The new term ‘Ebonics’, which frequently occurs in the US media, is missing from conventional dictionaries. The closest one can get to it is Ebony, explained by the Longman Dictionary of English language and Culture as “American magazine, esp. for and about African Americans.” Therefore, it should be obvious enough that term Ebonics, roughly speaking,  has something to do with African Americans.

In fact, the variety of English that is currently termed Ebonics by various publications including TESOL Matters, has been known for decades as Black English, or Black English Vernacular, or African American Vernacular. The term in question sounds vivid, it looks good in writing, it is short enough and does not make a direct reference to race or color, but isn’t there more to it than meets the eye? To answer this question, we will have to look into three major issues:
- Social and cultural attitudes toward African American English;
- Its entry into the mainstream of American culture;
- Recognition of African American English, or Ebonics, by the ELT community.

In the past, the speech of Black Americans, with its distinctive pronunciation, vocabulary and grammar, was regarded as lazy, or ungrammatical, or even suggesting inferior intelligence. Perhaps no other form of speech in the history of the English language has been so deplored, debated and defended. Be that as it may, Black English seems to have always  been curiously appealing to many educated white speakers. Even Benjamin Franklin (1706–1790), outstanding politician, scientist and writer, attempted a version of Black English in his Information for Those Who Would Remove to America:

“[White man] make de Black Man workee, make de Horse workee, make de Ox workee, make ebery thing workee; only de Hog. He, de Hog, no workee; he eat, he drink, he walk about, he go to sleep when he please, he libb a gentleman.”

A still more striking example is that of Joel Chandler Harris (1848-1908), who at the turn of the century wrote the famous Uncle Remus Stories, a collection of American Negro folktales, as told by Uncle Remus to a white boy. Joel Harris himself was white, the son of an Irish laborer. He never read his stories aloud to people because he was too shy. Joel Harris was fascinated by this dialect and the rich cultural tradition behind it.

Mr. Harris definitely succeeded in reproducing the essence of this dialect, for his stories, translated into Russian, have been immensely popular with more than one generation of young readers and their parents in this country. Moreover, they have been adapted and used extensively in Russian secondary schools for classroom reading in English.

Anyway, the entry of Black English into the context of American culture, into the mainstream of American life is believed to have begun with Brer Rabbit stories. Later it was to sustain its place there through music hall, radio and the movies.

The mingling of Black and White American cultures is further illustrated by the story of the Charlestone writer Du Bose Heyward.  A White Southerner, Heyward was descended from one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. In 1925 he published a novel, Porgy, which became a bestseller. Meanwhile, up in New York, the young composer George Gershwin was looking for a suitable subject for an American folk opera. A friend lent him a copy of Porgy for light reading, and Gershwin was quick to recognize its potential. In 1934 George Gershwin, his brother Ira Gershwin and the novelist Heyward spent the summer together working on the opera Porgy and Bess. It is full of the sounds of Black music – and Black English. The tune Summertime, for one, long ago crossed the boundaries of the English-speaking world.

Furthermore, most Russian readers will know that elements of Black English were very effectively used in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, To Kill a Mockingbird and other well-known novels written by white American writers.

On the other hand, some African Americans have provided most vivid examples of public speaking and writing.

A striking example is that of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who in 1963 produced one of the finest specimens of contemporary American English – his speech I Have a Dream, which remains unmatched in terms of style and will stand as long as the English language itself:

“I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood… I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin…”.

Black English acquired its label from the Civil rights movement, and later from the pioneering sociolinguistic work of William Labov. It was William Labov who thoroughly investigated Black English Vernacular. Basically, he pointed out the systematic nature of its grammar patterns; he showed that these patterns were not 'mistakes' but regular features which did not in the least impair everyday communication.

Therefore, recognition on the part of linguists was thus assured. Recognition on the part of the general public, however, was much slower and much more controversial. The battleground was the education system. Some Black activists argued that if Black English was a variety of the language with its own norms and rules, then the schools should make allowances for Black English-speaking children. In other words, they demanded that the language rights of African Americans be recognized on a par with their political and social rights. (The same debate is now taking place in the British Black and Asian communities.)

