don’t have their own written language. White students don’t, either. Nobody does.

When a colon replaces a period

Great teaching example I’ll use this fall, from George Gopen’s Expectations: Teaching Writing from the Reader’s Perspective:

The film has been modified from its original version. It has been formatted to fit your TV.

versus

The film has been modified from its original version: It has been formatted to fit your TV.

(Gopen capitalizes the independent clause after a colon. I don’t, so I would write this without the second capital.)

In the first version, a number of modifications could have been made: change in length, removal of bad words, elimination of explicit sex scenes.

In the 2nd version, just one change has been made, and we know what it is. The film has been formatted to fit our TV. The end.

Gopen says the colon in such sentences functions as an equals sign, and I like that way of thinking about it, though colon-as-equals-sign is too abstract to help students decide when to use one, obviously.

But as an analogy, it’s interesting and fun.