Blacks want a "place at the table".

[IceJad]

Black culture could be defined in many ways. As for music, rap is one of their genres. Then there are the hairstyles such as dreadlocks that seem to be related to their culture. Their language, while english in general, tends to be distinct, and has even been given the name, "ebonics".

Music and hairstyle are part of forming a culture but they alone cannot make a culture.

I would hardly call ebonic a language. If ebonic is a distinct version of English then Manglish (Malaysian broken English) and Singlish (Singaporean broken English) should be considered languages. In reality ebonic, manglish and singlish are improper English. To be a language there must be proper and uniform grammatical syntax, spelling and punctuation. While I enjoy watching Mr.T say "I pity da fool" and "Sucka", it is not proper English.

I'm sure I'll now be labeled as being racist for even writing any of this.

Not in my books. Explaining something or giving your opinion will never constitute being racist for me. But then I'm not known to take my racial qualities very seriously. You can call that a chink in my armour.

 

[Occams Barber]

I would hardly call ebonic a language. If ebonic is a distinct version of English then Manglish (Malaysian broken English) and Singlish (Singaporean broken English) should be considered languages. In reality ebonic, manglish and singlish are improper English. To be a language there must be proper and uniform grammatical syntax, spelling and punctuation. While I enjoy watching Mr.T say "I pity da fool" and "Sucka", it is not proper English.

Both Manglish and Singlish are recognised forms of vernacular English. Both fall under the general category of a "creole". A 'creole' is a form of language which develops at the margins where two or more languages meet (typically conqueror and conquered). It begins as a very basic 'pidgin'; a grammatically simplified form used for basic communications. Over generations it evolves into an almost discrete language. You are confusing 'improper' English with 'formal' or 'standard' English. Both Manglish and Singlish are vernacular forms of English. Both have a standard grammatical form. The development of spelling and punctuation rules depend on the extent to which the creole is represented in written communication. Creoles tend to be used informally. There is also a tendency to look down on creole speakers as linguistically and socially inferior.

Ebonics or, more correctly, African American Vernacular English (AAVE) , has similar origins in a pidgin/creole which developed as a common means of communication between disparate linguistic groups imported for the slave trade. It is a vernacular (common) form which borders on a separate language. Like all languages it has developed and changed over time. Linguistic borders can be extremely fuzzy.

All three variants are considered to be 'proper' (if informal) English.

For a similar creole development look to English. Following the Norman invasion in 1066 there was a need for Old French speaking invaders and Old English (or Anglo-Saxon) speaking natives to communicate. This led to a pidgin which became a creole which you now see as 'proper' English. Spelling, punctuation and (some ) grammatical rules did not develop until the introduction of the printing press some centuries later.

OB

 

[Nithavela]

To be a language there must be proper and uniform grammatical syntax, spelling and punctuation.

Citation please.

 

[IceJad]

Both Manglish and Singlish are vernacular forms of English. Both have a standard grammatical form.

I hear Manglish everyday and to some extent Singlish. And at times I myself indulge in some Manglish. I can personally tell you that there are no stndard grammatical form of it.

You can throw subject, and verb all over the sentence. You're over analysing what we local call Bahasa Rojak. Let me give you some examples.

1. "Want to go football or not?"
2. "Football want to go or not ar?
3. "What you want? Don't kacau me lar"
4. "Like this can meh? Sure wrong one lar"

Syntax and grammar? Well good luck explaining it to me. Because to us there is no grammar just put some words together as long as the listener can understand that's it. Mix Malay, Hokkien, Cantonese, Tamil and English. There is a different word from borrowed from different local language for the same subject.

 

[Occams Barber]

I hear Manglish everyday and to some extent Singlish. And at times I myself indulge in some Manglish. I can personally tell you that there are no stndard grammatical form of it.

You can throw subject, and verb all over the sentence. You're over analysing what we local call Bahasa Rojak. Let me give you some examples.

