Two UMass scholars focus
on the ways in which children learn and use language.
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f
you say "to-MAY-to" and I say "to-MAH-to,"
or if I say "EE- ther"and you say "EYE-ther,"
we can share a laugh and harmonize in a light-hearted ditty
about our linguistic differences. But if you say "He plays
basketball" and I say "He be playin' basketball,"
suddenly it's a whole different story.
Of all today's language-related controversies, from hate speech
codes to "English only" laws, none sparks more impassioned
debate than the issue of Black English. Also known as African-American
English or Ebonics, the English spoken in millions of black
homes from coast to coast is more than just another dialect
of the world's most widely spoken tongue, more than another
variation on the language of Mark Twain, Winston Churchill,
Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, and Crocodile Dundee. African-American
English is a political punching bag, the butt of a thousand
racist jokes, and the focus of fiery public policy disagreements
that often generate more rhetorical heat than educational light.
Fortunately, this variety of American English has also become
the subject of scholarly research that promises to pay dividends
in two important areas ? addressing the day-to-day learning
needs of black children in our nation's classrooms, and furthering
our theoretical understanding of the remarkable human ability
to use any language at all. |
In February, the National Institutes
of Health announced a $2.7 million grant to support the next
phase of an ongoing Black English research project headed
by two UMass scholars, communication disorders professor Harry
N. Seymour and linguistics professor Thomas Roeper. The Seymour-Roeper
research team, which includes numerous faculty members and
graduate students from both of their departments as well as
Smith College psychology professor Jill deVilliers, is focusing
on the subject to which both men have devoted their careers
? the ways in which children learn and use language.
Although the research agendas of the two team leaders dovetail
neatly in this project, they come to the work with different
scholarly concerns and different styles of thinking about
language. For one, the issues involved are theoretical; for
the other, intensely practical. One is concerned with teaching
people to speak correctly; the other concentrates on describing
how people's language works without reference to how it ought
to work. Together they hope they can help do away with some
of the stubbornly pervasive language attitudes that have distorted
public discourse about African-American English and limited
the educational opportunities available to many black children.
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