Oakland School Board Research Articles

The intertextual origins of public opinion: constructing Ebonics in the New York Times

In this article, I revisit the 1996 Oakland School Board (OSB) resolution on Ebonics and perform a discourse analysis of the NeW York Times coverage of the decision. Using the framework of intertextuality, I consider how reported speech allows authors to appropriate authority and construct various stances toward the OSB decision. I discuss how other framing devices work in tandem with intertextuality to discursively construct ideologies of Ebonics. I also analyze how language from early articles is incorporated in subsequent news items, and emphasize the need to consider both discursive reproduction processes and cognitive processes of reception when using intertextual analysis to understand the origin of language ideologies. I suggest that this approach to media discourse analysis can be utilized by linguists who wish to actively shape attitudes toward stigmatized language varieties.

Beyond Ebonics: Linguistic Pride and Racial Prejudice (review)

Reviewed by: Beyond Ebonics: Linguistic pride and racial prejudice by John Baugh Edwin Battistella Beyond Ebonics: Linguistic pride and racial prejudice. By John Baugh. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. Pp. 149. John Baugh begins this book by reminiscing about his youth in Philadelphia. He grew up codeswitching between the ‘proper speech’ insisted on by his parents, teachers, and church elders and the rejection of white speech by the hippest and coolest of his role models. B became an expert codeswitcher and even developed skills as a mimic, which as a youth led him to make fun of the accents of some of his classmates. As a result, B came to appreciate at an early age the notions of linguistic pride and shame and the ways in which racial prejudice connects with linguistic devaluation. In Beyond Ebonics, B draws on this perspective and on his professional work in linguistics and education to put the Oakland School Board episode into historical perspective. Beyond Ebonics consists of nine relatively short chapters dealing with the history of the notion of Ebonics, the Oakland School Board resolutions of December 1996 and January 1997, various legislative reactions, the legal implications and policy concerns raised by the Ebonics resolutions, and the media and public reactions (including attempts at satire). B also teases apart the various theoretical perspectives that researchers bring to the study of African American speech and culture, and he includes three appendices: the LSA’s January 1997 resolution on Ebonics and bills passed in 1997 by the Texas 75th Legislature and the California Senate. B emphasizes a number of important facts that have gone unnoticed in the press commentary and other folklore that has arisen from the Ebonics discussion—he notes for example that the 1973 coining of the term ‘Ebonics’ by Robert Williams was intended to reflect a grouping of language varieties with African roots broader than just African American Vernacular English but that this sense of Ebonics was soon morphed into synonymy with Black English. B also reminds us that the Oakland School Board revised its resolution in January of 1997, clarifying its intent. Especially valuable also is B’s description of the political reactions to the Ebonics discussions, from Education Secretary Richard Riley’s position on Title VII funding to the comments of African-American political leaders such as Jesse Jackson and Kweisi Mfume and legislators such as Arlen Specter, Lauch Faircloth, Maxine Waters, and Peter King. And B discusses the media and public reactions—describing the positions of African-American opinion makers such as Brent Staples, Bill Cosby, and Oprah Winfrey as well as the reactions of editorial cartoonists and late-night comedians and some of the more openly racist material on the internet. Of special interest to linguists are the chapters on ‘Ebonics genesis’ and ‘Disparate theoretical foundations’. The first provides background on the origins of the term ‘Ebonics’ and its ‘definitional derailment’ (74); the second explicates the various theoretical traditions involved in discussions of Ebonics and African American English. B has done linguists and the public a service by providing a lucid, readable, and engaging overview of the issues surrounding Ebonics and public policy. Edwin Battistella Southern Oregon University. Copyright © 2002 Linguistic Society of America