1. "Want to go football or not?"
2. "Football want to go or not ar?
3. "What you want? Don't kacau me lar"
4. "Like this can meh? Sure wrong one lar"

Syntax and grammar? Well good luck explaining it to me. Because to us there is no grammar just put some words together as long as the listener can understand that's it. Mix Malay, Hokkien, Cantonese, Tamil and English. There is a different word from borrowed from different local language for the same subject.

The key is "the listener can understand it". Different forms will be dependent on the local language mix and the language mix will vary. Underlying rules may be borrowed from English or other contributing languages. There may be sub-vernaculars depending on the local language mix. The fact that you can indulge in some Manglish says that there is something standard which identifies Manglish from other languages; in other words, there are certain Manglish rules. Basically you are seeing the process of language development before your eyes.

Take English - a settled language - yes?. Contrast a Glaswegian worker with a farmer from the Yorkshire moors with someone from Dorset or compare a Cockney with a Southern American with an Australian or a South African....

English varies - accept it. What you see as 'proper' English happens to be the dialect spoken in the general area of London and the South East when Caxton started publishing and had to make some difficult decisions. All languages, including vernacular variants, come with implicit rules. If these rules did not exist you would not see the language as distinctive.

OB

 

[IceJad]

Take English - a settled language - yes?. Contrast a Glaswegian worker with a farmer from the Yorkshire moors with someone from Dorset or compare a Cockney with a Southern American with an Australian or a South African....

English varies - accept it. What you see as 'proper' English happens to be the dialect spoken in the general area of London and the Midlands when Caxton started publishing and had to make some difficult decisions. All languages, including vernacular variants, come with implicit rules. If these rules did not exist you would not see the language as distinctive.

OB

Here is where I don't agree with you. Whether you're from American, Cockney or Aussie the syntax of their English sentence is pretty much the same. Take for example

British English: I'm not afraid of any axe wielding grey bandit

American English : I'm not afraid of any ax wielding gray bandit

You know that each word in the sentence is correctly placed. You may pronounce them differently with an accent but grammatically they are the same.

Manglish on the other hand will come up with something like this.

"I no scared of some grey punya axe bandit."

Manglish will not over time develop into a separate distinct language on its own. Because every Malaysian know it is broken English. Manglish - Mangled English. The name should tell you what it is. Every Malaysian know to a certain extent what proper English sentence sounds like. We were once British subjects.

The only rule to Manglish is that there is no rule. Then how we know it is Manglish and not Ebonics? Simple the intonation, choice of words and the amount of loan words from our three main races.

No Malaysian will ever say Manglish is my culture. We have our own proper language to represent us. Malay as the national language and also the mother tongue of the Malays, Mandarin/Cantonese/Hakka/Hokkien for the Chinese and Tamil/Hindi for the Indians. Of course there are many other minority with their own languages. English is our second language and also our business language.

 

[Junia]

For that to happen needs an overhaul of the system. Because without interference means they can be who they are without facing prejudice.

Being who they are doesn't necessarily mean breaking the law. Blacks have a distinct culture which should be encouraged, cultivated, instead of being discriminated if they don't act and dress like whites.

Yes

 

[iluvatar5150]

Smith was not British. He was Rhodesian.

Smith who? You mean Scott? I didn’t say he was British; I said he was white.

It was the pre-independence prime ministers who were British.

And it is now Zimbabwe, not Zambia.

Northern Rhodesia became Zambia.

I worked with a white Zimbabwean for a while. He'd left because life had become impossible. Mugabe was sending his thugs to murder white farmers. This "paragon of black virtue" sent the nation into a hell hole. Africa should be one of the richest nations on the planet. It has all the natural resources anyone could want. But the noble black leaders are far more interested in filling up their bank accounts than enabling their people to prosper. Ooooooh... am I being prejudiced? Only if you reject the facts.

This phenomenon happens frequently enough that it has a name.

Resource curse - Wikipedia

 

[Ken-1122]

Africa should be one of the richest nations on the planet. It has all the natural resources anyone could want.

In a modern world, the abundant of natural resources has little to do with the wealth of a country.

