In this presentation, I explore the language, specifically the African-American Vernacular English (AAVE), used in the cult television series The Wire. The show is known for its narrative complexity, its broad and varied cast of characters from all layers of society, its shifting thematic arcs and, not least, its uncompromising realism and attention to detail; be it the minutiae of police investigations, the slow, spirit-crushing grind of various institutional machines, the rules of ‘the game’ (the street, political maneuvering, the unspoken codes of police loyalty, etc.) or the rich, realistic language of its protagonists, The Wire makes a serious commitment to immersing its audience in the gritty realism of Baltimore’s criminal underworld.
Among other things, the present work sketches out the different ways in which AAVE features are used in The Wire. Selected, representative examples are used as a platform to discuss details of usage, the accuracy of these representations, their relevance in creating credible dialog and how they contribute to our understanding of the characters and the world they inhabit. In doing so, I address the complex relationship between language and Popular Culture and also show the potential usefulness of The Wire as a resource in studying AAVE and language in general.
About the presenterJoe Trotta
Joe Trotta is a linguist and an expatriate American who lives and works in Gothenburg, Sweden. Since 2002, he has been an Associate Professor in English Linguistics at the University of Gothenburg. From 1998-2002, he was a Senior Lecturer at Halmstad University College. In addition, from 2003 to 2005, Joe was a visiting scholar at the CUNY graduate center in New York City.
The focus of Trotta’s research on grammar/syntax has been ‘descriptive-oriented theory’, i.e. an approach which incorporates generative, functional and cognitive insights along with corpus research into a theory-neutral, descriptive framework.
Aside from grammar, Joe is a scholar with many interests and eclectic tastes, which include, among other things, semantics, sociolinguistics, urban dialectology, semiotics, computer-mediated communication, and, of course, Popular Culture. Most of Joe’s most recent publications deal with issues of identity and linguistic representation in different Popular Culture channels such as TV dialogs, music lyrics, ads, social media, etc.