Liberating American Ebonics from Euro-English

he term Ebonics, a blend of ebony (black) and phonics/phonetics (speech), was originally coined to refer broadly to the linguistic and paralinguistic features ... which represent the communicative competence of the West African, Caribbean, and the United States slave descendant (Williams vi). The compass of Ebonics in the United States includes the Gullah language and what we academics, at least, know as English, Vernacular, African-American English, and African American Vernacular English, its most up-to-date scholarly name. The Oakland School Board used the term Ebonics to refer narrowly to African American as the mother tongue of most of its African American student population, with the intention of giving terminological credence to its historical origins. Following the Oakland tradition, we shall use the term Ebonics to refer to that variety of Ebonics also known as and its synonyms, unless otherwise noted. However, even then, Smitherman has made the point that American Black English itself may be thought of as comprising an entire range of distinctives from unique grammatical patterns to simply characteristic tones, rhythms, and communicative styles that can overlay the most proper standard (It Bees Dat Way 16). The terminology pertaining to Ebonics raises certain questions that we shall address: Is American Ebonics (in the narrow sense of Ebonics in the United States) a different language from English? Is it a dialect of English? How does American Ebonics relate to the larger Ebonics picture? In pursuit of answers, and while acknowledging Arthur L. Palaca is Professor of at the University of Akron and director of its Certificate Program in Linguistic Studies. He teaches linguistics, including courses on and the linguistics of point of view. His work has appeared in Written Communication and in the edited collections Landmark Essays on Voice and Sentence Combining: A Rhetorical Perspective. This paper is based on a 1999 CCCC presentation and was supported by a University of Akron Teaching Excellence Grant.

TOEFL to the Test: are Monodialectal AAL‐speakers Similar to ESL Students?

In this paper, I draw attention to the validity of the Oakland School Board's resolution on Ebonics, and to the value of ESL‐based approaches to the teaching of ‘Standard American English’ to speakers of other dialects of American English. I do so by demonstrating the validity of comparisons made between monodialectal speakers of African‐American Language (AAL)/‘Ebonics’ and low‐level ESL students, and by illustrating the bidialectalism‐instilling potential of the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL). Use of this proficiency test puts the spotlight on a much‐neglected area, namely, the bidialectal or dialect‐specific nature of listening comprehension for pre‐college and first‐year students raised in the inner city. The findings of two longitudinal studies are cited to demonstrate that, for many Ebonics‐speakers, SAE is much like a second language. The students' performance on the TOEFL, particularly on the listening comprehension and grammar sections, suggests that both comprehension and production of ‘Standard English’ can be problematic for transitional students whose first language is AAL. The pedagogical implications of this finding are carefully explored.Every time I say something the way I say it, she correct me until I say it some other way. Pretty soon it feel like I can't think. My mind run up on a thought, git confuse, run back and sort of lay down.….Look like to me only a fool would want you to talk in a way that feel peculiar to your mind.(Alice Walker, 1982: 183–4)

Ebonics and Public Awareness

The Oakland School Board resolution in December 1996 fueled a plethora of debates regarding the place and purpose of Ebonics as a valid communicative method and teaching tool. Opinions ranged from credulous applause to outright disdain. Although academicians and politicians have tended to be at the forefront of the debate, the news media have also published thousands of letters, articles, and commentary. Seemingly, a renewed interest in Ebonics has emerged. Given the media attention, this project assesses the level of awareness of the subject for a sample of 420 students from a racially and ethnically diverse college in the South. Logistic regression analysis is used to identify variables associated with awareness of Ebonics and the Oakland decision. Results suggest that although the majority of students are aware of the Ebonics topic, awareness levels varied. White respondents tended to be more aware of the topics than non-White respondents. The level of awareness surrounding the Oakland School Board decision also varied based on race, presidential inclinations, and previous knowledge regarding Ebonics. Although the Ebonics topic has existed for decades, its place as a source of attention and debate tends to ebb and flow like that of most controversial issues (Harrison, 1984; Smitherman, 1977). The Oakland School Board's 1996 resolution acknowledged the existence of Ebonics as a language, resolved to use it as a teaching

