Slang, result of ignorance or acceptable dialect?

[haku]

i love them to death becuz im bisexual so ya screw off anybody who hate bisexuals or lezbions

realese them tatu fans should be able to see there videos unless there is soemthign you are hiding

I almost got blind from those gruesome visions of butchered English.

[Lux]

ebonics isn't butchered english.

[haku]

Originally Posted by Lux

ebonics isn't butchered english.

Yes it is.

[Lux]

it is arguably a dialect. the british may speak proper english, but that doesn't matter. it is a valid means of communication that evolved from english, so it is not a butchered version. bring that argument here and see how far you go with it. by here, i mean where most of the population isn't white and where some places are only inhabited by black people who speak ebonics.

[haku]

Originally Posted by Lux

it is arguably a dialect.

I don't consider ebonics to be a dialect, and certainly not a language, but that's another debate.

Originally Posted by Lux

bring that argument here and see how far you go with it.

I have no doubt that i would get beaten up and killed, you don't need to warn me.

[Lux]

you wouldn't get beat up. don't stereotype. you would be laughed at.

[Rachel]

Oh come on Lux!!! "Soemthign" is total laziness. It is butchered English.

[zelda05]

I don't think Amber would be beaten up or laughed at. But I have to agree with Amber and Rach that "Soemthign" is butchered English. And so is "whaddu yooz talkin bout".

[Lux]

seomthign is spelled wrong. that's all. but speaking in a certain way that completely ignores grammatical rules DOES include ebonics. simply put. i.e. you be the man yo dawg forget troubles we got cho back if shit go down tanight

[haku]

Originally Posted by Lux

you be the man yo dawg forget troubles we got cho back if shit go down tanight

And that's not butchered english? That's absolutely awful. Ebonics is not a dialect, it's a rudimentary slang with no proper grammar and syntax, it's terrible to read and hear.

And in my opinion it's not doing any good to make black children believe that their slang is an actual language because it gives them the false impression that they don't have to learn correct english in school, and it also fuels the prejudiced idea that correct english is too difficult for black children, that they are not intelligent enough to learn a full language and that a vulgar slang with no grammar and limited vocabulary is enough for them. It's a way to keep poor people in their underdeveloped state.

In all developed countries you can find people who speak slangs in the poor suburbs of big cities, but it certainly doesn't mean that you can tell those people that their slangs are actual 'dialects', it's just slang and children must be taught the correct form of the language at school so they have a chance to access higher education or simply integrate mainstream society.

[madeldoe]

ebonics IS a language. if you actually did some research, you would know that ebonics HAS grammar elements and rules, just like any language.

"you be the man yo dawg forget troubles we got cho back if shit go down tanight"

some negro didn't just decide to start speaking this way. although its precise origins are still debatable, it is of no doubt that ebonics is deeply rooted in the African language. So the sentence above is simply a modernized version of the ebonics spoken during the slave era, where the language originated. So to deny ebonics of its legitimacy is to deny the whole African American dialect.

as far as ebonics being taught in schools, the program is designed to cultivate and embrace the African culture, so its not just a language class. Who do we learn our first concept of language from? Our family or closest environment. Before black kids even step into Preschool, they already have a defined set of dialect instilled in them. The SEP (Standard English Proficiency) program resembled that of any standard ESL programs, where English was taught as a second language and the original language was the backdrop. The purpose of the SEP program was NOT to say that American English need not be learned, but the goal was to teach a second language not "fix the home language you bring to school" You wouldnt try to "fix" spanish in order to fit into the rules of American English.



btw. if you havent noticed yet..ebonics is at the pinacle of mainstream society. so maybe you need to take some ebonics classes

[catmincenz]

Originally Posted by zelda05

I don't think Amber would be beaten up or laughed at. But I have to agree with Amber and Rach that "Soemthign" is butchered English. And so is "whaddu yooz talkin bout".

I also agree, talk about murdering the English language

[marina]

But what's wrong with * i love them to death , i love him to bits!* ?
I always say that ....

