THE USE OF AFRICAN-AMERICAN VERNACULAR ENGLISH

IN FRIDAY MOVIE

By
IRFAN THORIQ AL-FAUZY
A1B021008

ENGLISH EDUCATION STUDY PROGRAM

DEPARTMENT OF LANGUAGES AND ARTS
FACULTY OF TEACHER TRAINING AND EDUCATION
UNIVERSITY OF BENGKULU
2025
 CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background

As the language evolves from time to time, a language branching. English

branches into many varieties. A variety of English that is widely used in printed
books, newspapers, and other mass media is called Standard English (Yule, 2006).
Standard English is believed to be the most prestigious variety of English (Meechan
and Rees-Miller, 1997), and it is taught in institutions and schools. Standard English
is often associated with the social group with the highest degree of power, wealth, and
prestige (Trudgill, 2002). This makes Standard English the standard variety and
others the nonstandard variety, which lacks prestige.

The United States of America has many kinds of nonstandard English

varieties across its fifty states. For instance, people in the Southern and Northern parts
of the United States have some distinctive features that make them unique in their
ways. As immigrants and slaves from other continents came to the country, they also
developed their distinctive variant of nonstandard English. Some of them are Chicano
English, spoken by Mexican migrants from around California and Texas, Cajun
English, spoken by Cajun people from Louisiana which is known for its French
influences, and African-American Vernacular English.

African-American Vernacular English (AAVE), also known as Black English

or Negro English, is one of the predominant English variants in the United States
which is spoken by African-American people of low and middle-class of their
communities. AAVE found its origins in the African slaves, where they were owned
by white American people, dominantly in the Southern region, to work at their
residence. As slavery existed for many years, African slaves were in compelling
circumstances to develop English and then evolved into AAVE which is known by
now.

Initially, AAVE was dominantly used in the rural southern of the United
States. However, between 1910 and 1970, after the abolition of slavery, many
African-American settlers moved from the Southern region to other regions, known
as the Great Migration. The settlers moved from the rural south to the urban, large
metropolitan cities in the Northern part of the United States. This led to the
emergence of the urban AAVE in the Northern region (Wolfram, 2004), associating
AAVE with the urban lives of African-American neighborhoods.

Since the signing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 which prohibits the
segregation and discrimination of colored people, AAVE became more popular, even
influencing non-black spoken American English. Galuh (2014) states that the
emergence of prominent black figures, such as Barrack Obama, Oprah Winfrey, and
50 Cents, contributed to the popularity of AAVE. Moreover, entertainment like music,
movies, and television series also make a part of the AAVE widespread. Black rapper
musicians such as Snoop Dog and 2Pac are famous for their hip-hop music, whose
lyrics used AAVE and the theme often depicted “life in the hood” and black culture.
Meanwhile, African-American-themed cinema is also popular with American
audiences. Black actors such as Will Smith and Denzel Washington are popular in
Hollywood cinemas. Black movies or sitcoms often depicted the lives of African-
American families, and some focused on gangster life and hood conflicts.

From a linguistics perspective, AAVE has unique features if compared to

Standard English or other spoken nonstandard English. In terms of grammar, AAVE
has slightly different grammar rules when spoken. Wolfram (2004) in his research on
urban AAVE grammar categories the unique traits of AAVE grammar based on its
verb phrase (copula/auxiliary absence, invariant be, completive done, sequential be
done, remote been, simple had + verb, specialized auxiliaries, irregular verbs, subject-
verb agreements, and others), negations, nominals, and question formation.

Based on the grammar perspective and how popular African-American

entertainment is mentioned above, the writer chose to discuss how grammar is used in
spoken AAVE. The writer selected the movie Friday for this research. Portrayed by
Ice Cube and Chris Tucker, the movie depicts two buddies facing troubles in an urban
neighborhood.

The writer chose the movie Friday because the movie depicted black culture
in an African-American urban neighborhood or “hood”, portrayed by black actors,
and the dominant use of AAVE throughout the movie. Using African-American-
themed movies, such as Friday, is also effective in learning how AAVE is spoken,
particularly its grammar. Hence, the study is focused on grammatical analysis in the
Friday movie.

