[Ads-l] "NA's"

[Laurence Horn]

I'm not sure; does Native Americans here really denote those who used to be designated as Indians, or does it mean "native-born Americans", i.e. those people born in the U.S., in which case it's saying the opposite of what you're (plausibly enough) taking to mean, viz. "We're all immigrants", it's just a question of how many generations ago.  (Where "all" doesn't include the true Native Americans = American Indians.)  Or maybe, with no pejorative intent, it could mean that even N[ative] A[merican]s = American Indians came here from elsewhere too, presumably from Asia, a long long time ago.  We (at least I) need more context to know whether there's pejorative intent here, although I'm probably being naive.

LH



> On Sep 28, 2015, at 9:46 PM, Mark Mandel <thnidu at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
> 
> WTF?! The only way I can make sense of that -- and I do mean semantically:
> parsing is not the issue -- is to assume that the speaker is using
> "immigrant" to mean "not one of Us". (Shakes head in dismay.)
> 
> Mark
> On Sep 21, 2015 12:52 AM, "Wilson Gray" <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
>> Thanks to the immigration issue, _N[ative]A[merican]_ is coming to be used
>> with the same pejorative intent as _P[uerto]R[ican]_, at least in/on
>> Facebook:
>> 
>> "Bullshit! NA's are also immigrants."
>> 
>> --
>> -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
>> 
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>> 
> 
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