Ebonics William Labov Summary

With a background affected tremendously by the dark history of African Americans, language has become a significant problem to what the term Black English really means to different people. In If Black Language Isn’t a Language, Then Tell Me, What Is, James Baldwin attempts to analyze what a language really means and how Black English evolved to fulfill an important role for Americans. Black English sounds proper to blacks, but to whites it may not be a proper use of language. Throughout this essay, Baldwin uses a specific tone and relates to his audience by opening his mind to both emotion and logic while still upholding his credibility. Baldwin tries to persuade the audience to respect the language of Black English using his personal experience. The history of different languages mentioned in the essay is used to help convince the audience of thinking about the term language from a new perspective. Whites and Blacks both may speak the same language, but that does not mean that they understand each other because the language can be spoken in different matters. As Baldwin states, “The white man could not possibly understand, and that, indeed, he cannot understand, until today”. A white man or black man had to be careful about the words they used in front of each other because some words would be considered offensive for one another. Baldwin uses African American language and culture to reveal the impact that the English language Americans use has created.

Speech is often associate with race because some individuals believe that if the person does not sound “educated” enough the person comes from a lower class and was brought up in the so called “ghettos” and this association is often made towards someone that forms part of a minority group. The author illustrates that race is tight up with speech

In the civilized society that everyone lives in today, all languages and culture should be equal. That is the main idea in both Gloria Anzaldua’s essay, “How to Tame a Wild Tongue”, as well as James Baldwin’s “If Black English Isn’t a Language, Then Tell Me, What Is?”. The authors in both these texts support their argument in various ways, and in doing so, manages to effectively persuade their audience. The ways that each author approaches their argument is different in their appeals, evidence, and styles. Similarities also exist between the texts of the two authors. The rhetorical strategies that Anzaldua uses makes her argument much stronger than Baldwin’s argument.

In accordance with other languages, Ebonics cannot necessarily be taught. The only way you can do that is if you break the rules of the English language. Just think, having a class where you purposely learn English in the wrong manner. Ebonics has no rules defining what is right to say as opposed to that which is grammatically incorrect. That means there is no right or wrong way to state something. This sparks yet another question. Can Ebonics be written and evaluated? Besides slavery, and the mistreating of blacks in the past, the ignorance behind this “undefined language” acts as the crutch for why blacks are not as well off as others. For many years, blacks were put into slavery. We all know that at one point the slaves learned the language of English. Well slaves were often watched by there master and many assistants on the plantation. Slaves would speak of things that would upset the master such as talking bad about him or even planning an escape. So slaves had do other choice but to come up with a language so wrong that whites could not do nothing but classify it as gibberish. As the years go by, blacks still create a language of their own. Mainly the uses of Ebonics is to separate our African culture from any others. While we strive to be different amongst others, we are only hurting ourselves. We may learn the grammar rules of English but, it would be overshadowed by our up bringing of using Ebonics. Many use its existence as an excuse to why

David Foster Wallace’s essay regarding language and the usage of the English language in America captured my attention from the beginning. Through several gasps of humor and wording geared toward an audience of intellectual scholars, Wallace’s stance on language was raw and honest – nothing was held back that he thought important.

Jamila Lyiscott, in her poem “Three Ways to Speak English” (2014), suggests that linguistic profiling still affects society today. Lyiscott supports her suggestion by writing about her personal experience of when a lady announced she was articulate after observing the way the spoke and the color of her skin. Although, Lyiscott claims she speaks three different forms of English, there’s one for home, one for school, and one for friends; the lady would have thought she wasn’t articulate if she spoke the way she did with her friends even though she is perfectly capable of expressing her thoughts in a brilliant way. Her purpose is to raise awareness about language stereotypes because she wants people to know that “broken” English or different forms

Speech is one of the first things humans adopt, also making it one of the most important tools a human uses. Taking this ability for granted and degrading the English that is spoken can seriously detriment a person in the future. In his essay, John Simon addresses the importance of keeping good English alive; he sees is it as a waste of time to use improper English because it blurs and impedes communication. Simon argues that thinking clearly affects your ability to articulate, that a person cannot depend on institutions to give the proper training, and that everyone should play a role in proper education to stop the slow death of proper English. To speak good english one must be able to express their thoughts well.