Some previous studies have been conducted regarding this topic. One by
Wulandari (2018) analyzed on the use of AAVE in a movie titled Precious, which the
author focused on the AAVE variations and their functions when uttered by the
characters in the movie. Other study by Astuti (2018) also analyzed on AAVE
grammar and the factors of why the AAVE is used, but uses a rap song titled
Everybody to collect the data. The writer acknowledged that this study is also focused
on AAVE grammar features, but this study also compared them to the Standard
English.

1.2 Identification of the Problem

AAVE is one of the English varieties, commonly spoken by the African-

American community. From the perspective of native English speakers, AAVE is
often viewed as “incorrect” English due to some of its grammatical features that
tend to break the rules of Standard English, which led to a misconception.
 This study aimed to analyze AAVE grammar aspects used in Friday movie.
By identifying and categorizing grammatical features of AAVE, this study
contributes to a deeper understanding of AAVE linguistics, particularly from its
grammar. On the other hand, foreign English learners, particularly from EFL
(English as a foreign language) countries, may be interested in learning AAVE,
aside from learning Standard English, which adds to their English knowledge and
improve their English in speaking situations with native speakers.

1.3 Statement of the Problem

Regarding the problem of the research, the writer proposed research questions as
follows:

1. What are the grammatical features of AAVE discovered in the Friday

movie?
2. What are the differences between the grammatical features of AAVE used
in the Friday movie compared to grammatical features used in Standard
English?
1.4 Limitation of the Research

One feature that distinguishes nonstandard English from Standard English is how
it constructs a sentence. This study solely focused on grammar aspects of AAVE
spoken in the movie Friday.

Using Wolfram's theory on urban AAVE grammar, the writer analyzes AAVE
grammatical features from its verb phase, negation, nominals, and question
formation. These grammatical features used in the movie will be compared with their
Standard English counterparts.

1.5 Aims of the Research

Following the research questions mentioned above, the aims of the research are
stated as follows:
 1. Discovering the grammatical features of AAVE used in the Friday movie
2. Analyzing the comparison between the grammatical features of AAVE
used in the Friday movie and grammatical features used in Standard
English

1.6 Significance of the Research

The significance of this research is as follows:

1. Practically, this research will be useful for learning nonstandard English,

especially AAVE. Learning English through movies is one effective way,
and this research will provide information on AAVE in the movie Friday.
2. Theoretically, this research can be a helpful reference for students,
lecturers, and academic participants in sociolinguistics studies, specifically
on English variables and dialects.
1.7 Definition of Key Terms

The key terms used in this study are as follows:

a. African-American Standard English. African-American Standard English

or AAVE is an English variant commonly used by African-American
communities in the United States. AAVE is known for its distinct features
compared to Standard English., particularly in the grammar aspects, such as
verb phrases and negations.
b. Standard English. Standard English (or Standard American English) is an
English variety that is considered the standard one. This English is often
associated with a higher social group class, which makes this variety the most
prestigious compared to other English varieties. Standard English is also used
in schools and institutions when teaching English.
 c. Friday. Friday is a buddy comedy movie released in 1995 starred Ice Cube
and Chris Tucker. Themed on African-American urban neighborhoods, this
movie is used in this study because of the AAVE usage.

CHAPTER II

LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 African-American Vernacular English (AAVE)

a. Definition of AAVE

African-American Vernacular English, or AAVE, is an English variant used

exclusively by African-American communities across the United States. The term
“Vernacular” is a general expression that refers to any kind of social dialect, typically
spoken by the lower-status group, which is treated as a “non-standard” because of
marked differences from a socially prestigious variety treated as a standard language
(Yule, 2006). In this case, AAVE is a nonstandard variant of English, spoken by a
low-status African-American group, and considered low prestige if compared to the
standard language in the United States, which is Standard English.

