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chomsky explains of ebonics (or black vernacular english) that, in essence, "standard english" is taught and expected to be learned in schools because it's the dominant language of power. he then goes on to explain that if suddenly, people speaking BVE were reaching positions of power en masse, that BVE would carry with it a sense of prestige. chomsky also explains that in touring universities in the hinterlands of the US, he often comes upon locales where he can't understand anyone around him, and they're speaking english. he says that upon enquiry regarding local dialects, it's generally revealed that "standard english" must be taught to those individuals while they're enrolled in the university so that they can communicate effectively with recruiters from IBM and the like.
chomsky has a lot to say about ebonics. essentially, however, his discussions are purely conceptual in nature and revolve around power dynamics and social oppression. essentially, if you examine his arguments, he says that, "in an insular and perfect world where a member of community A will never venture beyond her community, her dialect should be celebrated and encouraged."
well, sure. that's great. but it does more to perpetuate a horribly unbalanced power dynamic against community A if their community is not absolutely insulated from those beyond it. in my opinion, it's helpful to have a mastery of the tools of the oppressor if you want to give weight to tools beyond their reach. does hip hop do this? is it a way to use the white power structure to deliver a little trojan bomb of BVE to white ears? maybe.
hurricane katrina brought international attention to ray nagin. his quotes were often peppered with BVEisms. sharpton used BVEisms on the campaign trail. the black panthers used BVEisms. black celebrities use BVEisms in press. oprah even uses them when she needs to whip her audience into a frenzy.
do any of you believe though, that the most powerful of the people mentioned above do not have a complete, functional mastery over the language of the oppressor? do any of you believe that they would have been just as well served--or better served--by having been encouraged to communicate **exclusively** in BVE throughout school?
that's my only concern with BVE. of course it's a practical means to colloquial verbal discussion. of course it has its own structure. of course people are often saturated in it. the rub is in the notion that not everyone is immersed in it. if you have a school of 3000 black kids in the bronx (which my mom taught at for 15 years) i can tell you from first hand experience that not every student there wants to be institutionally exposed to BVE. should their education then be made a process whereby they go home to do their homework for an english language writing class and rigorously adhere to the rules of grammar and structure conveyed to them in class, while another student sitting next to them ignores what they'd both had equal exposure to in class and hands in a paper disregarding every rule they had learned--and both receive an equal grade based on politically correct relativism or teacher apathy?
i'm well aware of BVE's ability to fit linguistics' mold of language. i've never claimed that it wasn't a language or a dialect. what i do claim, however, is that schools theoretically exist to teach a program. if two students are enrolled in the same school, exposed to the same program, each has an equal **opportunity** to come away with the same mastery of what is taught. it's both an educator's and a student's prerogative to subvert that opportunity thru either apathy, frustration, political correctness, fear or ennui. i seriously believe that if 10% of the students in a class can come away from that class with an ability to express that they've learned something from it, then ALL of the students had the same opportunity to gain at least what that 10% had learned. i think testing and grading are ridiculous, but as students are in those boxes for 8-10 hours a day, they might as well go home with something to show for their time.
that's my basic point. argue away as you wish.
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