 

[iluvatar5150]

In a modern world, the abundant of natural resources has little to do with the wealth of a country.

eh.... Natural resources are certainly no guarantee of wealth, but they can be a significant factor. Natural resources are why the Arab gulf states are fabulously wealthy. They're part of why Norway is doing so well. They're part of why the US and Canada have done so well. They're why Venezuela was doing well. They've helped Russia and China, too.

 

[Aldebaran]

Music and hairstyle are part of forming a culture but they alone cannot make a culture.

I would hardly call ebonic a language. If ebonic is a distinct version of English then Manglish (Malaysian broken English) and Singlish (Singaporean broken English) should be considered languages. In reality ebonic, manglish and singlish are improper English. To be a language there must be proper and uniform grammatical syntax, spelling and punctuation. While I enjoy watching Mr.T say "I pity da fool" and "Sucka", it is not proper English.

I get amused as well when I hear people of his color say things like, "whashoo be tawkin 'bout, mang? Ah deent do nuffin!" Not proper English by any means, but I've been accused of racism for even pointing it out. I'll be told that I'm trying to make them sound unintelligent. However, I think they're doing that to themselves when they actually talk that way on a regular basis.

Not in my books. Explaining something or giving your opinion will never constitute being racist for me. But then I'm not known to take my racial qualities very seriously. You can call that a chink in my armour.

Well, here in America, people too often use the word "racist" if someone says something about race that someone else doesn't like, even if it's true. It seems to apply exclusively to caucasians for some reason.

 

[Aldebaran]

In a modern world, the abundant of natural resources has little to do with the wealth of a country.

It depends on how, or if, they're used. There are places that are poor, but mining exploration sometimes reveals that those places have rich deposits of minerals that could be mined. But if the inhabitants of those places aren't aware of it or don't have the means of mining them, then it's no different than owning an acre of land sitting on top of an oil deposit that you aren't aware of and don't know how to drill for.

 

[Ken-1122]

It depends on how, or if, they're used. There are places that are poor, but mining exploration sometimes reveals that those places have rich deposits of minerals that could be mined. But if the inhabitants of those places aren't aware of it or don't have the means of mining them, then it's no different than owning an acre of land sitting on top of an oil deposit that you aren't aware of and don't know how to drill for.

So are you agreeing with me?

 

[Ken-1122]

eh.... Natural resources are certainly no guarantee of wealth, but they can be a significant factor. Natural resources are why the Arab gulf states are fabulously wealthy. They're part of why Norway is doing so well. They're part of why the US and Canada have done so well. They're why Venezuela was doing well. They've helped Russia and China, too.

What about Japan? They have few natural resources yet they are one of the richest nations on Earth. How'd they do that?

 

[BNR32FAN]

What would they talk about that would be different from what they're talking about now? And would they accuse others of racism if anyone questioned or disagreed with what they would be demanding?

You can’t answer these questions based on a person’s color. That’s the very root of racism itself. You’d have completely different situation with different individuals.

 

[iluvatar5150]

What about Japan? They have few natural resources yet they are one of the richest nations on Earth. How'd they do that?

What about Japan? I never claimed there was a 1:1 correlation between resources and wealth, so I don't know how this is a rebuttal to what I said.

 

[Occams Barber]

Here is where I don't agree with you. Whether you're from American, Cockney or Aussie the syntax of their English sentence is pretty much the same. Take for example

British English: I'm not afraid of any axe wielding grey bandit

American English : I'm not afraid of any ax wielding gray bandit

You know that each word in the sentence is correctly placed. You may pronounce them differently with an accent but grammatically they are the same.

Manglish on the other hand will come up with something like this.

"I no scared of some grey punya axe bandit."

Since Manglish isn't English (its based on English) why are you surprised that the Manglish equivalent of a British sentence is a bit different? Even with this difference it's still intelligible to a native English speaker and probably more intelligible than a similar sentence spoken with a Glaswegian brogue. Note that 'no' is a normal Scots variant on 'not', 'scared' and 'afraid' share the same meaning and 'grey' and 'axe wielding' are reversible in 'standard English. The only odd word is 'punya - presumably a Malay term denoting possession (of the axe).

