About three years ago I got a frantic call from a teacher in the upper Midwest asking for help. Her high school had banned her from teaching Huckleberry Finn to her upper-level English class because the book contained the “n-word”. She thought it was important to not only let the students read the book, but also to read that word, unexpurgated, in class (there were readings aloud). She was willing as well to have a discussion about the use of the word with the students, which I thought was good. Sadly, I couldn’t help her, for there’s not much someone like me can do on the high school level about such matters.
This kind of censorship has occurred with other works of literature as well, including To Kill a Mockingbird and the stories of Flannery O’Connor. Even historical documents get censored. In the two articles below by libertarian law scholar Eugene Volokh, he reports that his own school UCLA condemned a lecturer, W. Ajax Peris, for reading Martin Luther King’s “Letter From a Birmingham Jail” aloud. The essay is a classic of anti-racism literature, and an iconic document in the struggle for civil rights. It also contains the “n-word.” Peris’s crime was that he read that word aloud, quoting the text directly. (I’m referring, of course to the full word.)
King’s letter contains two mentions of the word; here’s one:
But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate filled policemen curse, kick and even kill your black brothers and sisters; when you see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six year old daughter why she can’t go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see ominous clouds of inferiority beginning to form in her little mental sky, and see her beginning to distort her personality by developing an unconscious bitterness toward white people; when you have to concoct an answer for a five year old son who is asking: “Daddy, why do white people treat colored people so mean?”; when you take a cross county drive and find it necessary to sleep night after night in the uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no motel will accept you; when you are humiliated day in and day out by nagging signs reading “white” and “colored”; when your first name becomes “nigger,” your middle name becomes “boy” (however old you are) and your last name becomes “John,” and your wife and mother are never given the respected title “Mrs.”; when you are harried by day and haunted by night by the fact that you are a Negro, living constantly at tiptoe stance, never quite knowing what to expect next, and are plagued with inner fears and outer resentments; when you are forever fighting a degenerating sense of “nobodiness”–then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait.
That’s eloquent, and the word serves a real purpose here—showing its hurtful use in oppressing and degrading black people. Frankly, I don’t see the use of glossing over it, or saying the “n word” in its place, for the “offense” of the word is no worse than the images it conjures up: beatings, lynchings, and cross-burnings. Nevertheless, Peris was reported to the University and condemned by his department. It’s not clear yet whether he’ll suffer further punishment. One thing is for sure, though: he’ll be ostracized.
This brings us to the crux of the matter: is it okay to use the n-word in full when you’re reading it in a historical or literary context? The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) says “yes”, arguing that the entire unredacted word has a didactic purpose, and prohibiting its utterance is an infringement of academic freedom:
Peris’s academic freedom, as a faculty member at a public institution bound by the First Amendment, includes the right to decide whether and how to confront or discuss difficult or offensive material, including historical readings that document our nation’s centuries-long history of racism,” Patton said. “Doing so does not amount to unlawful discrimination or harassment, and the law is abundantly clear that UCLA could not investigate or punish a professor for exercising his expressive or academic freedom.”
UCLA is, of course, a public university, and so the First Amendment applies, which allows the use of such a word, especially when it’s not a “fighting word”.
I think the same argument holds true for any historical document or work of literature, so long as it’s presented in a didactic and not disparaging way. Yes, some people may be offended, while others may feign offense (after all, the word is regularly used by blacks themselves, and is pervasive in rap music; the crime is that the word is uttered didactically by a non-black person—but one who is not trying to insult someone). Still, there are a lot of things that are offensive, but none so taboo as the n-word. As a Jew who’s been subjected to similar slurs, those involving epithets like “yid”, “kike”, “Hebe”, and so on, I have to say that I do find them offensive, and would be angry and upset if they were directed at me or other Jews (secular or not). But when they occur in law documents or literature, as they do in, say, The Catcher in the Rye, I find no problem with reading them, silently or aloud.
