Discusses the politics of English and suggests that English varieties of the inner city and the socially disenfranchised continue to be stigmatized by speakers of more esteemed varieties. (Author/VWL)

Discusses the need for a forum to discuss public issues related to language. Introduces three papers that focus on current language issues. (Author/VWL)

In response to Morrow's (CS 731 019) reflections on dialect interference, the author notes that those who want to find dialect interference in writing will always find it, and those who look for complex cultural codes will find those too. (HOD)

Criticizes Herskovit's "Myth of the Negro Past" and Turner's "Africanisms in the Gullah Dialect" for their emphasis on trait diffusion, lack of any index of relative linguistic significance of specific items, failure to assess the importance of the dominant White culture, and failure to maintain historical and cultural…

Teacher attitude remains the crucial variable, and it spells success or failure for many students speaking Black English in the public schools. (Author/IRT)

Considers the pursuit of language rights of speakers of English varieties, particularly those collected under the category of African American vernacular English. Describes how a lack of legal language rights for African Americans have left them to appeal to attitudes in the search for democratizing teaching policies. Concludes that attempts to…

Reviews two books, "American Earlier Black English," by Edgar W. Schneider, and "The Death of Black English," by Ronald Butters, that capture the essence of the renewed controversy on the reemergence of the historical issue and a new dispute over the current development of Vernacular Black English. (36 references) (JL)

Studies on the acting white hypothesis--the premise that black students purposefully do poorly in school and on standardized tests because of racialized peer pressure--to explain the black-white achievement gap have not been able to negate the fact that a "burden of acting white" exists for some black students, even though it is not prevalent…

The divergence controversy is addressed in this holistic examination of Vernacular Black English (VBE). The debate over VBE stems from Labov's conclusion that the vernaculars of Black and White dialects in the South reveal completely different patterns of development. This study is based on patterns obtained from the writer's earlier research on…

The loss of the copula in Black English Vernacular (BEV) is demonstrably traceable to norms of pidginization that have their roots in West African languages and in contact among those languages. An extensive examination of the verb systems of a number of West African languages reveals that in every case a variety of verbal forms serves the many…

Demonstrates how the speech and writings of Blacks living in the United States and abroad reflect a holistic cognitive style. (DA)

Reviews the debate between Herskovits, Turner, and Johnson on Africanisms in Gullah. Suggests that Whinnom's approach, which considers pidgins and creoles under the rubric of "linguistic hybridization," is a more appropriate model with which to view Gullah, making irrelevant the question of whether it is an African or European language.…

Notes that familiarity with the language of students--and especially awareness of the features of their languages that make acquisition of educated English difficult--enables the teacher to use a variety of techniques. Suggests that tolerance and acceptance of a panoply of dialects is a must, not a choice. (RS)

Hilliard, a professor and expert on African culture, speaks about the racial and cultural bias of standardized tests, multiculturalism, the concept of race, Afrocentric teaching, Ebonics, recruiting and retaining African-American teachers, and the future classroom. (SK)

Suggests that Ebonics deserves respect as a genuine spoken dialect, widely used and important in American culture. Notes that students who are fluent in it benefit when they are allowed to add standard English to their repertoire and taught the appropriate occasions for each way of speaking. (RS)