I remember having to grade the essay of a classmate who was fluent in Ebonics. When I returned her paper, she wasn't too happy but I felt her grammar needed to be corrected because it was an essay, not a narrative. She claimed that she was speaking with her own "voice" so it was important to use "African American Vernacular English" i.e. Ebonics. Our teacher sided with me on the issue, but my classmate accused us both of being racist. How were we to understand the importance of Ebonics? My Teacher was a Franco-Prussian and I was a Scottish-Filipina. My classmate happened to be black, but c'mon, that's no excuse for using bad grammar on a school paper. Besides, if there's one thing you should know about me, I ain't no racist. Now, if I were to correct the grammar of that sentence using my evil grammar skills I would be saying I am racist. See where the double negatives can cause problems? I vote no on Ebonics. If only to prevent people like Justin Timberlake from using it.
2006-09-19 13:12:33 · 19 answers · asked by Lainie 2 in Society & Culture ➔ Languages
Your teacher should have made it clear that since instruction in the classroom is in English, all handed in homework would be expected in the same language.
My opinion: The validity of Ebonics is of value only to stupid college professors in a "publish or perish" situation, and to stupid news anchors on a slow night.
Your classmate needs to join mainstream culture. She's not planning on being a rapper, a basketball player, a felon, or a bling-encrusted drug dealer.
2006-09-19 13:29:32 · answer #1 · answered by Anonymous · 4⤊ 1⤋
Ebonics is a dialect of English. Whether it is accepted as a language on it's own or not shouldn't be the issue.
Linguistics say that a native speaker of a language speak the language correctly.
However in an academic setting the expection on written work should be in academic language and within the norms of "Standard English". That should be clear to all students. You can tell them that while you understand that people speak with different accents and dialects, the expectation in your class and any other academic setting is to have the work done in Standard English.
2006-09-19 14:40:48 · answer #2 · answered by seaelen 5 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Ebonics is a joke. Call me racist if you want, because I realize that most people who speak "ebonics" are black, but I feel that ebonics is a lazy man's language. It's for people to damn lazy to learn proper english and, heaven forbid, actually making them have to study. In actuality, I am far from being racists, and my beliefs on "ebonics" have nothing to do with race. My beliefs are derieved from the fact that people should learn how to speak properly if they want to get far in the job world and come across to the rest of society as being intelligent. If you have no intentions of ever getting a good job and could care less what societal issues you may have by sounding ignorant, then by all means, speak your made up language.
Oh, and in response the the girl who called you racist because you gave her constructive criticism on her paper, you should make it clear to her, that just as you wouldn't accept a paper written in Chinese or Spanish, you are not accepting her paper for the same reason. Tell her you use Standard American English.
2006-09-19 13:31:29 · answer #3 · answered by Peanuts 3 · 4⤊ 0⤋
No! Ebonics is not a language. When black people use ebonics they are trying to segregate themselves from American society. Then they wonder why they can't get a job. I could not hire someone who speaks ebonics to answer phones and deal with clients. I think that ebonics is doing harm to the people who use it and it's very juvenile.
2006-09-20 06:01:54 · answer #4 · answered by Melissa B 1 · 2⤊ 0⤋
Ebonics is not a language, it is a dialect, and using such colloquial expression in a school paper would be improper.
This has nothing to do with race. It has nothing to do with the culture in which the dialect originates - it is a matter of formality. It would be just as improper, in an English essay that is supposed to adhere to writing standards, to write, "the mousie spied the wee bairn".
2006-09-19 13:23:12 · answer #5 · answered by ? 2 · 3⤊ 0⤋
LOL Ya know what sure only if you do it the same way they add the word ain't to the dictionary with a caption that is is only used by the ignorant and poorly educated. you can't tell me that it's a Black Language because educated black people normally have very good grammar
2006-09-19 13:22:13 · answer #6 · answered by burnin_soulz 2 · 2⤊ 0⤋
Ebonics (which I do imagine is variety of a stupid call and maximum linguists use the word "African American Vernacular English") is often seen a dialect of yankee English. Linguistic specialists have lengthy recognised that AAVE is not merely slang or sloppy English, yet a dialect with its personal complicated grammatical and phonological regulations, a lot of that are very such as Creole languages and to some African languages. that isn't to assert that childrens ought to no longer study favourite American English in college, merely as every person ought to study the classic variety of the language spoken of their us of a, because that's probable they're going to desire that to be triumphant. i'm African American, and although I grew up listening to an excellent variety of this dialect, mutually with from kinfolk contributors, my mom tried to get me now to not communicate that way and that i surely used to really imagine that this modification into merely careless, uneducated English (even if if utilized in imaginative concepts each and every each and every now and then). yet then I examine a piece of writing in come across mag (see less than) that began to regulate the way i presumed about it. this textual content, through a linguistics professor at Stanford, confirmed how "Ebonics" had very sure regulations. case in aspect, something human beings merely imagine is careless grammar, like leaving out the conjugated "to be" (case in aspect, "He workin") surely has an complete algorithm for once you depart it out, because you do not depart it out each and every of the time. even as i presumed about it and utilized those regulations to how human beings talked I pronounced that change into authentic. that's surely very exciting (to every person attracted to language in a linguistic, quite than a prescriptive/pedantic sense) If human beings like some answering the following opt to snigger on the theory that AAVE has regulations, tremendous, yet they do thereby prepare their lack of information of linguistics (and probable their prejudice )
2016-10-16 01:25:46 · answer #7 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
No. Ebonics is a dialect of English.
2006-09-19 16:41:56 · answer #8 · answered by Taivo 7 · 1⤊ 1⤋
No. I think by making it acceptable it just gives Americans another short cut in life. We need to stop dropping the standards in life.
2006-09-19 13:21:24 · answer #9 · answered by ifitaintmeidontcare 2 · 3⤊ 0⤋
Spanish, French, Russian are all languages ppl don't understand Ebonics is just that lol but no it shouldn't
2006-09-19 13:19:29 · answer #10 · answered by taffy2513 4 · 1⤊ 2⤋