Other terms for AAVE are Black English or Negro English. Another term,
Ebonics, is also used. Ebonics is derived from Ebony (black) and phonics (sound).
According to Baugh (2000), the term Ebonics was coined by Robert Lee Williams in
1973 at a conference titled “Cognitive and Language Development of a Black Child”.
Williams asserted more on Ebonics in his book, Ebonics: The True Language of
Black Folks, published 2 years later, in which he stated that Ebonics “… may defined
as the linguistic and paralinguistic features which on a concentric continuum
represent the communicative competence of the West African, Caribbean, and United
States slave descendent of African origin. It includes the grammar, various idioms,
patois, argots, ideolects, and social dialects of Black people” (Williams, 1975). From
that statement, according to Green (2002), the term “Ebonics” was created to refer
specifically to the language of people of African descent that had its roots in West
African languages, and not as a reference to any dialect of English. Therefore,
Ebonics does not explicitly refer to the English variant spoken by African-American
people, but any language originated from the West African language as a whole.

1. Origins of AAVE

Many linguists still dispute AAVE origins. Green (2002) draws that there are
several hypotheses regarding the origins of AAVE:

a. Substratist view. It favors West African language influence on AAVE

due to the similarities of its structure. West African language was
considered substrate because of the subordinate social status of their
speakers concerning the social status of English speakers.
b. Creolist view. It stated that AAVE may have originated from creoles. It
is also stated that AAVE is related to and influenced by Jamaican
creoles and Gullah (a creole spoken by African-Americans around the
southern United States)
c. Anglicist or dialectologist view. It favors the English influence on
AAVE based on the characteristic patterns. It downplayed the West
African language influence on AAVE.
d. Founder principle view. It theorized that AAVE was born by the
language of the founders of colonial America and its offspring that
impacted the African language.
 e. Settler principle view. It theorized that AAVE was created by African
slaves but did not begin as Creole, instead from the contact between
Africans and Europeans in the seventeenth century.

In addition to the views above, Mufwene (2014) states that the origins of
AAVE are polarized by two arguments: the anglicist or dialectologist view and the
Creolist view.

2. Grammar of AAVE

Regarding the grammar of AAVE, there are many significant differences

between AAVE and Standard American English. Wolfram (2004) outlined major
grammatical features of AAVE as follows.

a. Verb phrase

AAVE verb phrases are distinguishable from Standard English grammar

regarding the use of tense, mood, and aspect. There are some rules of verb phrases in
AAVE that are not alike to their standard counterparts.

a) Copula absence

“They (are) acting silly”

“You (are) good”

Copula is a linguistic term for a word or phrase that connects the subject to
object complement. “is” and “are” are examples of copula. In AAVE, however, it is a
common thing that copula is not used when forming a sentence.
b) Invariant be

“Sometimes they be playing games”

AAVE often used the word “be” in their sentence. “Be” in AAVE is referred to
as habitual “be”, which is used to an action that has been done habitually.

c) Completive done

“They done used all the good ones”

“I done told you not to mess up”

The usage of “done” in AAVE refers to an action completed in the recent past
and is also used to highlight the change of state or to intensify an activity.

d) Sequential be done

“My ice cream be done melted by the time we get there”

“If you love your enemy, they be done eat your alive in this society”

The combination of the words “be” and “done” to become “be done” is used
in AAVE sentences to refer to a resultative or a future conditional state.

e) Remote been

“I been had it for about three years”

“I been knowing him”

“Been” is used in AAVE to refer to an activity that has already been done in
the distant past.

f) Simple had + verb

“They had went outside and they had messed up the yard”
 The usage of the auxiliary “had” added in a past or perfect verb indicates a
simple past tense action.

b. Negation

Negation in AAVE often participates in multiple negations, where a single

negative proposition may be marked both within the verb phrase and on postverbal
indefinites.

Examples:

“It wasn’t nothing”

“They didn’t do nothing about nobody having no money or nothing like that”

The usage of the word “ain’t” is common in AAVE negation. The word
functions as a general preverbal negative for the present tense “be” (am not, isn’t,
aren’t) and for the perfect auxiliary “haven’t/hasn’t”.

