folk devils:
1. Oakland Schools Err with Ebonics Vote: THE OAKLAND
school board is doing its students a disservice by categorizing
“Ebonics” – also known as “black English” – as the primary
language of African American students. The San Francisco
Chronicle, 12/20/1996.
2. Social commentators of every hue, gender, national origin and
political persuasion, up to and including Maya Angelou, the
Rev. Jesse Jackson, Kweisi Mfume and Rush Limbaugh,
stopped just short of advocating that the members of the
Oakland school board be hind-quartered and lynched for
advancing such an outrageous policy. Pittsburgh Post-Gazette,
1/1/1997.
3. The Academic Fad that Gave Us Ebonics. Wall Street Journal,
1/22/1997. 4 The recent decision by the Oakland, Calif.,
School Board to teach Ebonics, or black English in its public
schools is at best misguided, and at worst a deliberate attempt
to re-segregate our American society by keeping blacks mired
in poverty and self-defeating behaviors. The Virginian-Pilot
(Norfolk, VA), 1/27/1997.
4. THE OAKLAND, Calif., school board, backpedaling furiously,
now has revised its ill-advised resolution of Dec. 18 on the
teaching of “Ebonics.” Good riddance to bad rubbish. The
original resolution was so poorly drafted that I am minded to
venture a suggestion: While Oakland is teaching English to its
children, let someone teach English to its school board. When
the uproar arose, the board insisted that it had no intention of
actually teaching Ebonics, or Black English, in the classroom.
The Augusta Chronicle, 1/25/1997.
5. Public school officials in Oakland, having declared that
African Americans speak a language distinct from English,
defended their plan to help failing black students, while
California’s schools chief Thursday questioned the wisdom of
the decision. San Jose Mercury News, 12/20/1996.
6. Schools to recognize black ‘Ebonics’ California district to use
dialect as a bridge to proper English ... The resolution has