Nigger (other)

In the English language, ''Nigger'' is a racial slur directed at black people. Starting in the 1990s, references to ''nigger'' have been increasingly replaced by the euphemism , notably in cases where ''nigger'' is mentioned but not directly used.Oxford English Dictionary Online, s.v. ''nigger, n. and adj''.; ''neger, n.'' ''and adj''.; ''N-word, n''. In an instance of linguistic reappropriation, the term ''nigger'' is also used casually and fraternally among African Americans, most commonly in the form of ''nigga'', whose spelling originated from the phonological system of African-American English.

The origin of the word lies with the Latin adjective ''niger news, with the agreement of victim and family, mentioned the slur when reporting on a physical and verbal assault on the black NHS worker and musician K-Dogg. Within the week the BBC received over 18,600 complaints, the black radio host David Whitely resigned in protest, and the BBC apologized.

In 2021, in Tampa, Florida, a 27-year-old black employee at a Dunkin' Donuts punched a 77-year-old white customer after the customer had repeatedly called the employee a nigger. The customer fell to the floor and hit his head. Three days later, he died, having suffered a skull fracture and brain contusions. The employee was arrested, and charged with manslaughter. In a plea bargain, the employee pled guilty to felony battery, and was sentenced to two years of house arrest. In 2022, in explaining why the employee did not receive any jail time, Grayson Kamm, a spokesman for Hillsborough State Attorney Andrew Warren, said "Two of the primary factors were the aggressive approach the victim took toward the defendant and everyone working with the defendant, and that the victim repeatedly used possibly the most aggressive and offensive term in the English language."

Intra-group versus intergroup usage

Black listeners often react to the term differently, depending on whether it is used by white speakers or by black speakers. In the former case, it is regularly understood as insensitive or insulting; in the latter, it may carry notes of in-group disparagement, and is often understood as neutral or affectionate, a possible instance of reappropriation.

In the black community, ''nigger'' is often rendered as ''nigga''. This usage has been popularized by the rap and hip-hop music cultures and is used as part of an in-group lexicon and speech. It is not necessarily derogatory and is often used to mean ''homie'' or ''friend''.

Acceptance of intra-group usage of the word ''nigga'' is still debated, although it has established a foothold amongst younger generations. The NAACP denounces the use of both ''nigga'' and ''nigger''. Usage of ''nigga'' by mixed-race individuals is still largely considered taboo, albeit not as inflammatory as ''nigger''. As of 2001, trends indicated that usage of the term in intragroup settings is increasing even amongst white youth, due to the popularity of rap and hip hop culture. Linguist Keith Allan rejects the view that ''nigger'' is always a slur, arguing that it is also used as a marker of camaraderie and friendship, comparable to the British and Australian term "mate" or the American "buddy".

According to Arthur K. Spears in ''Diverse Issues in Higher Education, 2006'':

Kevin Cato, meanwhile, observes:

Addressing the use of ''nigger'' by black people, philosopher and public intellectual Cornel West said in 2007:

2010s: increase in use and controversy

In the 2010s, "nigger" in its various forms saw use with increasing frequency by African Americans amongst themselves or in self-expression, the most common swear word in hip hop music lyrics. Ta-Nehisi Coates suggested that it continues to be unacceptable for non-blacks to utter while singing or rapping along to hip-hop, and that by being so restrained it gives white Americans (specifically) an impression of what it is like to not be entitled to "do anything they please, anywhere". A concern often raised is whether frequent exposure will inevitably lead to a dilution of the extremely negative perception of the word among the majority of non-black Americans who currently consider its use unacceptable and shocking.

Related words

Derivatives

In several English-speaking countries, " Niggerhead" or "nigger head" was used as a name for many sorts of things, including commercial products, places, plants and animals, as a descriptive term (lit. 'black person's head'). It also is or was a colloquial technical term in industry, mining, and seafaring. ''Nigger'' as "defect" (a hidden problem), derives from " nigger in the woodpile", a US slave-era phrase denoting escaped slaves hiding in train-transported woodpiles. In the 1840s, the ''Morning Chronicle'' newspaper report series ''London Labour and the London Poor'', by Henry Mayhew, records the usages of both "nigger" and the similar-sounding word "niggard" denoting a false bottom for a grate.

