from implementing language curriculum based on Ebonics.
Florida Times-Union, 1/27/1997.
2. Arsenio Hall be no fan of Ebonics. “Malcolm X didn’t need it.
Martin Luther King didn’t need it. Maya Angelou didn’t need
it. It’s absurd. Absurd. I think it creates awful self-esteem in
black kids to tell them they need something extra that other
Americans don’t need. It sends out an awful signal.” Austin
American-Statesman, 2/2/1997.
3. St. Louis Superintendent Cleveland Hammonds says city
schools won’t sanction Ebonics as a separate language. St.
Louis Post-Dispatch (Missouri), 12/27/1996.
4. Treating black students who say “He bin” instead of “He has
been” like foreign language students is no way to raise
academic standards in American classrooms, says Education
Secretary Richard Riley. Associated Press, 12/14/1996.
5. At a ceremony for the Congressional Black Caucus this week,
[actor Bill] Cosby said: “I didn’t hear any ignoromics spoken
this morning. There are more than 100 people and nobody said
‘liberry.’ Nobody said, ‘We bein’ here.’” St. Louis Post-
Dispatch, 1/9/1997.
6. The Philadelphia school board president, a board member and
the deputy superintendent yesterday said there was no way
their schools would recognize “slang” as a second language.
The Philadelphia Daily News, 12/21/1996.
7. Aisha Blackshire-Belay, chair of African Studies at Indiana
State University and a linguist specializing in black English,
expressed serious reservations about Oakland’s decision
Wednesday to incorporate “Ebonics” into English teaching.
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 12/22/1996.
8. Forget Ebonics – it’s an insult, Emerge editor tells NSU group
... “To me, it’s an insult,” said Curry, editor-in-chief of
Emerge magazine. “You’re saying we can’t teach our kids, and
I disagree with that.” The Virginian-Pilot (Norfolk, VA),
2/5/1997.A person or group standing at the epicenter of a growing moral panic
is held up for criticism and its defenders or representatives become