Radicalism of reading

[davemarc]

> From: Greg Montalbano <Greg.Montalbano at ucop.edu>
> 
> >Joshua A Fruhlinger sez
> >
> >>Oh, sir, do not forget Ebonics, the language of the downtrodden and
those
> >>without educational 'tunities, in an endless search for political and
> >>social legitimacy, a march for lingual secession that no doubt makes
> >>Linguistics majors croak and moan in the name of structure.
> >
> >Actually, professional linguists have been making a considerable effort 
> >to educate foax like yourself, and get them to quit repeating this cheap

> >pop-political jive.
> >
> >
> >Cheers,
> >David
> 
> Not to reopen old wounds -- or threads (Ebonics: threat or menace?) --
> but the point of the exchange between me & Joshua was more in line with
the
> current "propaganda/lame media" thread:  the whole Ebonics embroglio
wasn't
> ABOUT Ebonics -- it was about the newsmedia purposely presenting the
subject
> in a false, inflammatory light to stir up as much controversy (& sell as
> many papers & as much commercial time) as possible.
> 
I concur with David C. though in milder tones.  I think the problem is
confusing the problem (poor, superficial coverage and understanding of
Ebonics) with the linguistic phenomenon of Ebonics.  "Ebonics" is a
horrible term, as far as I'm concerned, but it refers to an actual family
of languages that's as valid as any other in the English language and ought
to be recognized as such.

What does this have to do with TP?  Check out Vineland for pachuco dialect,
Valspeak, and Japanese English, as well as other forms that seem to be more
"mainstream."  And then, in Mason & Dixon, well...naah, don't want to make
this a spoiler message.

Anyway, I've spoken about Ebonics with a genius linguist who's married to
another genius linguist, and both of them only have a problem with how
linguists were virtually overlooked in the "debate" on the subject.  So
that proves everything.

davemarc