Are people who speak ebonics?

Question

Are people who speak ebonics, incapable of speaking proper english? Or do they just choose not to?

Is it an accent of some sort?

Answer 1

Ebonics is a dialect of English. People who speak Ebonics must LEARN to speak Standard American English just like someone living in Appalachia or Minnesota or Texas must LEARN to speak Standard American English. It is a different dialect, and like all dialects, it functions according to rules of grammar and pronounciation that are different than what is generally considered to be Standard. Everyone who wants to speak using Standard American English must LEARN it as their second, non-native, dialect.

EDIT after reading other answers: LOL at "slavemasters speaking proper English". That is a complete lie. The slavemasters generally spoke in a Scots-laced version of early Southern Appalachian English because many of them were Scots refugees to the south after the Battle of Culloden. THAT is the version of English that the slaves learned to speak. That is why some of the features of Ebonics resemble features of Scots English. Ebonics is NOT a "code". It is the version of English learned by non-native speakers of English from Africa listening to refugee lower-class Scotsmen speaking Southern Appalachian English.

And, BTW, the "axe" pronounciation of "ask" is actually far older in English than American slave days and the rise of African-American Vernacular (Ebonics). It dates all the way back to Old English times (ascian versus axian) and gave us the pair of words "task" and "tax". It is NOT a "black" thing, but an Old English thing.

Answer 2

In my linguistics class we decided it was a dialect: like southern, Boston, New York) Though some people were trying to get Ebonics taught in schools in California. They claimed that children who grew up speaking Ebonics were having trouble in school because it was in proper English and not Ebonics. The ability to be able to speak proper English (no matter the dialect) is always looked favorably upon. I saddens me that people choose only to speak in Ebonics and handicap their children in school.

Answer 3

Fortunately we have translators! Just enter any phrase in proper english, and choose which slang dialect you'd like to see it transformed/multilated into:

http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/jbc/home/chef.html

Now ain't da Innanet wunnerful?

But in all seriousness, Ebonics isn't just a case of not learning proper English. It's actually a dialect of it's own that's predominant in some communities, with distinct rules for grammer that differ from standard written English. The problems is that its rules and norms aren't the same as standard written english, and many kids who are raised in households where its spoken, fail to become fluent in both- which is obviously a problem as standard written english is the language of business, and job interviewers don't want anyone to axe them a question.

For the record, the British would argue that most of us don't speak "proper English" either.

Anyway, here's some backgound information:

Answer 4

The symptom of Ebonics is not unique. It is in other places as well. For instance, I can speak the local variant of English and the international English.

For instance, Hanglish is the use of English words but with the Hangkyu grammar rules.

In short, we can chose which variant to use when the intended audience changes. I have switched between these variants effortlessly: Thai-English, Malaysian-English, Singapore-English, Chinglish, Hong Kong English, American-English, Queen's English and Hanglish.

Answer 5

I think it's just a vernacular thing. If everyone around you speaks a certain way, it's easier to just go along (conform) with your surroundings. But I'm guessing in school they do teach proper English, it just doesn't get used, or even enforced.

Answer 6

Is ebonics making a comeback of sorts?

I personally know of no one who does that

Answer 7

it isn't that they are incapable, they choose not to....and they wonder why no one takes them seriously or respects them. Who would hire someone that can not speak in a normal lanuage. That is why they continue to do and live where they live.

and it is really pathetic that your when you meet a black person that does honestly speak in normal english and doesnt' act like a stupid "ganster"....his fellow black people will say he sold out, but wonder why they dont' get the same respect....

Answer 8

It's a cultural thing they choose to do. I am always so impressed when I hear intelligent black people speak proper English. It lets me know there's hope for the ones who axe questions and want to know my birfday.

Answer 9

Ebonics is not an accent. It is a choice, to some consciously and to other unconsciously. Here is some background about ebonics to perhaps help you understand...


What is Ebonics?

