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THE REAL EBONICS DEBATE:
POWER, LANGUAGE,
AND THE EDUCATION
OF AFRICAN-AMERICAN CHILDREN
Edited by Theresa Perry & Lisa Delpit Boston, MA: Beacon Press. 1998.
ISBN. 0-80703145-3. $12. 00. -Reviewed by Peggy J. Anderson
Since December of 1996, when the Oakland (CA) school board unanimously passed the Ebonics resolution requiring all schools in the district to participate in the Standard English Proficiency (SEP) program, the Ebonics debate has been addressed by many prominent Americans, both Black and White, who seldom find themselves on the same side of an issue: President Clinton, Jesse Jackson, Maya Angelou, William Bennett, Goerge Will, Kwesi Mfume, Rush Limbaugh, Pete Wilson.
All of these individuals, some of whom speak Ebonics eloquently themselves, were either ambivalent toward or totally rejected the Oakland proposal. How could this be? For the answer to this and other perplexing issues related to whether teachers should use the language variety their students speak as a bridge to teaching them standard English, The Real Ebonics Debate is the place to go. This book cuts to the heart of how America educates its children, especially its children of African heritage. Those who are familiar with Rethinking Schools (RS), a collaborator in the writing of this book, will appreciate its quality and clear targeting of the issues.
Americans of European descent have come to recognize that many Americans of African descent have not melted into the great melting pot as they might have predicted. Instead, cultural and linguistic patterns remain in tact. Most...