OAKLAND School Board Resolution on Ebonics (Amended Version

OAKLAND School Board Resolution on Ebonics (Amended Version

Oakland School Board Resolution on Ebonics (Original Version

Oakland School Board Resolution on Ebonics (Original Version

Ebonics and Academic Achievement: The Role of the Counselor

A primary purpose of the school is to foster academic achievement, and a primary goal of the school counselor is to support the overall achievement of students by addressing problems and concerns that present impediments to their education. Regarding the language development of Ebonics-speaking African American youth, this article contends that school counselors must assume the role of consultants to and collaborators with teachers and students toward the fulfillment of two objectives: (a) increasing and improving students ' use of Standard English without depreciating their culturally based dialect, and (b) improving the teacher-student relationship in the language learning process. INTRODUCTION Successful communication between counselor and client is the modus operandi of effective counseling and helping. Communication is even more important in cross-cultural counseling situations such as when the counselor and the client come from different cultural backgrounds that suggest language or dialect differences. Bankart (1997) highlights the historical importance of language and culture in the dyadic counseling relationship, concluding that it is important not only for counselors to understand their clients' cultural world view but also to understand the linguistic system clients use to communicate that world view. Proficiency in Standard English is a legitimate and viable learning goal for African American school youth. However, these students' common engagement with and fluency in Ebonics, or that dialect of English peculiar but not limited to African Americans, suggests that Ebonics is a real and legitimate community-based language system that cannot be ignored or devalued. Thus, whereas African American school youth should be expected and required to learn Standard English, Ebonics should be allowed in certain school-based learning activities. Moreover, as affirmed by the resolutions of the Oakland (California) Unified School District's (OUSD) (1996,1997)1 and the Linguistic Society of America (LSA) (1997), African Americans' use of Ebonics should be incorporated into these and other school activities without demeaning, discrediting, or repudiating its users. This position applies equally to issues related to Ebonics and Ebonics-speaking students in the school counseling setting. The present article focuses on the school counselor's role as it relates to two areas: (a) effective counseling of African American students who speak Ebonics; and (b) consulting and collaborating with teachers to facilitate the effective teaching of Standard English to Ebonics-speaking students while preserving the integrity of these students' indigenous language system. Although the primary focus of this discussion is urban African American youth from preschool through grade 12, there are important secondary implications for African American higher education and adult learners. THE NATURE OF EBONICS Contrary to the Oakland school board's controversial 1996 resolution, which stated that language use, specifically that of African American students in urban settings, was genetically based, language is learned or culturally based. (The OUSD's amended January 15, 1997, resolution acknowledges this and omits references to language as having any genetic basis.) Black English-speaking persons from different parts of the world speak varieties of English that are peculiar to their cultures or nationalities. Thus, the English spoken by Blacks in Nigeria differs in rules, sounds, and meanings from that spoken by Blacks in Jamaica. Similar disparities are evident in the English of Black South Africans and Black South Carolinians. Correspondingly, the dialect of English spoken by Whites from the Appalachian Mountains region of the U.S. differs from that spoken by Whites in Ireland, the United Kingdom, and Australia. Variations within English, or any other language for that matter, often result from a combination of social, political, historical, geographic, and socioeconomic factors (Beaman, 1994). …

The Ebonics Controversy

The term Ebonics, coined by the author in 1973 at a conference on the language of Black children, was formed by combining ebony (black) and phonics (speech sounds). Two schools of thought on the origin of Ebonics are presented: (a) pidgin/Creole and (b) African retention. What sparked the national controversy on Ebonics was the Oakland school board's decision to recognize Ebonics as a legitimate language. The school board's primary goal is to discover more effective ways to improve African American children's acquisition of Standard English and reading skills. Three research studies are presented to support the use of Ebonics in the classroom as a bridge to Standard English. Many African American children speak Ebonics or a home language. Using the language children bring to school as a bridge to teaching new language systems is a widely used technique in second language acquisition.

