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Opinions on "Ebonics" | ||
Tags: United States | Dialect | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| egill Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5697 days ago 418 posts - 791 votes  Speaks: Mandarin, English* Studies: German, Spanish, Dutch | Message 9 of 25 21 March 2012 at 9:23pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I don't have too much to add, as I think the issue is quite settled linguistically.
On a hopefully interesting sidenote, I would like to point out that that the ask/axe alternation is a regional thing that has been around since the Old English days. For a long time, they were both considered acceptable for literary use. In fact, Chaucer even uses both variants in the same line: "Axe nat why, for though thou aske me, I wol nat tellen Goddes pryvetee." The Miller's Tail 449-450 Edited by egill on 21 March 2012 at 9:24pm 6 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| nonneb Pentaglot Groupie SpainRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4752 days ago 80 posts - 173 votes Speaks: English*, Ancient Greek, Latin, German, Spanish Studies: Mandarin, Hungarian, French | Message 10 of 25 22 March 2012 at 4:50pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Southerner here: "Aks" instead of "ask" is a feature of Southern American English in certain areas (including mine) and is not stigmatized as being a feature of black speech, but rather of any person with a thick accent far from General American.
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| KimG Diglot Groupie Norway Joined 4978 days ago 88 posts - 104 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, English Studies: Portuguese, Swahili | Message 11 of 25 23 March 2012 at 9:40am | IP Logged | |||||
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Americans I've talked to have said to me its just slang, but, I certainly think it looks like there is an dialect of sort, or sociolect, since I saw people living so close to each other, speak more or less a different dialect in the same city. An real dialect I think would be spoken by white people too, not just by almost everyone with a certain skin colour in parts of southern US.
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| luke Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 7206 days ago 3133 posts - 4351 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Esperanto, French | Message 12 of 25 23 March 2012 at 9:54am | IP Logged | |||||
My wife doesn't like "aks" at all and she is very annoyed by the mispronunciation. It is independent of race. One of our friends kids mispronounced it and was corrected by his mother. This was a young boy, about 4 years old. Some children have remarkable diction and they always seem to be much smarter than average. Edited by luke on 23 March 2012 at 9:55am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Ari Heptaglot Senior Member Norway Joined 6583 days ago 2314 posts - 5695 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Mandarin, Cantonese Studies: Czech, Latin, German | Message 13 of 25 23 March 2012 at 10:00am | IP Logged | |||||
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The stigmatization of AAVE needs to be combatted. Should African Americans learn Standard American English? That's the choice of each individual. For a lot of people, it's probably a good idea, because of how American society works. Everyone else shouldn't tell them what they should and shouldn't do. What everyone else should do is to keep struggling for a society in which African Americans don't need to suppress their sociolect. When the stigmatization appears, call it out. Say "Dude, you're being a douche".
Personally, I think AAVE is the bee's knees, and I'd be speaking it all the time if I thoght I could get away with it. Unfortunately, I'm pretty much as white as one can be, so I'll have to satisfy myself with admiring the sociolect from afar. 4 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Hampie Diglot Senior Member Sweden Joined 6660 days ago 625 posts - 1009 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: Latin, German, Mandarin | Message 14 of 25 23 March 2012 at 10:27am | IP Logged | |||||
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Everyone should definitely get the chance to learn the stander version of a language in school -- because unless
you can speak it you cannot get a job, almost; however, one should not force upon people to use that language outside school and/or work. That's just absurd. In Sweden we have a sociolect called by most people Rinkeby Swedish (it's an area where many immigrants live) and by scientists Multi Ethnic Youth Language, and using that when you're at a job interview and you will not get the job; however you cannot "make" people speak regular Swedish with friends, on the buss, etc. etc. -- but they have to get the chance to learn it. There was, a couple of years ago, a heated debate whether the schools gave these groups a fair chance to learn standard language or not and a leading person in the field of literature argued for a literary canon to combat the problem (like that would work...). 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| manish Triglot Groupie Romania Joined 5547 days ago 88 posts - 136 votes Speaks: Romanian*, English, German Studies: Spanish | Message 15 of 25 23 March 2012 at 10:54am | IP Logged | |||||
I'm white and I have spoken it in a school that was 67% Hispanic and 24% African-American (and the rest Asian, I was like the only white person). Come to think of it, the Hispanics would speak AAVE too (at least the ones who spoke English natively). You can speak it as a white person, just don't use expressions like "the bee's knees" and you'll be fine :P It ain't no problem if you white and you wanna talk Ebonics, I been doing that and it never caused nuthin' (of course it's not just about the grammar, but about the accent/intonation as well). The sad part is rather that, having been away from the States for so long, I might be losing my AAVE abilities :( Edited by manish on 23 March 2012 at 6:48pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Volte Tetraglot Senior Member Switzerland Joined 6440 days ago 4474 posts - 6726 votes Speaks: English*, Esperanto, German, Italian Studies: French, Finnish, Mandarin, Japanese | Message 16 of 25 23 March 2012 at 1:42pm | IP Logged | |||||
I'm originally from Canada, and I say "aks/axe" for "ask" at times. Having a few Southern features in my speech doesn't lead to more than the occasional joke, I find. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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