Why, though, shouldn’t professors redact the word to the shortened “n-word” version when teaching it? Well, think of how that would sound when reading King’s letter. And should you redact the letter itself, changing the text to read “when your first name becomes ‘n-word’ and your middle name becomes ‘boy’. . . . .?” It’s not the same, is it? King’s eloquent denunciation of black oppression is watered down.
In the piece below, Volokh describes how his dean at UCLA apologized (but Volokh did not) for Volokh’s quoting a law case when a man was prosecuted for “loud, abusive, or otherwise improper language” for saying “What, are you an idiot? What do I have to do, be a nigger to be served in this—in this place?” That’s directly from the law transcript. As Volokh and Harvard Law Professor Randall Kennedy emphasize in their longer piece below, the word “nigger” has been spelled out in full in literally thousands of court decisions, including those authored by the likes of Sonia Sotomayor, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Thurgood Marshall, Sandra Day O’Conner, Clarence Thomas and so on. They didn’t abbreviate the word because they insist on accuracy; and abbreviation not only broaches that accuracy, but distorts the offense.
Lawyers obey what Volokh call the “use-mention” distinction, which draws a bright line between using such a word as an insult, and referencing them in a didactic context, like court cases or teaching literature. As Volokh says in the article below:
Professors certainly shouldn’t use epithets, racial or otherwise, to themselves insult people. But when they are talking about what has been said, I think it’s important that they report it as it was said. This is often called the “use-mention distinction,” see, e.g., Randall Kennedy, How a Dispute Over the N-Word Became a Dispiriting Farce, Chron. Higher Ed., Feb. 8, 2019; John McWhorter, If President Obama Can Say It, You Can Too, Time, June 22, 2015 (distinguishing “using” from “referring to”).
Thus, when I have talked in my First Amendment Law class about Cohen v. California, I talked about Cohen’s “Fuck the Draft” jacket, not “F-word the Draft.” When I talked about Snyder v. Phelps, I talked about Phelps’ signs saying things like “God Hates Fags.” When I talked about Matal v. Tam, I talked about a trademark for a band called “The Slants,” which some view as a derogatory term for Asians. I suspect many, likely most, law professors do the same; they should certainly be allowed to. If I were to talk about the Redskins trademark case, I would say “Redskins,” rather than talk around the word, the way some news outlets apparently do.
What’s useful in Volokh’s piece above is his list of reasons why you shouldn’t abbreviate the n-word in a “mention” context. He gives five reasons. I won’t go into them all, but they include some of what I said above, as well as the “slippery slope” argument: once a word is made taboo, it makes it easier to make other words taboo, as each group demands that it gets the same consideration. This is not just a theoretical speculation: people have already been punished for using the term “Negro”, “wetback,” “bitch” and “fag.” And of course there are blasphemy considerations as well: many believers get deeply inflamed when someone in academic or intellectual discourse criticizes Islam or mocks the Prophet. Some of those people are even driven to murder! Nevertheless, I, at least, don’t favor a ban on such speech or images.
I recommend you go the article above and read Volokh’s arguments. They’re certainly worth considering.
After several experiences like this, and observing the censorship of those who use taboo words in the “mention” rather than “use” (derogatory) context, Volokh and his UCLA Academic Senate Committee on Academic Freedom created a statement prompted by Peris’s denunciation. It’s contained in the post below, or you can read it directly here. It allows instructors free rein to assign material that is potentially offensive, but also allows students the right to discuss that material, which is only fair. As Volokh says, “it’s not a binding university rule [JAC: it should be, as similar principles apply in my school], but we hope it will be influential.”
Finally we get to the document at the bottom (click on screenshot below the book) that really does make a compelling case for the “use/mention distinction”: a 32-page, heavily documented piece written by Volokh and Randall Kennedy. If you read Kennedy’s biography above, you’ll know he’s not only a black, liberal, anti-racist Harvard Law Professor specializing in race law and relations, but has no problem using the n-word in full. In fact, he wrote a book about it in 2003 (click below to go to its Amazon page). You can also see Randall Kennedy discussing the word’s use on a PBS video here.
