<HTML><BODY style="word-wrap: break-word; -khtml-nbsp-mode: space; -khtml-line-break: after-white-space; ">This goes back -- in the linguistic literature -- at least to the 1960s with the work of Engelmann and Bereiter on the language of disadvantaged African-American children in preschool (?headstart) programs in Urbana IL -- as I recall, that report claimed that these four year olds came to school with no language at all, and it was what Labov was reacting against in "The Logic of Nonstandard English" and his 1966 report on language in the inner city.<DIV><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></DIV><DIV>Dennis<DIV><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></DIV><DIV><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></DIV><DIV><BR><DIV><DIV>On Jul 25, 2007, at 12:00 PM, Anthea Fraser Gupta wrote:</DIV><BR class="Apple-interchange-newline"> <DIV dir="ltr" align="left"><FONT face="Arial" color="#0000ff" size="2"><SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 14px"><FONT face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">On 7/25/07 12:19 PM, "Anthea Fraser Gupta" <<A href="mailto:A.F.Gupta@leeds.ac.uk">A.F.Gupta@leeds.ac.uk</A>> wrote:<BR><BR></FONT></SPAN> <BLOCKQUOTE><SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 14px"><FONT face="Arial">Can anyone explain why all this literature refers to 'language acquisition' <BR>and not to 'the learning of Standard English'? Using 'language acquisition <BR>makes it sound as if children are coming to school without any language!<BR></FONT><FONT face="Times New Roman"><BR></FONT></SPAN></BLOCKQUOTE><SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 14px"><SPAN class="078435916-25072007">Ron wrote "</SPAN>And that’s exactly what the dominant US folk ideology assumes about the <BR>language of African Americans.<SPAN class="078435916-25072007">"</SPAN><BR></SPAN></FONT></DIV> <DIV><SPAN class="078435916-25072007"><FONT face="Arial" color="#0000ff" size="2">Exactly -- is anyone challenging the terminology? </FONT></SPAN></DIV> <DIV><SPAN class="078435916-25072007"><FONT face="Arial" color="#0000ff" size="2"></FONT></SPAN> </DIV> <DIV><SPAN class="078435916-25072007"><FONT face="Arial" color="#0000ff" size="2">Anthea</FONT></SPAN></DIV><BR><P><FONT size="2">* * * * *<BR>Anthea Fraser Gupta (Dr)<BR>School of English, University of Leeds, LS2 9JT <<A href="http://www.leeds.ac.uk/english/staff/afg">www.leeds.ac.uk/english/staff/afg</A>><BR>NB: Reply to <A href="mailto:a.f.gupta@leeds.ac.uk">a.f.gupta@leeds.ac.uk</A><BR>* * * * *<BR> </FONT> </P> <DIV> </DIV><BR> <BLOCKQUOTE style="PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT: #0000ff 2px solid; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px"> <DIV class="OutlookMessageHeader" lang="en-us" dir="ltr" align="left"> <HR tabindex="-1"> <FONT face="Tahoma" size="2"><B>From:</B> owner-lgpolicy-list@ccat.sas.upenn.edu [<A href="mailto:owner-lgpolicy-list@ccat.sas.upenn.edu">mailto:owner-lgpolicy-list@ccat.sas.upenn.edu</A>] <B>On Behalf Of </B>Ronald Kephart<BR><B>Sent:</B> 25 July 2007 17:22<BR><B>To:</B> <A href="mailto:lgpolicy-list@ccat.sas.upenn.edu">lgpolicy-list@ccat.sas.upenn.edu</A><BR><B>Subject:</B> Re: Ebonics: The Subject Still Stirs Strong Feelings<BR></FONT><BR></DIV> <DIV></DIV><SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 14px"><FONT face="Arial"><BR>Ron<BR><BR></FONT></SPAN></BLOCKQUOTE><FONT face="Arial"></FONT></DIV><BR></DIV></DIV></BODY></HTML>