Chapter 3: No Kinda Sense

In this chapter, Lisa Delpit describes how her daughter's experience at school gave her insight into what could be done in American schools for students who do not speak Standard English (SE).  Her premise is that schools need to be more welcoming to what children do bring to the classroom and honor the places from which they come.

Delpit begins with a description of  how her eleven-year-old daughter came home from school and stated "She be all like, 'What ch'all talkin' 'bout?' like she ain't had no kinda sense." The use of Non Standard English--Ebonics--seemed to catch Delpit off guard.  She relates her personal memories and how they conflicted with the feelings she had at that moment. She describes discussions with family members about the use of SE, from her mother stating to her when she was ten-years-old, "Lisa, would you please speak correctly? Don't sound so ignorant!" to arguing with her sister, an English teacher, "...which would you rather your child be able to say, 'I be rich' or 'I am poor'?  My sister's response, with no hesitation: 'I am poor!' " (p. 33)  Delpit found herself chastising her daughter's use of Ebonics. Maya, her daughter, then restated the phrase, "...enunciating with exaggerated, overly precise diction, 'She said, 'What are you people speaking about,' as if she didn't have any sense.'" (p.33) Delpit ponders why she had such a strong reaction. 

Her daughter had been brought up in a middle-class African American family and, up until the middle of her fifth grade year, Maya had attended a predominately White private school.  She began to make statements such as "Maybe if I were prettier I'd have more friends."  And when Maya asked her mother if she could have plastic surgery to make her lips smaller, Delpit knew she had to act.  She chose to transfer Maya to a charter school where 98 percent of the students were African American. This transfer helped Maya regain self-confidence and esteem.  She was accepted by her new classmates and was more like her old self.  "But she also acquired new speech codes." (p. 34) Delpit relates how she was in awe at how quickly her daughter picked up these new speech codes and adapt to new circumstances, but also was unsure of what it all might mean.

Delpit began to wonder why she had such a strong reaction to Maya's words and then she thought about how easily her daughter acquired a new language that was not her home language, and what that might mean for African American children whose home language is not that of the school.  She decided that if we (teachers and the school community) accept students for who they are and what they bring to the classroom--language, culture and all, students will be more attuned to "building knowledge of 'standard English' " (p. 35).

Using the backdrop of the policy on Ebonics presented in the Oakland, California schools in the late 90's, Delpit argues that many people did not get it when the school board proposed that Ebonics be recognized as a language. The media and prominent African American leaders felt this proposal was a step backward for African American students.  Delpit admits there was a reason to be concerned, based on centuries of struggle of Black people, not only over language, but pretty much every thing else in society. However, the Oakland school board's policy was for teachers to be aware of what the African American students were bringing to the classroom and to use that as a starting point to teach SE. Delpit sites the work of Stephen D. Krashen and his "affective filter" as a explanation for students' obstacles in developing SE.  "The filter operates 'when affective conditions are not optimal, when the student is not motivated, does not identify with the speakers of the second language, or is overanxious about his performance,...[creating] a mental block...[which] will prevent the input from reaching those parts of the brain responsible for language acquisition.' " (p. 40)  If educators of students who speak Ebonics had a better idea of the roots of Black English, they may be able to remove some of the obstacles for students.  For teachers to "understand that Ebonics was rule-based, just like standard dialect, and that those rules had an historic basis in West African languages," (p. 42) could be a step for teachers to come closer to recognizing what their students may need.  Delpit suggests that schools change their form of classroom instruction, beginning with learning more about from where students function outside of the school environment.

In a description of how classroom instruction can change reminiscent of the work that Gibbons (2008) did in New South Wales, Delpit describes a project-based unit of culturally appropriate study where students' interests and core content can easily provide integrated instruction.  She describes the practice of hair braiding as a starting point for everything from historical significance (social studies) to symmetry (math) to interviewing people who braid hair (literacy) to even studying the chemical components of hair products (science). A unit such as this would recognize students and the use and instruction in SE could be incorporated and an obstacle removed from learning and using SE.

Delpit recognizes that one integrated unit will not change the world. She does make the argument that society needs to value contributions from cultures that are not part of dominate traditions.  "When we know the real history of Africa--the Egyptian wonders of technology and mathematics, the astronomical genius of the Mali Dogon, the libraries of Timbuktu--then we can teacher our children that if they do not feel they are brilliant, then it is only because they do not know whence they came." (p. 46)  She goes on to summarize her position--"When they [students] recognize that we believe in them, then they come to trust us, to accept us, to identify with us and to emulate us.  They will come, as Maya came, to adopt aspects of who we are, including our language.  If we were to put all of these classroom techniques to work, we would create schools in which children would more readily learn the standard dialect." (pp. 46-47)


In this essay, I can find so many arguments for supporting any student who is a second language/dialect learner.  The main obstacle for teachers would be when do you find the time to learn about students' cultural backgrounds--and what do you do when you have a multitude of cultural backgrounds in one class?  That makes me think of the "separate but equal" position--and it makes me cringe. Do we separate out the students who are L2 learners?  What about the students who already function using the dominate language?  What would they be missing if not given the opportunity to learn about cultures other than their own? There is such a mind-set that we have to ultimately have to get students to come to a collective unified understanding of the world.  I don't know what the answers are......