Ebonics is a language system characteristic of certain speech communities in the United States, especially (but not exclusively) African American communities in urban areas and the South. Although it has many features that distinguish it from various dialects of English, it also has very much in common with kinds of English all over the world. It also differs from community to community. We must be careful to note that (a) not all African Americans speak Ebonics; (b) there are non-African Americans who do speak Ebonics, by virtue of having grown up in the communities where it is spoken.

There is a significant scientific literature on Ebonics. The field which studies it is called 'sociolinguistics'. Within sociolinguistics, Ebonics has been known as Black English, Black English Vernacular or BEV (pronounced 'bee-ee-vee' or 'Bev'), and (most currently) African American Vernacular English or AAVE (pronounced like 'have' without the 'h', or 'ay-ay-vee-ee'). Linguists of various races have studied its systems of grammar, pronunciation, and vocabulary, as well as its origins and history, since the 1960s. The term Ebonics was first used in the 1970s. Some highly respected linguists who have worked on Ebonics are: John Baugh, William Labov, John Rickford, Geneva Smitherman, and Walt Wolfram. All have published books and articles on the subject.


2 Where does it come from?

There are two theories about the origins of this language system. One, called the 'dialectal hypothesis', asserts that Ebonics is a dialect of English, which evolved, as all dialects do, through a history of social and geographic separation of its speakers from speakers of other varieties of English. The other, called the 'creole hypothesis', asserts that Ebonics evolved out of a pidgin language that developed in West Africa as a result of the slave trade and commercial trade between Africans and Europeans during the 16th-19th centuries. This theory says that the pidgin language grew into a full-fledged language (a full language that develops from a pidgin is called a creole language) used by slaves, who, because of deliberate mixing of Africans from different tribes in the slave trade, did not share a common language. Creole languages have arisen in many parts of the world where European colonization has taken place, including the Caribbean, Hawaii, and Papua New Guinea.

These theories are not mutually exclusive; both can contain truth. Establishing the history of any language system (but especially one that has not been written down) is complex and detailed work, and linguists are still working on the origins of Ebonics. It is, however, well-established that (a) Ebonics has some features that are also found in West African languages; (b) some American English words (tote, yam and others) may well be borrowings from African languages; (c) Ebonics shares many features with many dialects of English; (d) the evolution of Ebonics since the end of the slave trade and the migration of many southern Blacks to the north shows that developments typical of dialect divergence are also taking place.


3 Is it 'bad English', 'slang', 'dialect', 'language', or what?

Most linguists would characterize Ebonics as a dialect of English. Some (usually strong believers in the creole hypothesis) claim that, due to its pidgin and creole origins, it is a separate language. All linguists, however, agree that Ebonics cannot correctly be called 'bad English', 'slang', 'street talk', or any of the other labels that suggest that it is deficient or not a full-fledged linguistic system. Whatever kind of critter Ebonics is, from the point of view of grammatical complexity, it is the same kind of critter as what is called 'standard English', 'proper English' or 'correct English'.


Is Ebonics 'genetically-based'?

No particular language comes with a human's genetic inheritance; only the ability to learn any language does. A child born in China to Chinese parents but adopted out in early life to an African family in Kenya would grow up speaking the language of her adopted family perfectly. We learn the language spoken by those who raise us and interact with us when we are small children.

The word 'genetic' is used in linguistics, however, as a technical term to describe the relationship between languages that come from a common source language (for example, Spanish, French, Italian, and Portugese all come from a variety of Latin carried by Roman soldiers and administrators to far-flung corners of the ancient Roman empire). In this sense, Ebonics might be said to be genetically related to other dialects of English, under both the dialectal and creole theories of origin (since creoles are mixtures of languages, and one of the languages contributing to the original African creole was English). Whether Ebonics is, in this sense, genetically related to West African languages or not depends on how true the creole theory proves to be.

© Johanna Rubba 1997

Answer 10

it started in the slave days that they started talking that way it was a kinda code the slave masters would always talk proper english and they did not want to be like them. and they talked like that so that the slavemasters would not understand them