The Washington Post published an excerpt from Chapter 1, which you can see here.
I read the entire 32-page document; it’s easier if you don’t delve deeply into the footnotes. Much of it is about the potentially detrimental effect of expurgating words on law students, but the overall argument is a general one for free speech and academic freedom.
In the end, I think I agree with Kennedy and Volokh: professors should be able to use any words in the “mention” context so long as they’re relevant, and students have the right to object or give counterarguments. And I have no problem with professors deciding to censor themselves: University of Chicago professor Geoff Stone stopped saying the whole n-word in his First Amendment law school class after the Association of Black Law Students objected. I wouldn’t fault him for that.
I won’t really have this dilemma, as I no longer teach, and, at any rate, none of my lectures come within miles of using potentially offensive words. But I believe that anybody who does so for good reason in the classroom (or in other didactic contexts) shouldn’t be censored, punished, or rebuked.
Since the mere mention of evolution offends the sensitivities of pious Christians, it would be best for
us all to just say “the E word” when this subject comes up in the classroom. Then, enthusiasts of the trans movement are deeply offended by the mention of X and Y chromosomes, so some shortcut usage will be required when mentioning chromosomes—perhaps just “the C word”.
It is simple to me: if you use a word with the intent of hurting someone, it is wrong. Otherwise it is not. End of discussion.
I think intention doesn’t quite capture it, as gratuitous and thoughtless use can cause offence. When white people use it to parrot gansta speech, that can come across badly, though that word is often written as “nigga”. A white person casually saying something like “nigga, please” will probably not be well received. That said, there will always be a context in which its use is acceptable. Its use in fiction coming out of the mouth of someone racist is acceptable because that’s the whole point. I can’t see how reading it aloud is any worse. Censoring the word would simply dull the force of it and water down the literary work. Similarly I would think that the reading out loud of a historical document to an audience of adults and young adults should nearly always be okay.
Stephen King is an example of an author who has been known to allow some of his characters to utter the word. The day that the pitch forks try to cancel Stephen King is the day we will have achieved peak wokeness.
I concur, littleboybrew. Knowing what hurts ?
ans: .easy.easy. to know.
When my first ( let alone, last ) name
was never, I mean .n e v e r.,
used by a lawfully wedded spouse and,
instead, appellations such as
Pussy, Cunt, Whore, Twat, Bitch,
Stupid Ass – Heifer and Crazy Bitch
were the names he, the bona fide Medical Doctor,
uttered in order to summon or to address me,
then I quite knew … … intent.
I soooo did .n o t. require
any Other ‘ to help ‘ me know … … that.
Its i n t e n t, let alone, the acknowledgement
that it should ‘ve long and long ago ceased,
should have, by him, by any Other, been ‘ censored, ‘
mattered NOT one whit … … to any one
o’multiple courtrooms’ family law / custody –
determining / mere handmaid – dissing / – hiding officials.
Such incited violence f r o m out of a spouse ?
hehhehheh: n e v e r, in ANY context
n o r for any intention, will it be censored.
Such domestic violence almost always goes
… …, by the ” laws ” Worldwide, especially,
… … unstopped.
Blue
” Woman Is The N Of The World ”
lyrics by Mr John Lennon, y1972
http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/johnlennon/womanistheniggeroftheworld.html
” Woman is the n of the world
Yes she is … … think about it
Woman is the n of the world
Think about it … … do something about it
We make her paint her face and dance
If she won’t be a slave, we say that she don’t love us
If she’s real, we say she’s trying to be a man
While putting her down we pretend that she is above us
Woman is the n of the world … … yes she is
If you don’t believe me take a look to the one you’re with
Woman is the slave of the slaves
Ah yeah … … better scream about it
We make her bear and raise our children
And then we leave her flat for being a fat old mother hen
We tell her home is the only place she should be
Then we complain that she’s too unworldly to be our friend
Woman is the n of the world … … yes she is
If you don’t believe me take a look to the one you’re with
Woman is the slave to the slaves
Yeah ( think about it )
We insult her everyday on TV
And wonder why she has no guts or confidence
When she’s young we kill her will to be free
While telling her not to be so smart
… … we put her down for being so dumb
Woman is the n of the world … … yes she is
If you don’t believe me take a look to the one you’re with
Woman is the slave to the slaves
Yes she is … … if you believe me,
you better scream about it
[ Repeat: ]
We make her paint her face and dance
We make her paint her face and dance
We make her paint her face and dance ”
Blue
Right on! It is actually a great song from the fantastic Sometime in NYC album. I was listening to it after many decades the other day and when that one came on I was quite startled to be reminded of it. I thought: “Oh wow. That’d NEVER fly today, John.” I was wondering how it was received in the early 70s when it came out.
