"African-American" vs. "black" at the Olympics

[Laurence Horn]

At 8:51 PM -0600 3/7/06, Cohen, Gerald Leonard wrote:
>The same thing happened when Nelson Mandela was being released from
>prison, and someone on TV or in the press (I forget which) referred
>to him as an "African-American."
>
>Gerlad Cohen
>>  ----------
>>  From:         American Dialect Society on behalf of David Bergdahl
>>  Sent:         Tuesday, March 7, 2006 8:41 PM
>>
>>  Last fall some of my students referred to the blacks in Conrad's
>>"Heart of Darkenss" as African-Americans--I think they assumed that
>>Af-Am is the
>>  polite form of "black" and the nationality issue never occured to
>>them--these same students constantly referred to "British
>>imperialism" despite the fact that the novella is set in the
>>Congo--ruled by Belgium at the time.  I think something similar is
>>going on with the sports-writer.
>>
><snip>
>
These case are different, though, in that it's *true* of Shani Davis
both that he is an African-American and that he was the first
African-American to win an individual gold medal in the Winter
Olympics.  An understatement, to be sure, as noted, but nonetheless
true.  Such is obviously not the case in either of the above
situations.

Larry

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