However, the situation soon became confusing enough because many educated middle-class Blacks refused to reject Standard American English. Parents and teachers found themselves wondering whether they wanted their children educated in a way that would disadvantage them socially and economically for the rest of their lives. Constance Clayton, the Black superintendent of schools in Philadelphia, eloquently expressed this point of view:

“I consider Black English as a dialect of a particular ethnic group – the Blacks. I consider it incorrect English. I know of no company or corporation which hires you on the basis of your ability to speak Black English. If a person is interviewing you for a job, I think if you said 'I’ve come to aks you for a job' rather than 'ask you for a job', I think the potential employer might be somewhat confused.”

Indeed, one prominent member of the Black community in the US who benefited from the eradication of the Black English characteristics in his speech was the former Mayor of Philadelphia, Wilson Goode. When he ran for office, he took language lessons to eliminate all traces of Black American English from his speech.

The most salient features of Ebonics are found in pronunciation, vocabulary and grammar. Basically, they are as follows.

Pronunciation:
Replacing th- with d-: dis, da, dere, often dropping the initial h and replacing the final -ng with -n (but that is generally typical of casual, very informal speech).

Vocabulary:
Ebonics makes use of what is popularly known as Black slang: brother  (used in direct address), man (used as filler), etc. But we shouldn't forget that standard English has been enriched by such Black English words of African origin as jazz, banjo, zombie, mumbojumbo (jumbo).

Another typical feature is play upon word (in particular, remodeling longer words of Latin or Greek origin so as to make them sound amusing): typogiraffical error.

Grammar:
Omission of the verb to be (You out the game = ‘You are out of the game’);

Eliminating the person distinctions of the verbs to be and to have in the present tense and in the past tense: I is, you is / was, You has… Specific distribution of present-tense inflections in other verbs (He fast in everything he do);

Using the –s inflection with present tense verbs in all persons: they puts in… This amounts to eliminating person distinction in notional verbs;

Using imperative forms with come and go, e.g. Come talk to me; Go tell him;

Using multiple negatives.

Although dialects are often viewed as being inferior to the mainstream language, Black English grammar has some useful refinements that Standard American lacks:

The use of the verb to be to signify a stable condition. In Ebonics, he working means ‘he’s busy right now’; on the other hand, ‘he be working’ means ‘he has a steady job’;

The use of double deictic determiners (this here book) to make a reference to something close at hand in contrast to something more distant;

Using the auxiliary done to build up verb forms with the added meaning of result (Sb done peeped..)

To this day, the status of Black English remains in the forefront of the continuing debate about Black rights. Moreover, this language variety is sometimes dealt with as though it were a dangerous social evil, practiced at will with subversive purposes.

In this context, a document published in the late ‘nineties seems revolutionary indeed. On December 18th 1996, the Oakland, California, School Board passed its Ebonics Resolution, which dealt with the education of African American children. This was promptly followed by another resolution, that of the Linguistic Society of America. It is not surprising, therefore, that the TESOL Board immediately realized that TESOL was in an ideal position to speak about the educational as well as linguistic issues around Ebonics. The Policy Statement of the TESOL Board on African American Vernacular English (of March 10, 1997) affirms that AAVE, or Ebonics, “has been shown through research to be a rule-governed linguistic system, with its own lexical, phonological, syntactic and discourse patterns and thus, deserves pedagogical recognition.” The TESOL Board insists that effective educational programs recognize and value the linguistic system that children bring to school. This system should be an aid and resource to facilitate the acquisition of Standard American English. Children learn best if teachers respect their home language and use it as a bridge in teaching the language of the school and wider society. If the children’s cultural and social backgrounds are valued, their self-respect and self-confidence are affirmed and new learning is facilitated.

“TESOL thus advocates”, says the Policy Statement, “that teacher education include instruction in linguistics and in developing partnership between the home and school.”

These documents have had a worldwide resonance among educators, linguists and politicians, as this is a question of language planning and language policy. Many countries have differing dialects, and educators need to know what the best ways are of educating students who do not speak the standard. People in various countries feel the need to overcome the prejudices many people have about different dialects. Besides, the issue deals with the need to determine the most appropriate educational programs for varying categories of learners.

It might be assumed, therefore, that the new term, Ebonics, reflects a new cultural, social and educational attitude toward one of the varieties of American English.

Bibliography
1. R.W.Bailey. Images of English: A Cultural History of the Language. CUP, 1992.
2. R.McCrum, W.Cran and R.MacNeil. The Story of English. London and Boston, 1992.
3. TESOL Matters. June/July 1997.
4. TESOL Matters. February/March 1997.
5. J.E.White. "Ebonics According to Buckwheat" // Time, Jan.13, 1997.