[Ads-l] terminology - Black American vs. African American

[Wilson Gray]

All that's good, Joel. (BTW, an impressive display of control of the full
set of data.) But what does it have to do with the fact that I *personally*
think that the use of "African-American" is a losing scene? After nearly
thirty years - thank you, Margaret, for the date - "A-A" has failed to
drive out "black (American)"/"Black (American)." OTOH, consider the
swiftness with which "black" drove out "(American) Negro" - "Negro" itself
failed fully to displace "colored," even in the speech of black people -
despite the fact that "black," in "urban" or "central-city" neighborhoods,
was once the most hurtful term that could be used to denigrate an American
of sub-Saharan African ancestry.

FWIW, "*American* Negro" always annoyed me, because of the implication that
we are Negroes somehow in America and not where we ought to be, instead of
being Americans, by a cruel twist of fate, not white. AFAIK, this was never
a problem for black Americans other than your humble correspondent, any
more than the similar "American Jew" - and "Jewess" like "negress" and
"lioness" - is anything that "our Jews" - like "our colored" - obsess over.

Further FWIW, my personal experience is that "Negro" was never able to
replace "colored" in the mouth of the non-black man in the street until
recently, if at all. "Colored" is still being in use by whites, Latinos,
East Asians, South Asians, Near-Easterners, etc. of my acquaintance who are
of my age. When I was in Europe in the Army, "colored" was the standard
term used by English-speaking Americans, Germans, French, and Dutch. Of
course, that was fifty years ago.

OTOH, British soldiers used "Yank(s)" without distinction, an unusual
experience for us - or should that be, "for *we*? - American *Negroes*.

Gascon, a language that distinguishes _I, we_ from _me, us_, nevertheless
*regularly* uses _I, we_ as the objects of a preposition. Is English
heading in that direction?

Youneverknow.

I don't know what to make of the current French, "un(e) black, une
blackette." Slang? Colloquialism? Joke? As far as I can tell, they're not
meant to be insulting, as "beur" and "buerette" are meant to be.



"The term 'African American' was originally introduced and suggested to
replace 'Black' in
1988 by Dr. Ramona Edelin, then president of the National Urban Coalition"

On Mon, Jan 5, 2015 at 1:29 PM, Joel S. Berson <Berson at att.net> wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
> Subject:      Re: terminology - Black American vs. African American
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> At 1/5/2015 07:04 AM, Margaret Lee wrote:
>
> >The term 'African American' was=C2 originally=20
> >introduced=C2 and suggested to replace 'Black' in=20
> >1988 by Dr. Ramona Edelin, then president of the=20
> >National Urban Coalition.=C2  Jesse Jackson then=20
> >popularized=C2 the term and incorrectly received=20
> >credit for=C2 originally introducing=C2 it.
> >--Margaret Lee=C2
>
> There's discussion in the ADS-L archives about=20
> the pre-historical use (that is, before=20
> Edelin/Jackson) of these and other terms.   I=20
> reported research I did in Early American=20
> Newspapers and Google Books in a message of 2 Mar=20
> 2011 titled "Nigger vs. Colored, et al."  It=20
> gives numbers of hits, sometimes separated into=20
> periods (e.g., before or after 1800), for various=20
> terms (not including "black", which is not amenable to database searching).
>
> Margaret, in Gbooks I found 42 instances=20
> of  "African American" before 1800 (none in EAN),=20
> most of which are probably false positives -- but=20
> one genuine quotation, probably the earliest, is=20
> from 1822 Sep 6, the Enquirer.  Of course this=20
> merely means the term was available long before=20
> Edelin, not that there was any movement then to=20
> adopt "African American" to replace "black".  For=20
> analysis of the historical evolution, see:
>
> Rael, Patrick. =93Introduction.=94 In=20
> African-American Activism before the Civil War:=20
> The Freedom Struggle in the Antebellum North, ed.=20
> Patrick Rael (New York: Routeledge, 2008).  p. 18.
>
> Rael, Patrick. Black Identity & Black Protest in=20
> the Antebellum North. Chapel Hill: University of=20
> North Carolina Press, 2002.   pp.  84--85.
>
> Black American Reference Book. Ed. Mabel M.=20
> Smythe. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1976.  pp. xi---xii.
>
> Drake, St. Clair. =93Negro Americans and the Africa=20
> Interest.=94 In The American Negro Reference Book,=20
> ed. John P. Davis (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.:=20
> Prentice-Hall, 1966).  p. 700.  [And note the=20
> change in title between 1966 and 1976!]
>
> Joel
>
> >  From: Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
> >  To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> >  Sent: Sunday, January 4, 2015 2:38 PM
> >  Subject: Re: terminology - Black American vs. African American
> >
> >On Sun, Jan 4, 2015 at 12:24 PM, Tom Zurinskas <truespel at hotmail.com>=
>  wrote:
> >
> > > Whites think African American is a better term.
> >
> >
> >Do they really? Or have they been gorilla-ed into it by some loud-mouthed
> >"spokesman," such as, in the this case, the Revd. Jesse? Back in the day,
> >Jackson advocated so strongly for "A-A" that I thought that it was his
> >original idea. (As did others. A white woman from Jo-berg, in a letter to
> >the editor of The Boston Globe, rhetorically and sarcastically asked,
> given
> >that she was a native African now an American citizen, what Jackson would
> >call her. Well, as any fool can plainly see, he would, if the occasion
> >arose, call her "white." What could possibly matter beyond that? *Nothing*
> >else. How can that not be so totally obvious as to render such a question
> >utterly otiose?!)
> >
> >The fact of the matter is that someone else suggested it. The Rev merely
> >"took the ball and ran with it," to coin a phrase. In other words, "he
> made
> >it his own," to coin another phrase.
> >
> >--
> >-Wilson
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>



-- 
-Wilson
-----
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-Mark Twain

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org