N-word - def. not covered

[Benjamin Barrett]

Can Somalia be considered to be part of North Africa? BB

On Dec 1, 2011, at 7:18 AM, Joel S. Berson wrote:

>
> I have just finished reading "The Anatomy of
> Blackness: Science & Slavery in an Age of
> Enlightenment", by Andrew S. Curran, which has
> suggested to me some additional factors in the retort of the bicyclist:
>
>> "I am not a nigger. I am from Somalia, I go to
>> school and I work. Do not call me a nigger!"
>
> First, the reference to Somalia might not mean "I
> am a recent African immigrant and therefore
> cannot have become a nigger (yet)".  Rather, the
> speaker might have been denying he was a Negro
> (nègre) because he was from North Africa (a
> "Moor", maure).  According to Curran, who treats
> almost entirely with the French Enlightenment,
> this was a distinction that arose during the
> period.  (See also the etymology of "Moor" and
> senses A.I.1 of "nigger" and A.1.a of "Negro" --
> "sub-Saharan" --- in the OED.)  Perhaps it
> persists today among North Africans (especially
> Muslims) who want to be distinguished from "black" sub-Saharan Africans.
>
> Second, alleged characteristics of behavior, such
> as laziness or lack of understanding
> (intelligence), became indivisibly associated
> with asserted physical (genetic) characteristics
> of the "black race", such as a "dark" or "black"
> brain: a Negro was inherently unintelligent and
> unindustrious.  The North African from Somalia
> might have been employing this racial stereotype
> to demonstrate that he could not be a nigger --
> he was intelligent (going to school) and industrious (working).
>
> Third, it's not just laziness that was associated
> with the Negro, but lack of understanding,
> criminality, immoral sexuality, etc.    I wonder
> whether the OED definition of "nigger" really
> needs to be extended to specifically refer to
> laziness.  "2b. Any person whose behaviour is
> regarded as reprehensible. derogatory" may be sufficient.
>
> Joel
>
> At 11/30/2011 10:35 PM, Benjamin Barrett wrote:
>> Caveat lector: If not apparent from the subject
>> line, this has a lot of offensive language.
>>
>> About a year ago, a Michigander white female
>> friend of mine who is a transplant to Hawai'i
>> shocked the other three of us in the room when
>> she went off on a rant about niggers. To
>> paraphrase, she said that a nigger was someone
>> who didn't work, who lived on the government.
>> She explicitly said that the word had nothing to do with race.
>>
>> I definitely can recall the word being used with
>> the connotation of being lazy as a child. The
>> OED provides a couple of definitions of the
>> n-word where race does not matter. Nothing hits
>> this exactly, however. I think the closest is:
>>
>> OED
>> 2b. Any person whose behaviour is regarded as reprehensible. derogatory.
>>
>> The AHD is similarly close:
>>
>> 2. Slang: Extremely Disparaging and Offensive .
>> a person of anyrace or origin regarded as contemptible, inferior, ignorant,etc.
>>
>> Wiktionary has nothing even close.
>>
>> Not being productive is also made explicit, with
>> a twist, in the HBO series _Sopranos_, sixth
>> season "Kennedy and Heidi"
>> (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kennedy_and_Heidi).
>> It is scene five, "Wrong Neighborhood." Tony's
>> son AJ is hanging with his friends when one of
>> them doors a bicyclist (played by Bambadjan
>> Bamba). The bicyclist is black and the dooring
>> friend calls the bicyclist the n-word.
>>
>> The bicyclist says, "I am not a nigger. I am
>> from Somalia, I go to school and I work. Do not call me a nigger!"
>>
>> Here, not only is being productive the issue,
>> but apparently being a _recent_ African
>> immigrant evidently disqualifies him from fitting the definition.
>>
>> Benjamin Barrett
>> Seattle, WA
>>
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>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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