N-word - def. not covered

[Dan Goncharoff]

Do Somalians consider themselves to be part of North Africa?
DanG



On Thu, Dec 1, 2011 at 2:54 PM, Benjamin Barrett <gogaku at ix.netcom.com> wrote:
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> Poster:       Benjamin Barrett <gogaku at IX.NETCOM.COM>
> Subject:      Re: N-word - def. not covered
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>
> 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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