In this book, Teresa M. Redd and Karen Schuster Webb explain not only what African American English (AAE) is, but also what role it may play in students' mastery of Standard Written English. Designed especially for writing teachers, this volume is a concise, coherent, and current source that summarizes the major schools of thought about…

This paper offers a brief but comprehensive overview of various issues pertaining to the use and origins of Black English. The purpose of the paper is to help educators understand Black English and celebrate this dialect in class while facilitating the acquisition of Standard English. It holds that Ebonics is a dialect of English with its own set…

Composition teachers should recognize that all errors in student writing are not the same. The author distinguishes between handbook rules, spoken language, and ambiguity. (MM)

Explores how a speech variety close to oratorical standard English is learned in one Afro-American peasant community in the West Indies. Material gathered during two field trips, one supported by a John Simon Guggenheim Foundation fellowship and the other by a National Institute of Mental Health grant. (VM)

Study concluded that use of Negro dialect or standard English made no significant difference in ability to answer literal questions; sex and level of readiness did. (Author/MB)

Originally appeared in Workpapers: Teaching English as a Second Language," Volume 5 (June 1971), Department of English, University of California, Los Angeles, California. (VM)

Article based on research supported by a National Institute of Mental Health grant. (VM)

Based in part on a presentation at the Conference on Symbolic Processes in Akron, Ohio, October 1970. (VM)

Takes issue with the widely-held notion that urban black children are verbally deprived. Slightly revised version of a paper presented, in part, at the Georgetown University 20th Round Table, Washington, D.C., March 1969. Appears in "The Florida FL Reporter special anthology issue, "Linguistic-Cultural Differences and American Education. (FWB)

Based on author's doctoral dissertation, University of Wisconsin. (Editor)

Contends that despite many overlapping characteristics, second dialect teaching requires a methodology distinct from that used in second language teaching, and discusses psychological, sociological, cultural, and linguistic aspects of second dialect teaching. (FB)

This paper reexamines the debate over the emergence of Black South African English (BSAE) as a variety of English that is institutionalized with distinct properties. It focuses on the tense logic in Bantu languages and discourse markers that chiefly account for uniquely BSAE features. Through an indepth analysis of these linguistic properties, the…

The research described here is part of a larger study dealing with the acquisition of language awareness in young children. (RM)