Top Lang Disorders Vol. 35, No. 1, pp. 61–75 Copyright c  2015 Wolters Kluwer Health, Inc. All rights reserved. Ways of Examining Speech Acts in Young African American Children Considering Inside-out and Outside-in Approaches Glenda DeJarnette, Kenyatta O. Rivers, and Yvette D. Hyter To develop a framework for further study of pragmatic behavior in young children from African American English (AAE) speaking backgrounds, one aspect of pragmatic behavior is explored in this article, specifically, speech acts. The aims of this article are to (1) examine examples of how external taxonomies (i.e., an “etic” or “outside-in” approach) have been applied to the speech act behavior of AAE child speakers and to note that etic approaches alone do not identify cultural characteristics that influence the presentation of speech acts in this population; (2) conceptualize a culture-sensitive framework where components of AAE speech act behaviors can be identified as gleaned from existing linguistic research; and (3) explain the utility of analyses of speech act behavior using taxonomies that have emerged from the cultural language style of AAE speakers, that is, an “emic” or “inside-out” approach. Key words: communicative functions, English speakers, language behavior, pragmatic behavior, speech acts, young African American Author Affiliations: Department of Communication Disorders, Southern Connecticut State University, New Haven, Connecticut (Dr DeJarnette); Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders, University of Central Florida, Orlando, Florida (Dr Rivers); and Department of Speech Pathology and Audiology, Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, Michigan (Dr Hyter). G.D. discloses that she has received a Faculty Research Grant from the Connecticut State University-American Association of University Professors. K.O.R. and Y.D.H. have indicated that they have no financial or nonfinan- cial relationships to disclose. Supplemental digital content is available for this article. Direct URL citations appear in the printed text and are provided in the HTML and PDF ver- sions of this article on the journal’s Web site (www .topicsinlanguagedisorders.com). Corresponding Author: Glenda DeJarnette, PhD, Southern Connecticut State University, Department of Communication Disorders, 501 Crescent St, New Haven, CT 06515 (dejarnetteg1@southernct.edu). DOI: 10.1097/TLD.0000000000000042 F OR YEARS, research regarding the use of African American English (AAE) in child speakers has centered on the structural as- pects of this variety of American English (Craig & Washington, 2002, 2004; Green, 2002; Jackson & Roberts, 2001; Newkirk- Turner, Oetting, & Stockman, 2014; Oetting & McDonald, 2002; Oetting et al., 2010; Roy, Oetting, & Moland, 2013; Seymour & Roeper, 1999; Seymour & Seymour, 1981; Stockman, 2010; Stockman, Guillory, Seibert, & Boult, 2013; Van Hofwegen & Wolfram, 2010). How- ever, within the last 30 years, the pragmatic as- pects of language, spoken by AAE child speak- ers have come into greater focus in the extant literature as well (Hwa-Froelich, Kasambira, & Moleski, 2007; Stockman, 1996; Stockman, Karasinski, & Guillory, 2008; Wyatt, 1995). The modicum of research on speech act prag- matic behavior in young AAE child speakers has employed an “etic” approach, in which taxonomies found in the studies of child Copyright © 2015 Wolters Kluwer Health, Inc. Unauthorized reproduction of this article is prohibited. 61