The N-word and the American psyche

The N-word: You know what it is and what it means – or do you? Neal Lester, Foundation Professor of English and director of Project Humanities at Arizona State University, tackles why this word continues to “wreak havoc on our American popular psyche” in an opinion piece in the Ahwatukee Foothills News, on the Teaching Tolerance website, a project of the Southern Poverty Law Center.

He writes: “American adults know the N-word’s history of violence, intimidation, and disparagement of black bodies, and most folks know that it has not shed its inherent connection to black/white racial bias and hatred even today. Entire websites are devoted to mocking and brutally attacking blacks across the globe and daily Google Alerts verify that the word is prevalent in public and private circles. The word travels across oceans in the form of hip-hop music and a hip-hop store in Malawi carries as its name this single word. Recently as a radio panelist on this “unforgiven” word, I was lumped with the old folks who can’t understand how the word has allegedly been coopted or appropriated by some younger folks to take its sting out, to be a “term of endearment.” My young accuser was right. It is impossible for me to imagine that this word – deemed “the most toxic in the English language;” “the most inflammatory, shocking and historic word in the English language;” “the filthiest, dirtiest, nastiest word in the English language;” the word that “occupies a place in the soul where logic and reason never go;” “six simple letters that convey centuries of pain, evil and contempt” and “the all-American trump card, the nuclear bomb of racial epithets” – can be termed one of endearment, and if the word is like “homey,” “man,” or “dude,” why is it used instead of these words?”

Major lawsuits defined to address “black-on-black racial harassment” are being discussed in courts in New York and on university campuses in Alabama, but the end result, Lester says, is this: “There is really no double standard in which Paula Deen can’t say the word, but any black person can.”

What is it that makes this word continue to hold such power, he poses? Individual choice.