Ebonics

The term Ebonics 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.

The term as first intended

What is claimed to be the initial mention of "Ebonics" was made by the psychologist [For Williams's background as a writer on issues related to IQ, see Baugh 2000, 16. Baugh also flatly states (2000, 18) that "Williams is not a linguist".] Robert Williams in a dialogue with Ernie Smith that took place in a conference on "Cognitive and Language Development of the Black Child", held in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1973. [Williams 1997; qtd Baugh 2000, 2. Conference details: Baugh, 2000, 15.] In 1975 it appeared within the title and text of a book edited and co-written by Williams, "." Williams there explains it:

A two-year-old term created by a group of black scholars, Ebonics may be defined as "the linguistic and paralinguistic features which on a concentric continuum represent the communicative competence of the West African, Caribbean, and United States slave descendant of African origin. It includes the various idioms, patois, argots, idiolects, and social dialects of black people" especially those who have adapted to colonial circumstances. Ebonics derives its form from ebony (black) and phonics (sound, the study of sound) and refers to the study of the language of black people in all its cultural uniqueness. [Williams 1975, vi; qtd Green 2002, 7, and qtd Baugh 2000, 15. Unfortunately there is something amiss with each reproduction of what Williams writes, and also possible incompatibility between the two. Green has a couple of what appear to be minor typing errors (whether Williams's or her own, and anyway corrected above following Baugh) but otherwise presents the text as above: an unexplained quotation ("the linguistic and paralinguistic features...black people") within the larger quotation. Baugh does not present the material outside this inner quotation but instead presents the latter (not demarcated by quotation marks) within a different context. He describes this as part of a statement to the US Senate made at some unspecified time after 1993, yet also attributes it (or has Williams attribute part of it) to p.vi of Williams's book.]

Other writers have since emphasized how the term represents a view of the language of Black people as African rather than European. [For example Smith 1998, 55–7; qtd in Green 2002, 7–8.] The term was not obviously popular even among those who agreed with the reason for coining it: it is little used even within the "Ebonics" book, in which "Black English" is the far more common name. [Baugh 2000, 19.]

John Baugh claims [Baugh 2000, 74–5; he puts the four in a different order.] that the term "Ebonics" is used in four ways by its Afrocentric proponents. It may be (i) "an international construct, including the linguistic consequences of the African slave trade"; [Williams 1975 and 1997, as summarized in Baugh's words.] (ii) the languages of the African diaspora as a whole; [Blackshire-Belay 1996.] or it may refer to what is normally regarded as a variety of English: either (iii) it "is the equivalent of black English and is considered to be a dialect of English" (and thus merely an alternative term for AAVE), or (iv) it "is the antonym of black English and is considered to be a language other than English" (and thus a rejection of the notion of "African American Vernacular "English" but nevertheless a term for what others term AAVE, but viewed as an independent language and not a mere ethnolect). [The equivalent, Tolliver-Weddington 1979; the antonym, Smith 1992 and 1998; both as summarized in Baugh's words.]

The term 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. [Baugh 2002, 12, citing O'Neil 1998.]

In 1996, the term became widely known in the U.S. due 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. [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.] 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. [For linguists' reasons for this avoidance, see for example Green 2000, 7–8.]

Notes

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. " [http://www.pbs.org/speak/seatosea/americanvarieties/AAVE/ebonics/ American varieties: African American English: Ebony + Phonics] ". PBS, 2005.
*Patrick, Peter L. " [http://privatewww.essex.ac.uk/~patrickp/aavesem/EbonicsQ&A.html Answers to some Questions about 'Ebonics' (African American English)] ". University of Essex.
* [http://linguistlist.org/topics/ebonics/ Ebonics discussion on LINGUIST List]
* [http://www.wsws.org/polemics/1997/jan1997/ebonics2.shtml Who is promoting Ebonics and why?]
* [http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=990DE3D61039F93BA35752C0A961958260 New York Times Article: 'The Ebonic Plague' which discusses the Oakland School Board's attempt to portray black English as a "genetically based" and "primary" language equivalent to English]