[haku]

Originally Posted by madeldoe

ebonics IS a language. if you actually did some research, you would know that ebonics HAS grammar elements and rules, just like any language.

Ebonics is not a language, it can be debated that it's a dialect, but certainly not a language. And yes, all slangs have their own internal logic, but their grammar and syntax is extremely rudimentary and lacks the complexity, precision, and finesse of an actual language. That's the point of a slang, it's a very simplified version of a language that uneducated people speak because they were never taught the correct form of the language.

Originally Posted by madeldoe

it is of no doubt that ebonics is deeply rooted in the African language.

Though some features of Ebonics like the absence of copula at the present tense can be traced back to some African languages (but Russian or Japanese don't have a copula either and they are obviously not African at all), the African influence in Ebonics is rather faint except in the area of pronunciation (for obvious reasons), but the general morphology of Ebonics remains very much Anglo-Saxon and 99% of the lexicon is of Anglo-Saxon origin, so the African origin of Ebonics is extremely debatable indeed.
Ebonics actually exhibits more resemblance with the slang of the English working class of the 17th century, i personally agree with the theory that African slaves who spoke many different African dialects and needed a way to communicate with their masters and between themselves picked words from the slang of the white working class and that the influence of their native African languages was minimal (except for pronunciation) in the construction of Ebonics because they didn't share a common African language to begin with and therefore their native lexicon was not kept within Ebonics.

Originally Posted by madeldoe

as far as ebonics being taught in schools, the program is designed to cultivate and embrace the African culture

How do you embrace the African culture by clinging to a slang derived from an Anglo-Saxon language belonging to the Germanic branch of the Indo-European family of languages, all of that having no relation at all with Africa.
If people want to embrace the African culture through a language, they should learn an actual *African* language, there are many interesting African languages they can choose from.

Originally Posted by madeldoe

The purpose of the SEP program was NOT to say that American English need not be learned

And that's the mistake, those children should be taught correct English instead of their slang, this problem should have been fixed decades ago.

My grand-parents only spoke the Norman dialect (and yes, that was an actual dialect, directly derived from Latin with some Old Norse influence from the Viking settlers), they grew up in the 1900s at a time when school was rudimentary and they were never really taught French, they only spoke the dialect that had been spoken in the area for centuries.
It was different for my parents, they grew up in the 1940s and school was compulsory everywhere for everyone at the time, they picked the Norman dialect from their parents of course but they were only taught correct French at school.
And now me, i know almost nothing of the Norman dialect and i could barely understand my grand-parents, i was only taught French.
With proper education, it only takes 3 generations to shift a population to the correct language.

Originally Posted by madeldoe

You wouldnt try to "fix" spanish in order to fit into the rules of American English.

The difference is that Spanish is an actual language, not an English slang.

Originally Posted by madeldoe

if you havent noticed yet..ebonics is at the pinacle of mainstream society.

Well, i do not live in the US so i wouldn't know, but if it's true that's really sad, it's never a sign of progress when 'mainstream society' loses the ability to speak the correct form of a language

Originally Posted by madeldoe

so maybe you need to take some ebonics classes

I'd rather not, i haven't spent all those years learning how to speak English as correctly as possible to ruin it with vulgar slang, incoherent grammar, and dubious spelling.

[KillaQueen]

ebonics is a jargon, nothing more. and it won't ever be a language or even a dialect per se, because it clearly is just 'something' derived from english. screwed up or not.

[Kappa]

Oooh I've been living in a lie all these years... I'm a lezbion!

[KillaQueen]

Originally Posted by darje

Oooh I've been living in a lie all these years... I'm a lezbion!

L-M-A-O!!!

[Kappa]

Gramatically challenged homosexuals for the win, eh KQ?

[KillaQueen]

tru dat. cuz we is definitly lezbionz.

[Kappa]

Originally Posted by KillaQueen

tru dat. cuz we is definitly lezbionz.

so wut we doin next, fellow lezbion?