Examples:

“She ain’t here”

“She ain’t do it”

c. Nominals

To form a possessive and plurals inflection in English, the affix “-s” is

commonly used. However, in AAVE, there are the absences of the said inflection in
its grammatical features.

Examples of possessive sentences in AAVE:

“The dog (‘s) tail was wagging”

“The man (‘s) hat was old”

Examples of plurals in AAVE:

 “I got 50 cent (-s)”

“It’s four mile (-s) from here”

In some cases, AAVE uses a type of associative plural in the form of “an ‘em”
as in the sentence “Jerome an ‘em” for “Jerome and his friends”. The use of “Y’all”
is also common as a second person plural as in “Y’all done now”.

d. Question Formation

There are two unique traits in AAVE when forming questions. First, questions
can be formed without subject-auxiliary inversion, as in “Where that is?” or “Why I
can’t go?”. Then, embedded questions, as in “I asked her could I go with her”, may
retain subject-auxiliary inversion, without the usage of “if” that contrasts with the
standard pattern as in “I asked her if I could go with her”.

2.2 Standard English Grammar

a. Definition of Grammar

According to Richards & Schmidt (2010), grammar is a description of the

structure of a language and how language units such as words and phrases are formed
into sentences. Language components are involved in forming a grammar. Those
components are as follows:

1. Phonetics, the articulation and perception of speech sounds

2. Phonology, the patterning of speech sounds
3. Syntax, sentence formation
4. Morphology, word formation
5. Semantics, the interpretations of words and sentences

In addition, Greenbaum and Nelson (2010) also included orthography and

pragmatics. Orthography refers to the writing system of a language, and pragmatics
deals with the use of particular utterances within utterance contexts. Regarding those
components, it can be said that grammar is the central aspect of language. Grammar
mediates the sound, word, sentence, and meaning of language.

The formation of a sentence involves a subject and an object. Subject and

object are nouns or are substituted by pronouns, combined and modified by other
words. For instance, in the sentence “The teacher teaches a reticent student”,
“Teacher” is the subject, and “student” is the object. Both are nouns, modified by
other words that form a sentence.

b. Comparison of AAVE and Standard English Grammar

As the grammar features of AAVE have already been mentioned, here are the
rules of Standard English grammar compared to AAVE grammar.

1. The use of copula/auxiliary

The use of copula or auxiliary verbs is common when forming a sentence in

Standard English. Auxiliary verbs determine the tense, mood, or voice of the
sentence. Some examples of auxiliary verbs are as follows.

 “Is”, as in “He is looking down”, indicates that the activity is ongoing. When
referring to a past activity, “was” is used instead.
 “Are”, as in “They are going to the school” has the same function as “is”, but
is used in plural subjects and second-person pronouns (you). If it is used to
describe past action, “were” is used instead.
 “Am”, as in “I am going to eat” has the same function as above, but is used in
first-person pronouns.
 “Do”, as in “I do like him”, indicates the emphasization of something. It is
also commonly used in questions, as in “Do you like him?”. In third-person
 subjects, the word “does” is used, and when forming negative sentences,
“don’t” or “doesn’t” are used. “Did” and “done” are other forms of “do” used
to describe past events.
 “Have”, as in “I have a car”, indicates possession. It is also used to indicate
necessity, as in “I have something to tell you”. When used in second-person
subjects, the word “has” is used, and when used to refer to a past action, the
word “had” is used.

In AAVE, it is not always necessary to use copula/auxiliary verbs when forming a

sentence. For example, in Standard English, the sentence “They are going to the
school” can be formed as “They going to the school” in AAVE, missing the auxiliary
verb.

2. The use of “be”, “done”, and “been”

The word “be” in Standard English is a type of auxiliary verb used to form a
progressive tense. Progressive or continuous tense describes an ongoing activity, as in
“He will be there”. On the other hand, AAVE used “be” as an invariant or habitual be,
which means that it is used to describe a habitual activity that occurs frequently, as in
“The boys be behave” which can be written as “The boys usually behave”.

