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There is a common misconception that when you hear African American English, the speaker is using poor grammar. The judge had consulted the site Urban Dictionary. (“Finna” is a contraction of “fixing to.”) But the judge made a grammatical mistake: In African American English it is impossible for “he finna” to be in the past tense. The judge had listened to a recording from a 911 call and argued that it was not possible to know whether “he finna shoot me” was present or past tense. The paper points to a 2007 dissenting opinion from a judge in the U.S. And meaningful access means that we can be understood.” “It’s really important that people have meaningful access to the courts. “The separate question this poses is, ‘Are the judges and the jurors and the lawyers misapprehending what people are saying?’” Temple law professor Jules Epstein said. Legal experts say the findings have disturbing implications, as they raise questions about the accuracy of Philadelphia court records and on fairness within the justice system. In Pennsylvania, court reporters must reach a 95 percent accuracy level to be certified. And 11 percent of transcriptions were called gibberish.
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Sixty-seven percent of attempts at paraphrasing weren’t accurate. Roughly 40 percent of the sentences the court reporters transcribed had something wrong.
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The team, which includes University of Pennsylvania linguists, a New York University sociologist, and a co-founder of Philadelphia Lawyers for Social Equity, tested 27 court reporters for both accuracy and comprehension. For a forthcoming study in the journal Language, researchers evaluated how well Philadelphia court reporters transcribe dialect. But saying this doesn’t necessarily imply hard feelings - it means the speaker isn’t really in someone’s circle.Īlong with lapses in comprehension, Abdul-Rahman has observed persisting biases around how African Americans speak: “The system keeps perpetuating the same faulty norms about us.” The unaware might think the speaker has a problem with someone. He’s been concerned that the true meaning of statements like “I don’t fool with them” glide past the ears of listeners who aren’t black. “You get it all the time, truthfully,” Abdul-Rahman said. There are times in court when Qawi Abdul-Rahman, a Center City-based defense attorney, gets the sense that folks listening didn’t understand a piece of testimony.