Talkin the Talk: An Examination of Black English in the American Education System

Talkin the Talk: An Examination of Black English in the American Education System

How many people here believe that schools should require the use of standard English at all times? That schools should respect all languages? How many people believe that Ebonics is a legitimate language that should not be compared to standard English?

Most of you are probably wondering why I am interested in Ebonics. Obviously I’m not black. But, that does not mean that I can’t take an interest in the success of my friends and classmates. I attended Amherst Regional High School in Amherst, Massachusetts. My town is supposedly a liberal, open-minded place. But I always wondered why there were very few black students in my advanced-level classes and how come some of the black friends I had in the beginning of the year were no longer around at the end. I talked to one of my friends about this once. She told me that many black students in our school had moved from a nearby city and that they were not used to the academic standards of the school. Many of them became discouraged due to the lack of support of the teachers and some students even dropped out. This is a problem. In my opinion, many teachers do not respect students’ cultures if they are not a part of the mainstream, white culture. Although language is only one part of this respect, it is a large part of every student’s culture. Even though there has been a movement to improve inner-city schools and increase the success of black students, these programs would benefit any school around the country.

Although the debate over the legitimacy of Ebonics as a language had been burning out, the Oakland school board decision in 1996 re-sparked this debate. Every marking period, in the Oakland school district, many African-American students brought home report cards singed with bad grades. In a school district where 53% of the student population is African-American, what concerned the school board was that these black students accounted for 71 percent of "special needs" students and received an average GPA of 1.8, compared to the average of 2.4 for all other students (Perry xi). It was time to correct that problem. The school board of Oakland, California organized a task force to do just this. The Ebonics Resolution, as the plan was called, recognized Ebonics as a legitimate language that deserved respect within the classroom.