The word “done” is a past participle form of “do”. It is used to refer to an

activity that has already been done in the past, as in “They have done eating”. In
AAVE, “done” is also used as a completive or perfective done, which is used to refer
to an activity that has already been done, but with more emphasis. The main
difference is that the word is used before the base form of a verb, as in “They done
eating the food”.

AAVE also combines “be” and “done” to form sequential be done, as in “My
ice cream be done melted by the time we get there”, which marks a resultative or a
conditional state. It is similar to future perfect tense, which also marks the resultative
state of future action, as the AAVE sentence can be written as “My ice cream will
have melted by the time we get there” in the tense.

“Been” is a past participle of “be”. It is used to form a past perfect

progressive/continuous tense, which is used to refer to an action that is ongoing in the
past, as in “I had been eating burritos before”. In AAVE, “been” referred to as remote
been or stressed been and has a similar function as “been” in Standard English. It
used to indicate an event that happened in the remote past, but with more emphasis as
in perfective done, as in “I been treating ‘em like that” which means “I have been
treating them like that for a long time and still am”.

3. The use of “had”

“Had” is a past participle of “have” and used as an auxiliary verb in past

perfect tenses and past perfect continuous tense, as in “I had a heart attack two years
ago” and “I had been playing this game beforehand”. In AAVE, “had” is also used in
the simple past tense, as in “They had went outside and they had messed up the yard”
that should be written as “They went outside and they messed up the yard” without
any “had” in Standard English.

4. Negation

Negation is words or phrases that function when stating something that is not true.
Negation uses negative phrases to express something false. Some of the common
negative phrases in Standard English are “no”, “not”, “never”, “none”, and others.
The word “not” is also combined with auxiliary verbs, as in the words “isn’t” (is +
not), “wasn’t” (was + not), “aren’t” (are + not), “weren’t” (were + not) and others.
Some examples of them in sentences are as follows:

 There isn’t any car on the road

 He wasn’t a crook
  They aren’t playing with us
 You weren’t here before

In AAVE, there is a grammatical feature of negation referred to as negative

concord or multiple negation. Multiple negation describes where two or more forms
of negation are used to express a single negation of a sentence. Trudgill (2002) stated
that Standard English lacks multiple negations, but most nonstandard dialects of
English, such as AAVE, allow it. Some examples of multiple negations are as
follows:

 They didn’t do nothing about ‘em (They didn’t do anything about them)
 Nobody don’t like him (Nobody dislikes him)

AAVE often used the word “ain’t” as the negation. Such examples of multiple
negations with “ain’t” are as follows:

 I ain’t got no money (I don’t have any money)

 Nobody around here ain’t heard of him (Nobody around here had heard of
him)
 Ain’t nobody done nothing (Nobody has done anything)

5. Nominals

Nominals refer to words or a group of words that form a noun sentence.

Nominal words can be modified with the suffix “-s” to indicate possessiveness, as in
“This is the man’s dog”, and plurals, as in “Two dogs”. In AAVE, when forming a
possessive sentence, “-s” is often absent, as in “A dog tail” and “This is that woman
hat”. AAVE plurals also had the suffix “-s” absent, as in “I got 50 cent” and “Two
boy”. Other AAVE plural aspects are the irregular plurals (two firemens, three
childrens), word shift from irregular to regular (oxes, gooses), the attachment of
plurals to forms that have zero marking in other varieties (three sheeps, two corns), a
type of associative plural “em” (Jerome an ‘em), and second-person plural y’all
(Y’all done now).

