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Ebonics, also know as African American Vernacular English (AAVE), continues to stir mixed opinions from Americans from all walks of life. Ebonics, a term comprised of the words "ebony" (black) and "phonics" (sound), is defined as "black sound”. Ebonics is name for a Creole that has been spoken for hundreds of years, based on the English spoken by slaves in the pre-Civil War South. Ismail Abdul-Hakim, a teaching assistant in linguistics, prefers to use the term African-American English because the term “Ebonics” narrows down this form of communication to simply a dialect. ... Ebonics is considered a separate language because it consists of all the aspects linguists use to categorize a language. ...
Ebonics evolved from a mixture of people who spoke different languages from the Afro-Asiatic family, such as Swahili and Wolof. ... Ebonics varies from standard English in its normal structure, being consonant-vowel-consonant-vowel, such as “mother” becoming “motha”. ...
Ebonics can be viewed as a continuum. ... Anyone on the bisalect level has a strong use of Ebonics. Those who use Ebonics frequently, but are able to convert to standard English, would be categorized as mesolect, and those who speak standard English often but can convert to Ebonics are categorized as acrolect. I would probably consider myself as an acrolect because I understand Ebonics and have actually been told that I change my voice when talking to black guys.
Oladele Omosegbon, a professor in Black American Studies, believes that the American society is missing the point of what Ebonics entails, and that society should be aware of the actual existence of and reason for the existence of Ebonics.
Approximate Word count = 1172
Approximate Pages = 4.7
(250 words per page double spaced)
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