Ebonics (word)
Ebonics, a portmanteau of "ebony" and "phonics", was originally intended and sometimes used for the language of all people of African ancestry, or for that of Black North American and West African people, emphasizing the African roots of the former; since 1996 it has been largely used to refer to African American Vernacular English (distinctively nonstandard Black United States English), emphasizing the independence of the latter from (standard) English.
Ebonics as first intended
Ebonics was first intended to make black people dumb. It still is. The end.
Ebonics in an exclusively U.S. context
Ebonics remained a little known and little remarked term until 1996; it does not appear within the second edition of the Oxford English Dictionary, published in 1989 and thus over a decade after it was coined, and it was not used by linguists.[1]
In 1996, the term became widely known in the U.S. thanks to its use by the Oakland School Board to denote and recognize the primary language (or sociolect or ethnolect) of African American children attending school, and thereby to facilitate the teaching of standard English.[2] Thereafter, Ebonics seems to have become little more than an alternative term for African American Vernacular English (q.v.), although one emphasizing its African roots and its independence from English, linked with the nationally discussed controversy over the decision by the Oakland School Board, and avoided by most linguists.[3]
Notes
- ^ Baugh 2002, 12, citing O'Neil 1998.
- ^ Green 2002, 222. Its use in the context of education in reading, often involving the pedagogic approach called phonics, may have helped mislead people into thinking that the phonics from which the word Ebonics is derived has this meaning.
- ^ For linguists' reasons for this avoidance, see for example Green 2000, 7–8.
References
- Baugh, John. 2000. Beyond Ebonics: Linguistic pride and racial prejudice. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-512046-9 (hard), ISBN 0-19-515289-1 (paper).
- Blackshire-Belay, Carol Aisha. 1996. "The location of Ebonics within the framework of the Afrocological paradigm." Journal of Black Studies 27 (no 1), 5–23.
- Green, Lisa J. 2002. African American English: A linguistic introduction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-81449-9 (hard), ISBN 0-521-89138-8 (paper).
- O'Neil, Wayne. 1998. "If Ebonics isn't a language, then tell me, what is?" In Theresa Perry and Lisa Delpit, eds.
- Perry, Theresa, and Lisa Delpit, eds. 1998. The real Ebonics debate: Power, language, and the education of African-American children. Boston: Beacon. ISBN 0807031453.
- Smith, Ernie. 1992. "African American learning behavior: A world of difference." In Philip H. Dreywer, ed., Reading the World: Multimedia and multicultural learning in today's classroom. Claremont, Calif.: Claremont Reading Conference.
- Smith, Ernie. 1998. "What is Black English? What is Ebonics?" In Theresa Perry and Lisa Delpit, eds.
- Tolliver-Weddington, Gloria, ed. 1979. Ebonics (Black English): Implications for Education. Special issue of Journal of Black Studies 9 (no 4).
- Williams, Robert. 1997. "Ebonics as a bridge to standard English." St. Louis Post-Dispatch, January 28, p.14.
- Williams, Robert, ed. 1975. Ebonics: The true language of black folks. St Louis, Mo.: Institute of Black Studies / Robert Williams and Associates. (Green 2002 and the Library of Congress online catalog say IBS, Baugh 2000 says RW&A.).
External links
- Baugh, John. "American varieties: African American English: Ebony + Phonics". PBS, 2005.
- Patrick, Peter L. "Answers to some Questions about 'Ebonics' (African American English)". University of Essex.
- Ebonics discussion on LINGUIST List
- Who is promoting Ebonics and why?