Imperfect English does not Equal an Imperfect Person In the article “Mother Tongue – Don’t judge a book by its cover… or someone’s intelligence by her English” by Amy Tan, the author asserts how often people are misjudged to be intellectually challenged due to their inability to clearly speak English. Offensively, sometimes treating such speakers as disabled. Naively believing that the volume used to communicate will somehow give clarity or understanding to what is being said. Tan also discusses some of the inaccurate and demeaning terminology sometimes used to depict these non-English speakers.

Language is an art form through which shapes our understanding of ourselves and our world. (BOSTES, 2012). It is through language; where human beings are able express their inner thoughts and emotions. Language is defined as the verbal behaviour; gestures, body movement (Pierce & Eplin, 1999). The NSW K-10 English Syllabus emphasises that language is central to the intellectual, social, and emotional development of all students and that the model of language development is through a sociolinguistic approach. Sociolinguistics is referred to as the study of language and its relationship with culture and society (Kennedy, 2014). Sociolinguistics is an approach through which correlates with the NSW K-10 English Syllabus, as learning English, is recursive and develops through ever-widening contexts (BOSTES, 2012). It is through English, where students develop their critical and imaginative faculties to broaden their capacity for cultural understanding. (BOSTES, 2012). Through the syllabus (the rationale, aims, objectives, outcomes, stage statements and content), is the notion of how students will develop an appreciation of language as well as the skills in composing, understanding values and attitudes. Thus, the study of English, as expressed in the syllabus, allows students to learn across the curriculum as well as develop an understanding about and dress contemporary issues they face (BOSTES, 2012).

To conclude, in relation with the findings made and my own experience on my practicum in a public school, I can realize that my beliefs were similar to the students who participate in the research. Nevertheless, the only difference is that I do not agree with the memorization of the rules instead, with the internalization by connections with their mother tongue. Also, I believe that in our practicum, we tend to copy the strategies that our mentor teachers use, which are the mechanic activities, paper sheets or drills, and so forth, letting our belief that English is acquired through

With the drastic measures that non-native language learners are driven towards, it illustrates how the demand of a certain inflection in an individual’s voice is valued. Nonetheless, studies conducted with semantic development in non-heritage language learners provides evidence that information is processed slower, which implies that learning a non-native language is a long procedure. The spectrum of issue associated with learning a non-native language is undeniably an ongoing concern that requires the attention of many, as ignorance would only exacerbate the matter at

In the world of English language, the notion of native and non- native speaker is very prominent. The concept of native and non- native speaker is still important to some people especially scholars because it shows the distinct features possessed by the speakers. However, as time passed and new varieties emerge the distinction between these two seems to be less visible. The issue also becomes debateable as each scholar has different opinion on the matter. Some seem to stick to their believes that there are still differences that differentiate the two, native and non- native speakers while some believe that the distinctions are no longer visible, thus make the two speakers equal. Nonetheless, according to some studies carried out, there are

This article is a short overview of the Eclectic theory or ideology of teaching English. A discovery of where the origins of the philosophy were born, and why it evolved and stayed alive in many fields of study to this day.. While many old school linguists see it as un principled and vague without any structure, is does have strong concepts and principles about language acquisition and learning environments, choices of activities and reasons for these varieties, A look at what prominent linguists say about the advantages and the disadvantages of this theory.

A plethora of scholars (e.g., Carter & McCarthy, 1988; McCarthy, 1990; Nation, 2010; Nation & Laufer 2012; Schmitt, 2010) in vocabulary learning, however, argue that vocabulary acquisition is the basic foundation of language learning because words are the building blocks of communication and without them, learners will not be able to express themselves and communicate by using a target language. Lexical errors are the most common among second language learners. In fact, vocabulary errors seem to be not only the most serious ones for students, but also the most disruptive ones for native speakers in terms of interpretation. As Gass (1988) observes, grammatical errors still result in understandable structures (e.g., she a girl), whereas vocabulary errors may interfere with communication (e.g., He tried to hold the

language pragmatics whose mission is to scrutinize how non 2native speakers do things with words with L 2. This paper reported that 4 NPT 2related aspects have been heavily document 2 ed in the current literature :1 ) L 1