ABSTRACT
This part introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters. The part focuses on data from a classroom intervention that shows how shifting instruction toward texts that draw on Black culture and vernacular language practices can also shift the dynamics of student reading comprehension. It discusses the salience and effectiveness of vernaculars in West Indian literature, drawing on the poetry and prose of Trinidadian, Jamaican, Barbadian and Guyanese writers—a tribute to John’s pioneering work in contact varieties as well as his abiding appreciation for literary expression across the Black diaspora. The part explores the implications of simultaneous participation in several speech communities in ‘Transnationalism, social networks, and heterogeneous language practices: A case study of a New York-based Jamaican student.’ It outlines how John R. Rickford’s stance as an intellectual activist served as a model for her own identity as a Black sociolinguist studying Black communities, concluding that ‘it is business and it is personal.’
