Eclecticism

Eclecticism in online spaces is especially highlighted by the phenomenon of online blackface. While people aren’t explicitly painting their faces black online, the mannerisms they affect in order to appeal to others online are clearly attempting to imitate stereotypical African American speech patterns. The strangest part of it all is that they only do this when they’re trying to be funny, and in posts where they are more serious (or, at least, not trying to make a joke), the “blaccent” disappears. Along with using copious amounts of AAVE in joke posts, this may also be coupled with the usage of memes or gifs depicting black people. Now, I don’t know the specific statistics of meme usage, but anecdotally, I am sure that most of the reaction images I have seen online feature black people. It could be argued that the humor doesn’t come from blackness, but if that were true, then why isn’t there more equal representation of other races in commonly used memes? It’s almost like a continuation of minstrelsy, except most of the people doing it don’t intend to be racist. The lack of knowledge of the origins of popular online slang causes people to credit these words to whatever overwhelmingly white community they discovered it in rather than their true originators, African Americans. Black people have said this dispersal of AAVE in online communities has made it hard to tell who is black and who is just trying to sound black, though it also becomes incredibly apparent that someone is not if their usage becomes egregious. It’s especially bad when brands try to use it:

Notice how the Pop-Tarts account credited teens with the language. Instead of AAVE being seen as an integral part of African American culture, it is now just the way annoying teenagers online speak. The only way to combat this is by spreading awareness and teaching history, which many activists online have been trying to do. Unfortunately, the proliferation of AAVE online is just one way black culture has been appropriated and repackaged to be palatable to non-black audiences.