It is like what Richard Dawkins says when he asserts that you can pretty much date a text to the decade by things like that.
There are a lot of good songs on that album, btw. Give it a listen.
D.A.
NYC
I agree. Although I would never use the word (thinks about using the word in this context, avoids using the word) in regular speech, I think we’ve made a mistake to privilege it as being un-utterable. I think educators should use the word when quoting course materials, and even in discussion. We’ve gotten past G– and d—, we shouldn’t begin printing new books to say n—–. I don’t think we should be making new blasphemies. We know that only people who aren’t liked are very prosecuted for them.
There’s a story in today’s NY Times about this issue, and the use of the story Fences in an English class. A Black student was expelled over the kerfuffle initiated by his mother: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/15/us/providence-day-school-fences-.html
With the word under discussion here, as really with any word, context and pretext matter. But, sadly, in the Flatland of our current, nuance-lacking political discourse, context and pretext seem to exist in the undetectable third dimension.
You ask me, footnotes are like interrupting an afternoon tryst in a second-floor bedroom to go downstairs to answer the front doorbell. They’re justifiable (hell, I’ve used ’em myself sometimes), but what they have to say damn well better be worth the effort.*
_______
*Especially if you’re not some David Foster Wallace-level genius.
Here’s where I think this comes from: like most liberals, I find the n-word so loaded that I’m extremely uncomfortable uttering it, or even writing it, in any context. So when you see a non-black person saying the word it triggers a reflexive aversion, and you question “Why is this person not uncomfortable saying it?” If you associate the word with racism, it is not a large leap to then associate the person comfortable using the word with racism. It’s a logical fallacy, of course, but logic carries little truck when visceral emotion is at play.
Personally, I have no issue with the use of the word in didactic contexts. I wonder, though, if the approbation would be lessened if, in quoting the text, the speaker interjected something like “– this word makes me very uncomfortable, but I’m directly quoting here –” prior to saying the word. I feel like people just want an assurance that the speaker knows this is a really offensive word. The drawback in the King context, though, is that it breaks up one of the greatest sentences ever written.
If I’m singing along to “Drop It Like It’s Hot,” I won’t censor myself, but will sing as Snoop intended the song to be sung (or rapped, or whatever).
According to popular media, black people use the word all the time. Is there any other word in the world that has such a sociological dichotomy? I can not think of even one other parallel.
Liberal?
I’m against any person or group owning a word. It should have never been allowed. It is analogous to the Muslim prohibition of images of Mohammed, though in that case they include themselves in the prohibition. I suspect the success of prohibiting the n-word has, in part, led to Critical Race Theory and the 1619 Project. They found that if they could make a word into a weapon, why not go the whole way?
I generally agree with what Jerry wrote, and I’m also sympathetic to your view Paul.
I can’t help but be uncomfortable both with ever thinking of uttering the N-word…and with the fact it’s now “the N-word.” That is, I’m uncomfortable with the amount of power people have given the word.
And it IS given. As some have said “Words are our slaves, not our masters” and “offense can never be given, only taken” etc.
Imagine a scenario with of a group of black people (esp young men) happily calling each other the N-word, but if a white person walks up and says, in just as friendly a tone “hey ma N-gas! the black people suddenly clutch their hearts, feel “unsafe” and great the incidence with opprobrium.