6. Question Formation

There are many ways of forming questions in English. Some of the questions
types are as follows:

 Yes/no questions, as in “Are you coming to the house?” (Auxiliary + subject +

verb + object)
 Object questions, as in “What are you doing?” (Question word + auxiliary +
object + verb). Question words include what, why, where, when, who, and
how.
 Subject questions, as in “Who hit him?” (Question word + verb + subject)
 Question tags, as in “You are the one who was doing it, haven’t you?”
(Sentence clause + auxiliary + subject)
 Indirect questions or embedded questions, as in “Did you tell him where is his
whereabouts?” and “He asked me if I could go to the beach” (Introductory
phrase + subject + verb)

When forming a sentence into a question sentence, there will be a subject-

auxiliary inversion, as in “You are coming” into “Are you coming?”. In AAVE, there
is no subject-auxiliary inversion when forming questions. The sentence “You are
coming” can be formed into “You are coming?” without inversion. But, AAVE does
inverse the subject and auxiliary in embedded questions, such as “I asked did he
know how to play soccer” compared to “I asked if he did know how to play soccer” in
Standard English.

2.3 Friday movie

Friday is a 1995 buddy comedy directed by F. Gary Gray and written by Ice
Cube and DJ Pooh. Ice Cube also portrays the protagonist, along with Chris Tucker.
This movie centered around two unemployed buddies Craig Jones (Ice Cube) and
Smokey (Chris Tucker) indebted to a drug dealer while facing troubles around the
neighborhood.

Themed around South Central Los Angeles African-American urban

neighborhoods, Craig, having been fired from his job, and Smokey must a find way
to get $200 they owe from a drug dealer, while dealing with some problems, such as
bullies, relationship troubles, and others.

2.4 Relevant Studies

In this study, the writer includes previous studies concerning this research that
are related to the topic.

In the first relevant study, Wulandari (2018) investigates of the use of AAVE
variations used in the movie titled Precious. By using the qualitative-quantitative
method, the writer found that some AAVE variations, such as copula deletion,
habitual be, double negative, and others are found in the movie. Besides from the
variation, the writers also analyzed the functions of AAVE utterances from the movie,
which the writers found that some functions such as emotive, referential, phatic, and
metalingual are being uttered.

In the second study, Astuti (2018) analyzed the use of AAVE in a song titled
Everybody by an American rapper, Logic. Using the descriptive-qualitative approach,
the writer focused on grammatical features in the song and also the underlying factors
of AAVE utilization. The results found that out of 13 AAVE grammatical features,
there are 11 can be found from the entire 222 data in the song. In addition, the writer
also concludes that the reason behind the AAVE use in Logic’s song is to establish
himself in the Hip-Hop community, which is closely related to American black
culture.
 The third study by Angreeni et al (2018) titled “African-American Vernacular
English in Shrek Movie” analyzed the usage of AAVE grammar in the movie. In
addition, AAVE utterances are also examined from if they are influenced by social
factors. As a result, the writer found that the character Donkey in Shrek spoke AAVE
and used a high amount of AAVE unique grammar. Another founding is that Donkey
utterances are influenced by class, gender, age, and linguistics environment.

In the fourth study, Nugraha and Laili (2023) analyzed AAVE phonological and
morphological features on Malcom X movie. The study found that there are some
AAVE phonological aspects in the movie, such as the “r-lessness” and the deletion of
“-ng”. In the other hand, negative forms (the use of “ain’t” and the multiple negation),
copula deletion, and demonstrative “them” are spoken by the movie characters.

In the fifth study, Mainingrum (2018) investigates the elaboration of AAVE

morphological and syntactic features found in the movie titled Moonlight, and then
compares them with the general ones. The writer found that the prime AAVE
morphological features used in the movie are the slang terms. These slang terms are
composed in two ways: word formation and morphophonemic processes. The
deletion, alteration, and duplication of many grammar aspects are the main AAVE
syntactic features spoken in the movie.

Regarding the similarities to this study, the writer acknowledges that almost
every related study used the qualitative approach and movies as the media to collect
the data, which is also used in this research. However, there are some differences
concerning the variables.

The first, second, and third study’s main focus is the AAVE grammar and
variations. However, those studies added other investigations outside the grammatical
field to support AAVE usage. In the case of the first study, the writer analyzed the
functions of utterances, the second study examined the reasons of AAVE utilization,
whereas the third study analyzed the social influences. Meanwhile, this study focused
on AAVE grammar, and then compared it to the Standard English counterpart. In
addition, the second study uses a song instead of movie.

