Ebonics: laziness or a language?

Question

What is your opinion?

Wow! I like these answers. I was told I was intolerant due to the fact I cringe when I hear the term "baby daddy/ baby momma."

Answer 1

It isn't a language at all. Ebonics is an expression for the sub-standard linguistics of an inner city student. Unfortunately, even after that student graduates high school or even college, the "ebonics" stain goes with them.

It doesn't seem to be apparent, or important enough, to the speaker that they are using improper grammar. With dropped 'g's, slurred consonants, double negatives, overwhelming slang terminology, half words, etc. it is hard to take these students (and adults) very serious. It is as if they say, "Gimme a goo job, jus' don' gimme no bull bout no school or speakin' like no college boy.

The very sad side of this story is that many professional football and basketball players continue to speak this poorly even after four years of "passing" English in a state university!

I weep for the future...

Answer 2

These answers are just scary. Marginalized groups often create their own style of talking. It has nothing to do with laziness. The language has its own rules for grammar, word usage and pronunciation just like all the other dialects in the US and in the UK too. It is both just the way some people speak and a way to show others that you belong to the same group.

Honestly, that you pick on this rather than saying this about Brits and others who speak differently than "standard" US English really hints loudly at a general racist attitude that assumes since it spoken by black people, it has something to do with laziness.

But maybe that doesn't come as a surprise. Sad that we still live in that type of world.

Answer 3

total crap - complete laziness

It's one thing to mess around with a language to be creative or have fun with it once you've mastered it but to learn a completely wrong/slang version of it as you're only way of communicating is truly pathetic and a indicator of the downward trend in society in general.

Pick up a book and read once in a while - learn how to speak properly then play around with the language.

The spelling, grammar, etc. of so many people today is absolutely horrid. Just spend some time on this site and read the questions and answers & see how many you can find that are clearly written, concise, have decent spelling etc., they're pretty rare.

The odd typo is one thing but some mistakes are pure ignorance not just a slip of a finger. Besides, these days with the computer and spell check - typos aren't even that excusable.

Answer 4

Ebonics is like the Cockney Rhyming Slang of North America.
It's not a language all its own, it's a dialect, but it's still complicated, useless, and puzzling for natives and foreigners alike.

Answer 5

no longer French, in case you want to communicate appropriate, fluent French, that is particularly stressful. i might might desire to declare that English is the simplest- English is particularly lots an oral language, if it doesnt sound intense-high quality out loud, that is incorrect. After that, something like Spanish or Italian is easy. Mandarin, isn't that stressful provided that there is not any conjugation or grammar, even though it does not sound like all western language and the sentence structures are completely distinctive. Plus, except you ensue to stay in Chinatown, that is variety-of ineffective.

Answer 6

Laziness!

Answer 7

Its a form of speach from a lazy race, a race that refuses to progress as a human being. It is pure laziness and ignorance. They should move on and quit living in the past. Its 2007 slavery was over along time ago!

Answer 8

Bill Cosby called it "crap."

My opinion is that it's a construct fabricated by a linguistics professor who was in a "publish or perish" situation. The media picked it up because it was a slow day for news. Much hoopla about "crap."

Answer 9

This is a dialect of English. It is like what British English is to American English. The urban African American population has developed this way of speaking, as Southerners have developed their way of speaking.

Answer 10

I think people can talk the way they want as long as people can understand them, If someone cant understand them, they should know how to talk so they can understand. But i dont think that it should become aparrent in the written language. That would just become a disaster.