gendered "nigga"?

[Lynne Murphy]

--On Sunday, October 28, 2001 7:24 pm -0500 Michael Newman <mnewman at QC.EDU>
wrote:

>> Interesting discussion on use of "nigga". I'm under the impression that
>> "nigga" is almost always applied to a male person. In my limited
>> experience men also seem to say "nigga" more than women, although it's
>> not strange or inappropriate for women to use it. But I don't think I've
>> ever heard a woman call another woman "nigga". (More likely for a woman
>> to call her friend "my bitch" parallel to a man calling his friend "my
>> nigga".) Any observations?

Somebody's written about this...the two possibilities coming to mind are
Mary Bucholz and Geneva Smitherman.  (Perhaps GS wrote about it and I heard
MB citing it?  Can't remember, but it's out there.)

Lynne




M Lynne Murphy
Lecturer in Linguistics
School of Cognitive and Computing Sciences
University of Sussex
Brighton BN1 9QH
UK

phone +44-(0)1273-678844
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