Exaggerated, maybe, but it captures a bit of the Monty-Pythonesque quality of the power of the N-word, and how diametrically different people can react to a word merely based on who utters the word. Happy buddy talk when one person uses it; outrage when someone with the wrong skin color uses it.
It’s not, of course, that there aren’t historical reasons that word has built up this cultural power! But the point I’m getting at is that I don’t see everyone as simply helplessly involved – we GIVE the word it’s power and the power can be taken back.
Black people did of course take some of the power back. Like gay people reclaiming words like “fag”
*some* black people have reclaimed the n-word and defanged it by using it amongst themselves.
But it strikes me as too bad that we haven’t gone all the way, that the 1/2 step forward of defanging the word among black people was undermined by giving the word ever MORE power to harm in the hands of a white person.
I’m echoing some of John McWhorter’s thoughts on this too, where as a black person he doesn’t view
cowering at the word as being at all empowering, just the opposite, and a sticks-and-stones approach seems to him the better way to remove power and currency of such words, as insults.
I’m fine with the word having the meaning it does. After all, all words have meanings. I’m also fine with the blowback one would get for using it to offend someone. As I said, I’m against a group owning a word: the word’s sole source of definition and controlling who gets to use it. I view it as a variety of Freedom of Speech. One should be free to use any word and suffer the consequences.
> Imagine a scenario with of a group of black people (esp young men) happily calling each other the N-word, but if a white person walks up and says, in just as friendly a tone “hey ma N-gas! the black people suddenly clutch their hearts, feel “unsafe” and great the incidence with opprobrium.
Alleging someone said the n-word is already a promising defense when accused of assault if you’re black. There are no bad consequences for lying about it. Public opinion will side with the attacker, even if he is is using the n-word to taunt his victim. This isn’t new, but was quite apparent in this year’s attack against a Macy’s employee: https://www.liveleak.com/view?t=uzKix_1593422604
There is no other group from which such behavior would be accepted. Not from Asians for mocking their eyes, not from gays receiving verbal abuse, not from Jews who face anti-semitic comments.
The stigma of n-word use by whites is a great asset for blacks. They would be truly harmed if the word somehow got extinct.
The offensive power of the word will never go away through its censorship. Quite the opposite, really. So those who want to ban its use, even when used in historical context, should consider what the long term goal should be.
I have long felt that the 1970s saw some progress in deflating the term, through its use in comedy in movies and even in television. Always used by some buffoon character who got their just deserts.
The word makes me sufficiently uncomfortable that I would avoid saying it in public, even if I am reciting King’s letter. I figure everyone can read it themselves. I agree that, perhaps, the offensive power of the word might be diminished by its proper, non-hostile usage in a historical context, but I don’t want to be the one saying it. I would not be offended if someone else said the word in an appropriate context, but I am not black.
Perhaps someone like Chis Rock could be persuaded to record King’s letter verbatim on youtube in support of Peris.
I’m always shocked when I hear a white person use it in a casual or confrontational context. I have no problem hearing it read as part of a work of literature or in any educational context, and I don’t think anyone should have the right to ban it.
In general I’m against any censorship, and don’t agree that there’s such a thing as hate speech. Exceptions being the usual legal restrictions on inciting violence or chaos, or libel.
When I was at high school we studied the novel ‘Nigger of the Narcissus’ by Joseph Conrad.
When I was a deck-hand on a trawler I wondered why the capstan wheel which hauled in the nets was known as the ‘nigger wheel’. The skipper wryly suggested that it was because it did all the hard work, which of course gave food for thought.
A favourite song is a Patti Smith song titled ‘Rock N Roll Nigger’. Before I decided to post here, I googled ‘patti smith lyrics rock n roll nigger’, and was suprised that the lyrics were not presented up front and centre. I finally found the lyrics by searching her discography, which brought to mind this dialogue from ‘Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy.’ Arthur Dent’s house is about to be demolished to allow the construction of a freeway bypass.