The fourth and fifth studies together analyzed AAVE morphological aspects, with
the addition of phonological in the fourth study and syntactic in the case of the fifth
study. As has been stated before, this study solely focused on grammar analysis.

CHAPTER III

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

3.1 Research Design

The research uses the descriptive qualitative method, which is a research method
that is presented via a descriptive form of data, specifically in the form of words and
phrases instead of numerals. According to Creswell and Creswell (2018), qualitative
research is an approach to discovering and understanding the meaning of individuals
or attributes for a social and human problem. Descriptive research is related to
emerging questions and processes, collecting and analyzing data, and explaining data
collected based on the theory.
3.2 Data Sources

The data are collected from an audiovisual material, which is a movie titled
Fridayl. The utterances spoken by the characters in the movie will be collected and
analyzed. The selected utterance is AAVE grammatical features used in the movie.
The movie script, authored by Ice Cube and D.J. Pooh, is also used as a supporting
source.

3.3 Research Instrument

Regarding the instrument, the writer will use a table to write utterances spoken in
the movie. The movie is used to determine the AAVE uttered by the movie characters.
Then, those utterances will be written in the table and categorized according to their
classification. After that, they will be compared to the Standard English counterparts.

No. Utterance Type SE Counterpart

1.
2.
3.

The table will answer both of the research questions (RQ). The first RQ, regarding
the AAVE grammar found in the movie, will be written in the “utterance” column
with their types in the “type” column. The second RQ, which compares AAVE
grammatical features and their Standard English counterpart, will be written in the
“SE counterpart” column.

3.4 Procedure of the Research

1. The writer will watch the movie and notice the AAVE grammatical features
spoken by the characters. The movie script is also used.
 2. All of the utterances spoken in the movie will be written on the table. The
table consists of the AAVE utterance, type, and the Standard English
counterparts.
3. Finally, each of the utterances, according to its features, will be analyzed and
compared to its Standard English counterparts.
3.5 Data Analysis Technique

The descriptive analysis technique is used when analyzing the data. After the
utterances in the movie have been collected, the writer will analyze them based on
Wolfram’s theory on urban AAVE grammar. Wolfram states that AAVE grammatical
features are in their verb phrases (copula absent, invariant/habitual be, completive
done, sequential be done, remote been, simple had + verb), negations, nominals
(possessive and plurals), and question formation. Those features will be compared to
the grammar in Standard English.

3.6 Reliability

A researcher should evaluate the reliability of the study in order to measure the
accuracy of the research method. According to Drost (2011), derived from Kubai
(2019), reliability is the extent to which measurements are repeatable when different
people perform the measurement on different occasions, under different conditions,
supposedly with alternative instruments which measure the construct or skill. A test
or instrument with good reliability means that the respondent will obtain the same
score on repeated testing as long as no other extraneous factors affect the score (Segal
and Coolidge, 2018).

One way to ensure reliability is through inter-rater reliability, where a researcher

works with a co-rater who observes the same subject using the same instrument.
From that, it can show if the instrument shows the same or slightly different score
when used repeatedly. The researcher asked one of the English Education alumni of
the University of Bengkulu, who researched AAVE grammar, to serve as the co-rater.
Regarding the assessment, the Cohen’s Kappa statistic is used to calculate the
correlation between the researcher and co-rated results. Both the researcher’s and the
co-rater’s observed data will be counted by counting the number of matches between
both data and determining the coefficient of agreement of observation. To determine
the coefficient, a formula is used as follows:

2S
KK =
N 1+ N 2

Notes:

KK: Coefficient agreement

S: Agree amount of the same object

N1: The sum of the category by the researcher

N2: The sum of the category by the co-rater

The coefficient of agreement can be interpreted from the table below:

Cohen’s Kappa Interpretation

0 No agreement
0.10 – 0.20 Slight agreement
0.21 – 0.40 Fair agreement
0.41 – 0.60 Moderate agreement
0.61 – 0.80 Substantial agreement
0.81 – 0.99 Near perfect agreement
1 Perfect agreement
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