‘Black English’ Classes Won’t Get Federal Funds Administration Says Ebonics Is Slang, Doesn’t Belong In Classroom

The Clinton administration declared Tuesday that “Black English” is a form of slang that does not belong in the classroom, and ruled that school districts who recognize the idiom in their teaching cannot do so with federal funds targeted for bilingual education.

The Oakland, Calif., school board last week revived a long-brewing linguistic controversy with a unanimous vote declaring that Black English, also known as Ebonics, is not merely a dialect but a language, rooted in a distinct African-American culture.

Students who speak it, the board said, should not be criticized or harshly corrected but given special assistance learning standard English, in much the same way as a student who moved from Mexico and spoke only Spanish would receive training in English as a second language. Board members said Oakland would seek federal funds to help pay for its new program.

Education Secretary Richard W. Riley, however, killed that hope even before the Education Department received a funding request.

“Elevating ‘Black English’ to the status of a language is not the way to raise standards of achievement in our school and for our students,” Riley said in a one-paragraph statement. It concluded with the declaration, “The administration’s policy is that ‘Ebonics’ is a non-standard form of English and not a foreign language.”

Ebonics, according to its devotees, explains why some blacks speak using variations on the verb “to be” in ways at odds with spoken English.

The controversy has divided African-American leaders. Some have said that recognizing that black students speak differently is the first step toward increasing low scholastic achievement among black pupils.

But other African-Americans, including Jesse Jackson, said Ebonics would limit black students’ ability to compete for jobs.