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The Nonstandard varieties (AAVE and working class) used by walter, a black main character in Hansberry's "A Raisin In The Sun" and those used by Stanley, a white main character in William's a streetc

This study deals with nonstandard varieties produced by Walter, a black
main character in Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun and Stanley, a white main
character in William?s A Streetcar Named Desire. The writer aims to find out
which character produces more nonstandard linguistic items of nonstandard
varieties, AAVE and working class. She is also interested to know each
character?s choices in using nonstandard varieties, and those types of linguistic
items used by them. The writer chooses those two characters because she wants to
know whether Walter and Stanley who come from different ethnic group, but
come from the same social class, in this case lower working class, may produce
different number of linguistic items in both nonstandard varieties (AAVE and
working class).
In order to identify the nonstandard varieties used by the two characters,
the writer employs Trudgill?s theory of AAVE linguistic items, and Guth?s theory
of working class linguistic items. She also use nonstandard linguistic items
proposed by Holme?s as supporting theory. As for social factor, she uses Holmes
and as for ethnicity and social class, she uses Trudgill,
From the research, the writer finds that Walter employs more types of
linguistic items in nonstandard varieties. Both of them also prefer using working
class variety than AAVE variety. in working class variety, Walter mostly employs
double negation, whereas Stanley mostly uses nonstandard verb forms. For AAVE
variety, Walter mostly uses absence of copula "to be", and Stanley uses mostly
aspectual system. This results support the writer?s assumption that that black
speakers are more possible in producing more nonstandard varieties than white
speakers. Although ethnicity also affects on someone?s choice of using language
variety, social class, addressees, and setting may bring more influences.
Moreover, this research also proved that language phenomenon also can be found
in literary works.