In any case, since Manglish isn't English, words don't necessarily need to be 'correctly placed' to determine meaning. Inflection and intonation rules can both be used as an alternative to word order. Old English had a fairly arbitrary word order, but who did what to who was determined by inflection (variable word endings - think of verb conjugation).


In any case we're way off topic. This (below) is an extract from an article on the American Linguistic Society web page. Note that it points out that AAVE ('Ebonics') has regular rules governing its grammar. That these rules may differ from standard English grammatical rules doesn't make it gibberish. It simply makes it one of the many legitimate variants on standard English. Even the Queen speaks in a dialect of English. A major difference between AAVE and the Queen's English is its social standing. Language elitism is a common form of prejudice.

What does Ebonics look like?
These distinctive Ebonics pronunciations are all systematic, the result of regular rules and restrictions; they are not random 'error'--and this is equally true of Ebonics grammar. For instance, Ebonics speakers regularly produce sentences without present tense is and are, as in "John trippin" or "They allright". But they don't omit present tense am. Instead of the ungrammatical *"Ah walkin", Ebonics speakers would say *"Ahm walkin." Likewise, they do not omit is and are if they come at the end of a sentence--"That's what he/they" is ungrammatical. Many members of the public seem to have heard, too, that Ebonics speakers use an 'invariant' be in their speech (as in "They be goin to school every day"); however, this be is not simply equivalent to is or are. Invariant be refers to actions that occur regularly or habitually rather than on just one occasion.
What is Ebonics (African American English)? | Linguistic Society of America​

 

[Occams Barber]

I get amused as well when I hear people of his color say things like, "whashoo be tawkin 'bout, mang? Ah deent do nuffin!" Not proper English by any means, but I've been accused of racism for even pointing it out. I'll be told that I'm trying to make them sound unintelligent. However, I think they're doing that to themselves when they actually talk that way on a regular basis.

Based on what you've written here I think you could be accused of language elitism, however I suspect that your comments have more to do with misunderstanding the legitimacy of 'Ebonics' and other variants of 'standard' English. (is there an evolving "Wisconsinese" dialect?)


This is a repeat of my earlier response to Icejad who has views similar to yours. - OB

This (below) is an extract from an article on the American Linguistic Society web page. Note that it points out that AAVE ('Ebonics') has regular rules governing its grammar. That these rules may differ from standard English grammatical rules doesn't make it gibberish. It simply makes it one of the many legitimate variants on standard English. Even the Queen speaks in a dialect of English. A major difference between AAVE and the Queen's English is its social standing. Language elitism is a common form of prejudice.
What does Ebonics look like?
These distinctive Ebonics pronunciations are all systematic, the result of regular rules and restrictions; they are not random 'error'--and this is equally true of Ebonics grammar. For instance, Ebonics speakers regularly produce sentences without present tense is and are, as in "John trippin" or "They allright". But they don't omit present tense am. Instead of the ungrammatical *"Ah walkin", Ebonics speakers would say *"Ahm walkin." Likewise, they do not omit is and are if they come at the end of a sentence--"That's what he/they" is ungrammatical. Many members of the public seem to have heard, too, that Ebonics speakers use an 'invariant' be in their speech (as in "They be goin to school every day"); however, this be is not simply equivalent to is or are. Invariant be refers to actions that occur regularly or habitually rather than on just one occasion.

What is Ebonics (African American English)? | Linguistic Society of AmericaWhat is Ebonics (African American English)? | Linguistic Society of America​

 

[Ken-1122]

What about Japan? I never claimed there was a 1:1 correlation between resources and wealth, so I don't know how this is a rebuttal to what I said.

I said natural resources has little to do with the wealth of a nation. You seemed to disagree. Other than a few oil rich nations in the middle east, most wealthy countries seemed to get the major part of their wealth from modern ideas and technology

 

[Ken-1122]

Africa should be one of the richest nations on the planet.

Africa is not a nation; it is a continent with approx 50 separate nations.