I googled ‘patti smith lyrics easter’, and ‘patti smith lyrics ghost dance’ and was presented with the lyrics at the top of the screen. Google is censoring Patti Smith because of a word.
I truly love the song. I truly love the lyrics.
I agree with littleboybrew -“… if you use a word with the intent of hurting someone, it is wrong. Otherwise it is not.”
Disagree and you’re a silly bunt.
My grandfather used to say the “n” word whenever he had the chance (or so it seemed to me). It made me uncomfortable, but I never called him out on it, even though as I got into my teens I wanted to. I don’t know how deep his bigotry infused his six kids, but they’re all Trump supporters, so there’s something. I see the word as dangerous when used in the way my grandfather used it- to demean and stereotype, but even so, it shouldn’t be banned or censored. I have no problem when the word is used in literary works written during a time and within a context where it is historically accurate.
With that being said, I really don’t have a good answer for how to handle people who are deeply disturbed when they hear or read the word. I hope the great majority of people can understand the context in which the word is used and not be offended. My hope may be wishful thinking.
Hell, it wasn’t all that long ago when there was that word-association sketch on SNL with Richard Pryor and Chevy Chase (well, OK, I guess it was 45yrs ago, fruit flies like a banana and all) and I’ve never heard any gasps over that.
That said, I have a black 30-something neighbor who runs a moving business and had a Sunday cookout in his back yard back around July with music piped up loud, and nearly all of it was Nigger Nigger Nigger. I was laying bricks out back with my mason, who is black, and he was getting uncomfortable, it was so gratuitous. But in the end it did lead to some interesting comments between the two of us. And this guy’s immediate neighbor is a black 90y/o lady in a wheelchair, who surely didn’t want to have to listen to that. I think her son must’ve had a talk with the guy since we haven’t heard it since.
But one of the things we talked about while it was going on, and since this is a mixed neighborhood and since little kids were running around, what do you do after you’ve taught your kid that he shouldn’t call anyone that, when he hears it blaring from next door?
I suppose it gets back to what (was it Dick Gregory?) said – it depends on how you say it, and that, like art, is hard to quantify.
Also, I recall that Pulp Fiction was laced with Nigger, to the point of being gratuitous. I got fed up with that while watching it, but nobody else seemed to mind.
How does it make sense to criminalize accurately quoting a book or what someone else has said? If some text within a larger body of text is in quotes, that means explicitly that the author of that larger text is not the author of the text in quotes, but has merely pointed to the fact that someone else wrote or said it. WTF???
This is part of the larger problem with Woke dogma: The demonizing of telling the truth about certain topics.
I do not think anything is being “criminalized.” That would violate the First Amendment. Demonizing is more accurate.
When I came to the US 25-ish years ago from Australia/Japan I got into a heap of trouble for using the “c word” – with women especially.
In the British commonwealth it is much more common, and less… electric than here. Often though, with my Crocodile Dundee accent I can get away with it or maybe its b/c I’m a just an obnoxious c*** myself and people have stopped caring about trying to domesticate me. hehehe
D.A., NYC
Never, according to a black American-born friend (though I’d say she is of mixed heritage). I think it is fair enough – for all I know she has suffered abuse, but from my point of view in context of historical works either fiction or historical narratives, we cannot escape it. I was shocked in reading Arthur C Clarke’s Childhood’s End when he used it, & says it was no longer – in that future – an insult. He was trying to show that racism would vanish, but I wonder if it is retained in modern editions as I read a very early edition.
If you were to say to her:
‘I agree, no one should ever use the word “nigger” ‘,
would that not
1/ be a kind of self-referential paradox–just did it!; and
2/ be objectionable to her?
I’d prefer to ask about the actual good or bad about ever using it, not about the good or bad about never doing things in their presence, that a person objects to, however irrationally.
Isn’t it time we concentrated on sentences in this context, including exclamatory of course, and stopped getting our shit in a knot about single words? Of course, that single word, as a nasty exclamation, is an exclamatory sentence, and is highly objectionable.