should I use Ebonics or not use Ebonics? – that question makes me cringe. A White author asking this should really take a look at their character and ask themselves, what do I know that will give life to this character of another race.

If they still want to do it, research. Listen in on conversations. Read books by Black authors. Ask around find out which non Black authors have created believable Black characters and read those , also read the Black characters by non Black authors people found unrealistic.

African American is a reading pet peeve of mine. I always find it a little too formal and stiff for fiction. Especially when another character is refered to as White not Caucasian

When non Black authors use African American as opposed to Black, I always assume they do it because they didn’t want to offend. And the PC ness of it does just that.

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I’m an African American dad & writer, and my advice to the writer is to skip the ebonics. Not every African American speaks with ebonics, and I fear it may come off as condescending and offensive if you attempt to tell your story in such a way. “Not black enough,” is offensive as hell, wether voiced by black or white people. The character is African American, there’s nothing wrong with him sounding like an American. Period.

And I could just as easily ask, “Why make a character white if the readership will never know it?” Or “Why make a character female if male is the default for most readers?”

Part of the point of emphasizing multicultural characters in fantasy and science fiction is because too often white IS thought of as the default, and we’re trying to change that.

without vocal cues in the dialog, it becomes really hard to indicate race, and that ultimately damages your message if race is a part of the concern. why make a character black if your readership will never know it?

Exactly. As a former military brat (multi-ethnic), I picked up various regional dialects, a bit of military speak, and speech patterns that my family used.

This is a great discussion. Thanks for posting the question!

I would be offended if your black character never talked about certain issues we face like the subtle racisim, especially as a black guy. But since’s science fiction it may never come up, although if it starts out in the 21st century in America then the character should acknowledge the fact that he gets looks of suspicion in certain areas because he is an African American guy.

Stacy’s advice was right on

That is so true about how people speak differently wiith different groups of people. When my mother is back home down South, she regains her Southern accent. My father speaks Spanish with his relatives. I use a lot more slang/Ebonics with my African American friends and Latino friends. So that is a key factor. Something an African American person has to learn to do is be able to “speak two languages” in a way. around white people and authority figures, most of us speak properly, no slang. But I know from what I’ve done myself and from what I’ve seen my parents and their friends do, when African Americans are just with each other, they loosen up and their is less of a concern for “speaking properly”

As a military brat, I pretty much lack an accent. People don’t place me as being from anywhere specific, except America.

Having said that, being in the military does not erase accents or patterns of speech from everyone. How a person’s core family unit speaks and how many years they spend living in a location are the primary influences on how they pronounce words.

IMO, your character needs to speak based on their influences, not on readers’ opinions of the world. Where do their parents come from? How do individuals from their parents’ backgrounds, childhood neighborhoods, and social class speak? How does that influence your character? Does your character have an opinion about how their parents speak and do they make conscious decisions about their own way of talking? How can you use the character’s voice and upbringing to flesh out the character better and further serve the plot of the novel?

Also question your motives for making a character the way they are. If you made them a military brat to avoid using a specific pattern of speech, that’s the foundation for a poorly-drawn, flat character. Being a military brat is a culture unto itself and your character needs to be one from the inside-out. Work your butt off to find several real-world military youth who fit your character’s ethnicity and cultural background and talk to them. Do interviews. Hang out with them. Read books of non-fiction, fiction, and poetry written by them. Research your character — that’s 3/4ths of writing them well and a crucial part of being a good writer.

The thing about a character not being “black enough” is that black is a false label that lumps diverse individuals into one, tiny box. “Black” is supposed to cover everything from the son of a Nigerain immigrant and a white woman who was raised in Hawaii to a girl raised by a Haitian aunt in the Bronx after her parents died in an earthquake to a rich girl raised in Texas by ranchers whose grandparents were Canadian. There are millions of vastly diverse individuals with thousands of cultural backgrounds and accents being lumped under the umbrella of “black” based solely on skin tone. If your friends think that all those people ought to speak one way, that’s their narrow life experience that’s being exposed, not any actual reality.

Make sure you know what background your character comes from and make sure you do the research necessary to flesh them out based on that background. That’s what matters — not what a couple of people who have a narrow definition for the tiny box of “black” think.