thank you for your essay. my grandparents spoke "broken english" only because they did not know of things like prepositions and articles. i see many asian counterparts who speak this way, and unfortunately white people either speak down to them or speak loudly, as if they were deaf. thankfully i am there to fill in the blanks. i too, have had to "code switch" or alter my mannerisms so that i would be taken seriously. its almost like a dance we do, every time we speak, to find the right nuances to convey our thoughts. i wish more people could be "culturally competent" as to understand that not everyone speaks like them, however, it does not make them any less than them. in addition, your essay reminded of that scene in Beverly Hills Cop where Eddie Murphy ridicules the black officer about the "banana in the tailpipe" speech...