Traditionally, as far as geographical distribution of differences in American English is concerned, the eastern half of the United States has been divided into three major dialect areas: Northern, Midland and Southern. Often "Midland" is further divided into North Midland and South Midland. Some sub-dialect areas, like New England and Metropolitan New York City, can also be found. These sub-dialect areas have their own characteristic forms, which aren't typical of the main dialect area. The often mentioned 'tonic' meaning 'soda pop' or 'pop' in the New England area is one example. Other examples of regional variation in vocabulary are the typical Midland expression 'a quarter till the hour' and the Southern word 'lightwood' for '(kindling) firewood'.
Black English is a term used for both dialects of English and English-based pidgins and creoles, and whose meaning depends considerably upon the context, and particularly the part of the world.
The fact that many Black Americans, especially inner-city children, speak in a language of slang' is an easily observable fact. The name given to this speech has ranged from "the language of soul" to "the shuffling speech of slavery." Concern has been raised in recent times over the role and implications of this language in trying to educate inner-city African American children who speak in the language of slang. The performance of these children continues to lag behind that of whites.
Many linguists trace the development of Black English back to the time of slavery and the slave trade. Thus, the history of Black English must date back to about 1619 when a Dutch vessel landed in Jamestown with a cargo of twenty Africans.(Smitherman, 5) During the slave trade, ships collected slaves from several different nations rather than just trading with one nation. The rationale that justified this action was simple. Africans from different nations spoke different languages and could not communicate with each other, and thus were incapable of uniting to overthrow the ships crew. In 1744 slave ship Captain William Smith wrote: "...the safest way to trade is to trade with the different Nations, on either Side the River, and having some of every sort on board, there will be no more Likelihood of their succeding in a Plot, than of finishing the Tower of Babel," (Stoller, 19). Upon arriving in America, all the slaves had to be able to communicate with their masters in some way. Thus, all the slaves had to learn at least some degree of English vocabulary. This established English as a common language among slaves. The one language that all the slaves had in common was English. Linguists propose that Africans developed a pidgin language with the English language providing the vocabulary.

When the African slaves bore children, they must have taught them this African-English pidgin. It was necessary that they be able to communicate with the slave master, as well as other slaves. This by no means suggests that Africans immediately relinquished their mother tongues. It is probable that the children of slaves were taught original African languages, but they were probably of little use amongst their diverse peer group. The African-English pidgin now had native speakers and would be forced to fill the needs of a normal speech community. Any vocabulary needs would be filled by borrowing from other languages. The pidgin graduated from its role as, as a language of transaction, and became a creolized language.(Stoller, 21) Geneva Smitherman proposed that "this lingo [early Black English] involved the substitution of English for West African words, but within the same basic structure and idiom as that characterized West African language patterns," (Smitherman, 5). In a very real sense, this new language was a mixture of West African languages (such as Ibo, Yoruba, and Hausa) and English. Listed below are some of the West African language rules that were embedded in early Black English that Smitherman notes in her book Talkin and Testifyin.