Skin That We Speak

Lisa Delpit, a MacArthur Fellow, received the award for Outstanding Contribution to Education in 1993 from the Harvard Graduate School of Education, which hailed her as a “visionary scholar and woman of courage.” She is the author of Other People’s Children: Cultural Conflict in the Classroom (The New Press) and is currently the executive director for the Center for Urban Education and Innovation at Florida International University. Joanne Kilgour Dowdy is Associate Professor of Adolescent/Adult Literacy at Kent State University in the Department of Teaching, Leadership, and Curriculum Studies. She is the author of GED Stories: Black Women and Their Struggle for Social Equity.

• ContentsPreface viiLISA DELPITIntroduction xvLISA DELPITPart One: Language and IdentityC H A P T E R 1 Ovuh Dyuh 3JOANNE KILGOUR DOWDYC H A P T E R 2 Ebonics: A Case History 15ERNIE SMITHPart Two: Language in the ClassroomC H A P T E R 3 No Kinda Sense 31LISA DELPITC H A P T E R 4 Trilingualism 49JUDITH BAKERC H A P T E R 5 Some Basic Sociolinguistic Concepts 63MICHAEL STUBBSC H A P T E R 6 Language, Culture, and the Assessmentof African American Children 87ASA G. HILLIARD IIIC H A P T E R 7 I ain’t writin’ nuttin’: Permissions to Failand Demands to Succeed in Urban Classrooms 107GLORIA J. LADSON-BILLINGSC H A P T E R 8 “. . . As Soon As She Opened Her Mouth!”:Issues of Language, Literacy, and Power 121VICTORIA PURCELL-GATESPart Three: Teacher KnowledgeC H A P T E R 9 Topsy-Turvies: Teacher Talk and Student Talk 145HERBERT KOHLC H A P T E R 1 0 Toward a National Public Policy onLanguage 163GENEVA SMITHERMANC H A P T E R 1 1 The Clash of “Common Senses”: TwoAfrican American Women Become Teachers 179SHUAIB MEACHEMC H A P T E R 1 2 “We don’t talk right. You ask him.” 203JOAN WYNNEAppendix: Linguistic Society of America Resolution onthe Oakland “Ebonics” Issue 221

"Although these lucid, accessible pieces speak most directly to teachers and would be teachers . . . the issues are broad enough to attract more general readers, especially parents."—Publishers Weekly