Arts & Entertainment
Books
‘Americanah’
by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
‘What the Word Be: Why Black English
Is the King’s (James) English’
by Diane Proctor Reeder
Book Review by
Kam Williams
W
hen most
people talk
about the
“King’s
English,”
they’re referring to a
very proper, aristo-
cratic
way
of
speaking in terms of
grammar and syntax.
That style is far afield from the uniquely
African-American phraseology also known as
Ebonics.
In fact, the pros and cons of teaching black
English has been the subject of debate in recent
years, with detractors arguing that it has no
place either in the classroom or in polite socie-
ty. Those naysayers might rethink that position
after perusing What the Word Be: Why Black
English Is the King’s (James) English.
For, according to its author, Diane Proctor
Reeder, the roots of Ebonics can readily be
found in the King James Bible, the text
employed by most slave masters to teach
Africans English. To prove her point, Ms.
Reeder simply quotes from scripture, such as
“Surely the people is grass,” which is found in
Isaiah 40:7.
The playwright/editor/businesswoman came
up with the idea for her opus after scouring the
Good Book front to back several times and
finding over 1,500 verses written in black Eng-
lish. Here, she carefully cites hundreds of those
examples from both the Old and New Testa-
ment, including Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers,
Job, Deuteronomy, Matthew, Mark, Luke and
John.
Who knew that the Bible is riddled with such
supposed mistakes as unmarked past and pres-
ent tenses, subject-verb disagreements, double
subjects, bizarre uses of the verb “to be,” pro-
noun insertions and absence of the copula?
Nevertheless, to this sister, there’s a method to
the madness, and what academics might deni-
grate as nails on the blackboard ghetto parlance
may now more accurately be appreciated as a
God-ordained vestige of slavery worth preserv-
ing. Reeder’s persuasive conclusion? “We
learned how to speak the way we do because
our ancestors learned to read with the King
James Bible as their primary text.” You be feel-
in’ her?
From the
award-win-
ning author of
“Half of a
Yellow Sun,”
a
dazzling
new novel: a
story of love
and race cen-
tered around a
young man
and woman
from Nigeria
who face difficult choices and chal-
lenges in the countries they come to call
home.
As teenagers in a Lagos secondary
school, Ifemelu and Obinze fall in love.
Their Nigeria is under military dictator-
ship, and people are leaving the country
if they can. Ifemelu—beautiful, self-
assured—departs for America to study.
She suffers defeats and triumphs, finds
and loses relationships and friendships,
all the while feeling the weight of
something she never thought of back
home: race. Obinze—the quiet,
thoughtful son of a professor—had
hoped to join her, but post-9/11 Ameri-
ca will not let him in, and he plunges
into a dangerous, undocumented life in
London.
Years later, Obinze is a wealthy man
in a newly democratic Nigeria, while
Ifemelu has achieved success as a
writer of an eye-opening blog about
race in America. But when Ifemelu
returns to Nigeria, and she and Obinze
reignite their shared passion—for their
homeland and for each other—they will
face the toughest decisions of
their lives.
Fearless, gripping, at once
darkly funny and tender, span-
ning three continents and
numerous lives, Americanah is
a richly told story set in today’s
globalized world: Chimaman-
da Ngozi Adichie’s most
powerful and astonishing novel
yet.
connects boys
with their new
counselor, a
v e t e r a n
schoolteacher.
Faced with
t h e i r
unquenchable
thirst for read-
ing to help
ease
the
unremitting
boredom of
everyday life,
“Mrs. Z”, now, “the book-lady,” gives
them the opportunity to share their
hopes, their disappointments, their dis-
illusionment and most of all, their anger
at a system that is crushing their spirit
and dreams for the future. What Freder-
ick Douglass advised us about
education rings true today—”It’s easier
to build strong children than repair bro-
ken men.” Tales of a Jailhouse
Librarian skillfully captures the sights,
sensations and rhythms of jail life.
Zeman mixes journalism, memoir and
character sketches with facts about the
juvenile justice system, describes the
various agencies, provides relevant sta-
tistics, and specific court cases that
become so palatable they are easily
digested. Never a “slog”. Interesting
and engaging. She makes a strong argu-
ment that these boys need education,
not jail time. “We have to recognize
that we have a very narrow window of
opportunity left to re-direct incarcerat-
ed youth toward education and living
productive lives. Jail isn’t always the
best solution. One million dollars
invested in incarceration reduces 350
crimes; one million dollars invested in
education reduces 600 crimes. It’s diffi-
cult to slap the word, criminal, onto a
juvenile—someone who is 16 or 17 or
18, someone who has the rest of their
lives ahead of them and is just as likely
as you or I were at that age to change.”
Not a screed or an expose. These are
real stories about real kids in prison,
stories so real and so raw they become
our own.
‘When I Say Jump’
by Gibran Tariq
After gradu-
ating at the top
of her law
class, Eliza-
beth Sellers is
ready to take
on and con-
quer the legal
world, but her
hopes quickly
fade
when
none of the
big Washing-
ton law firms
contact her. Discouraged, she returns
home to work in a local firm where her
first case might turn out to be her last.
When she is hired to take on the case
of four black toddlers injured at a day
care in Charlotte NC, she stumbles
upon a government conspiracy to
imprison one out of every four black
males born in this country. Both her life
and sanity are threatened, but the ulti-
mate question for her is simple: Are
black males worth saving?!
‘Tales of a Jailhouse
Librarian: Challenging
the Juvenile Justice Sys-
tem One Book at a Time’
by Marybeth Zeman
In a large suburban county
jail, a rolling library book cart
May 21, 2014 The Portland and Seattle Skanner Page 7