Ebonics in TV

[Francis M. Hult]

It does not address AA(V)E/Ebonics specifically but Schiffman's concept
of 'linguistic culture' may be of interest to your student, especially if the
project will involve a discussion of the intersection of language, society, and
policy (which, of course, was/is central to the ebonics debate).

Schiffman, H.F. (1996).  Linguistic Culture and Language Policy. Routledge.

Here is a short excerpt from
http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~haroldfs/540/summary.html :

"The main findings of this work are that language policy is primarily a social
construct, and as such rests primarily on other conceptual elements---belief
systems,
attitudes, myths, the whole complex that we are referring to as linguistic
culture. This also recognizes the role of language as the main vehicle for the
construction,
replication, and transmission of culture itself. And though language itself is
a cultural construct, this does not imply that it can be deconstructed,
changed, or radically
altered by the application of particular political scrutinies of one sort or
another. Language (and languages) mean different things to different people, and
policy-formulation is often vague and ill-defined. Perhaps the main
contribution of this book is to view language policy as not only the specific,
the overt, the explicit,
the de-jure embodiment of rules in laws or constitutions, but as a broader
entity, rooted in covert, implicit, grass- roots, unwritten, de facto practices
that go deep
into the culture."

Francis


Quoting "Patrick, Peter L" <patrickp at essex.ac.uk>:

>
> I received a query on the topic above, whcih I reproduce below,
> partly to suggest the level of interest of the person who asked me.
>
> I am also interested myself, however. It stands to reason that there
> must be such work out there somewhere, eg under cultural studies etc.,
> but whether there's any by linguists I don't know. I can't think of any
> offhand.
> It strikes me as a good way to get students thinking both about structural
> issues and about matters of representation, authenticity and identity,
> and relating them to modern historical changes in attitudes.
>
> Anybody know of any works? (I will pass them on to the inquirer too)
> thanks,
> 	-peter-
>
> I am currently taking a Linquistics class and part of our class project is
> an intensive research paper on Language. We can use any form of Language
> we wish for our research so I have chosen the topic of Ebonics.
> I just don't want to study Ebonics as a Language but Ebonics as a culture
> which it really is. So I was going to link the Ebonic language to the Tv
> Sitcom Show
> Sanford and Son. I wanted to show how Ebonics has been used in main stream
> television programs and how it continues to be used today. I was wondering if
>
> there is a link between Sanford and Son and the Social Linguistics within the
> show.
>
>
> Peter L Patrick
> Dept of Language and Linguistics
> University of Essex
> patrickp at essex.ac.uk
>
>