So a southern accent sounds like ebonics?...may i axe you that?
The 1700's and 1800's slaves probably didn't speak in ebonics either.
din du nuffins?
Its extremely well documented in the history of English.
And its very common sense. Emotions aside, the region was flooded with non English speaking Africans, who had to learn commands from the whites.
A close interaction blended words and accents. The north didn’t experience this so much until much later.
A large number of West African words came into Standard American through the medium of Black English: bug (bugu = annoy), dig (degu/ understand), tote bag (tota = carry in Kikonga), hip (Wolof hepicat one who has his eyes wide open), voodoo (obosum, guardian spirit) mumbo jumbo (from name of a West African god), jazz (? Bantu from Arabic jazib one who allures), banjo (mbanza), chigger (jigger/ bloodsucking mite), goober (nguba /Bantu), okra (nkruman/ Bantu), yam (njami/ Senegal), banana (Wolof). Also, the phrases: sweet talking, every which way; to bad-mouth, high-five are from Black English—seem to be either American innovations or loan translations from West African languages.
The speech of African Americans gradually became more like the speech of their southern white neighbors—a process called decreolization. And the speech of the whites became slightly more like that of the blacks.