A Study on ‘The Language’ of Resistance and Rebellion

This book entitled A study on the language of Resistance in the Writings of Toni Morrison: A Sociolinguistic Perspective is an academic attempt to re-introduce to the readers Morrisons language of anger, aspiration and hope which has been silenced for long due to factors which are not too far to seek. The language variation which is demonstrated in phonological, phonetic, morphological, syntactical and semantic levels highlights a fact that every variation has features which deserve to be respected. Here, the term variation is used to refer to differences existing within the same dialect. Language a person uses is a reflection of the background he is from. In other words, it is an identity. If defines the being of an individual in social and political sense.

The language of the oppressed has certain features which are normally ignored. First of all, such people are not encouraged to respect and represent themselves in their original language. They develop a sense of self inadequacy. That feeling gives an individual a feeling of guilt. This unreasonable guilt that a marginalized is subjected to disturbs his communicative competence. As a result, he will try to develop sense of negativism related towards his own language. This feeling is the initial reaction to the process which is going to over bulldoze the victim in due course of time. The reader will find such instances of victimization and also example of doing violence with words in the following chapters.