This article raises the reality of English as a naturally variant and fluid language inseparable from culture. The author addresses the tensions teachers face in the classroom when they make decisions about how African American students should use their language.

The author explores the racial and cultural ideologies that inform what it means to be Black in the United States and how this mainstream framing of Blackness intersects with teacher preparedness to engage Black textual expressions in the classroom.

The author argues that, by revolutionizing the literary canon, we are revolutionizing the English classroom, and urges us to shift from focusing exclusively on required texts to equally acknowledging the urgent need for consciousness and activism from our students.