Unequal partnership: Sociolinguistics and the African American speech community

ABSTRACTAmerican quantitative sociolinguistics has drawn substantially on data from the African American speech community for its descriptive, theoretical, and methodological development, but has given relatively little in return. Contributions from the speech community to sociolinguistics include the development of variable rules and frameworks for the analysis of tense-aspect markers, social class, style, narratives, and speech events, plus research topics and employment for students and faculty. The contributions which sociolinguistics could make in return to the African American speech community – but has not done sufficiently – include the induction of African Americans into linguistic, the representation of African Americans in our writings, and involvement in courts, workplaces, and schools, especially with respect to the teaching of reading and the language arts. This last issue has surged to public attention following the Oakland School Board's “Ebonics” resolutions on Dec. 18, 1996.The present unequal partnership between researcher and researched is widespread within linguistics. Suggestions are made for establishing service in return as a general principle and practice of teaching and research in our field. (African American Vernacular English, Ebonics, applications of sociolinguistics, community service, dialect readers, variation theory)

Text of the Oakland School Board Resolution on Ebonics

Text of the Oakland School Board Resolution on Ebonics

The Fallacy of Ebonics

ognize Ebonics as a language and a valid teaching tool. Jesse Jackson, Reverend AI Sharpton, a bevy of black community leaders, educators, parent groups and even some of the nation's top linguists announced that they would not oppose the Oakland plan. Even the Senate Appropriations Committee took the issue seriously, to hold hearings. The Oakland School Board made it easy for them by publicly de-emphasizing its claim that Ebonics is a separate language. The Board members protested that they were misunderstood and claimed that they had no plan to seek federal funding to teach Ebonics or to require teachers or students to learn it but simply use it as a way to help black students master standard English. Even this is an educational fallacy. The supporters of Ebonics are certainly right to criticize those teachers and school administrators that view black students who

Editorial: Applied Linguistics and Education

Editorial Applied Linguistics and Education This special issue of ial arrives at a time increasingly appearing cogether on the front page of newspapers. when language and education are The recent fer- politically, interactionally, vor over Ebonics in the state of California, and the multiple interpretations of the Oakland school board's policy suggest how and sociolinguistically complicated today's classrooms can be. Recognizing the lay- ering of issues involved in educational research, today's classroom researchers necessarily look beyond the statistical demographics of educational in detail to failure. To understand the Oakland school board's policy decision, as well as ongoing debate over bilingual education, researchers must look both the language practices that go on inside the classroom, and the kinds of language practices stu- dents bring with them to the classroom. This twofold attention to contextualized language use both in and out of school is one of the most important contributions applied linguistics can bring to educational research. Working in this area, authors in this volume of ial deal with both the minute structuring of language in the class- room, as well as with the linguistic habits and presuppositions students and teach- classroom talk interactionally pat- ers bring to the classroom from other realms. illustrated in 1979, is As Hugh Mehan terned and rule-governed. Since Mehan 's seminal work many other analysts of is classroom discourse have noticed that school-based knowledge organized in ways which some produces social students, but not others, can access. Instead of functioning as the leveling device imagined by strata Dewey (1943), public education more often re- of the larger society. In this volume, both of the interviews and two of the articles address the room can skills, is illuminate this process. way close attention to discourse in the The article by Dennis Lynch and Sharon class- Hilles illustrates precisely how a teacher's goal to teach apparently neutral academic embedded in institutionalized practices so that the classroom simulta- neously socializes students into norms, sometimes unpleasant ones, typical of so- ciety at large. This article also suggests, however, that there ity in is a potential flexibil- the necessarily scripted classroom practice. This flexibility can lead to either the reproduction or the change of societally scripted roles. This recognition of the cultural presuppositions behind an apparently neu- tral curriculum can also be seen in current research in literacy. Recent work in multiple literacies (see, for example, Street, 1993, and the chapters within) con- ceptualize classroom activity as only one among many kinds of literacy, the con- in the struction of a particular type of knowledge. Discourse patterns classroom literacies. can be an important resource for researchers as they identify these multiple Issues in Applied Linguistics ISSN 1050-4273 Vol. 7 © Regents of the University of California No. 2