| The term "Ebonics," which is a fusion of the words "ebony" and "phonics," also called a Portmanteau, received national attention in the U.S. in 1966 when the Oakland School Board in California made the decision to recognize Ebonics as an official dialect of African American children who were attending school there and to educate teachers in its use; later on a newly elected school board modified then dropped the resolution entirely. Today, Ebonics is more commonly referred to as African American Vernacular English, AAVE, and the discussion as to whether Ebonics should be officially recognized as a "language" of African Americans is on going. John Rickford, the Martin Luther King, Jr. Centennial Professor at Stanford University's Department of Linguistics, and author of Spoken Soul: The Story of Black English, clarifies the issues surrounding the Ebonics controversy; he also advocates the method of studying language, called "contrastive analysis," which involves drawing a student's attention to similarities and differences between Ebonics and Standard English. 08DR/CL SCA 30 min. |
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"Eliazabeth Tallent is one of our most penetrating and perceptive specialists in the domestic emotions. The tenderness and the frequent redeeming note that comes at the end of her stories seem like a gamble until you realize that they are not arbitrary, that she has made a kind of miracle in the redemption." -Richard Eder, Los Angeles Times Pulitzer Prize. Nobel Prize. National Book Award. Newbery Medal. Those are just a few of the accolades bestowed on writers whose works make it to the top. But, of course, good writing doesn't just happen. Any accomplished writer understands the challenges it takes to get all those thoughts down on paper. And for anyone interested in writing, it always helps to hear about writing from someone who's been there. This classic program presents novelist and short story writer Elizabeth Tallent, a professor of English and the Director of Stanford University's Creative Writing Program, who is the author of a novel, Museum Pieces, and three collections of short stories: In Constant Flight, Time With Children, and Honey; here she talks about whether and how writing can be taught, from short stories to novels. 08DR/CL SCA 30 min. |