In American English, "nigger lover" initially applied to abolitionists, then to white people sympathetic towards black Americans. The portmanteau'' ('White' + 'nigger') denotes a white person emulating "street Black behavior", hoping to gain acceptance to the hip hop, thug, and gangsta sub-cultures. Norman Mailer wrote of the antecedents of this phenomenon in 1957 in his essay ''The White Negro''.

''The N-word'' euphemism

One of the first uses of ''the N-word'' euphemism by a major public figure came during the racially contentious O. J. Simpson murder case in 1995. Key prosecution witness Detective Mark Fuhrman, of the Los Angeles Police Department—who denied using racist language on duty—impeached himself with his prolific use of ''nigger'' in tape recordings about his police work. Co-prosecutor Christopher Darden refused to say the actual word, calling it "the filthiest, dirtiest, nastiest word in the English language". Media personnel who reported on Fuhrman's testimony substituted ''the N-word'' for ''nigger''.

Similar-sounding words

(Latin for "black") occurs in Latinate scientific nomenclature and is the root word for some homophones of ''nigger''; sellers of niger seed (used as bird feed), sometimes use the spelling ''Nyjer'' seed. The classical Latin pronunciation sounds similar to the English , occurring in biologic and anatomic names, such as ''Hyoscyamus niger'' (black henbane), and even for animals that are in fact not black, such as '' Sciurus niger'' (fox squirrel).

is the Latin feminine form of (black), used in biologic and anatomic names such as substantia nigra (black substance).

The word ''niggardly'' (miserly) is etymologically unrelated to ''nigger'', derived from the Old Norse word (stingy) and the Middle English word . In the US, this word has been misinterpreted as related to ''nigger'' and taken as offensive. In January 1999, David Howard, a white Washington, D.C., city employee, was compelled to resign after using ''niggardly''—in a financial context—while speaking with black colleagues, who took umbrage. After reviewing the misunderstanding, Mayor Anthony A. Williams offered to reinstate Howard to his former position. Howard refused reinstatement but took a job elsewhere in the mayor's government.

es, Negro �ne.ɣ̞ɾois the Spanish word for black, and is commonly a part of place names and proper names, particularly in the Southwest of the United States.

Denotational extension

The denotations of ''nigger'' also include non-black/non-white and other disadvantaged people. Some of these terms are self-chosen, to identify with the oppression and resistance of black Americans; others are ethnic slurs used by outsiders.

Jerry Farber's 1967 essay collection, ''The Student as Nigger'', used the word as a metaphor for what he saw as the role forced on students. Farber had been, at the time, frequently arrested as a civil rights activist while beginning his career as a literature professor.

In his 1968 autobiography ''White Niggers of America: The Precocious Autobiography of a Quebec "Terrorist"'', Pierre Vallières, a Front de libération du Québec leader, refers to the oppression of the Québécois people in North America.

In 1969, in the course of being interviewed by the British magazine '' Nova'', artist Yoko Ono said "woman is the nigger of the world;" three years later, her husband, John Lennon, published the song of the same name—about the worldwide phenomenon of discrimination against women—which was socially and politically controversial to US sensibilities.

''Sand nigger'', an ethnic slur against Arabs, and ''timber nigger'' and ''prairie nigger'', ethnic slurs against Native Americans, are examples of the racist extension of ''nigger'' upon other non-white peoples.

In 1978, singer Patti Smith used the word in "Rock N Roll Nigger". One year later in 1979, English singer Elvis Costello used the phrase "white nigger" in his song "Oliver's Army". The slur usually remains uncensored on radio stations, but Costello's usage of the word came under scrutiny, particularly after he used racial slurs during a drunken argument with Stephen Stills and Bonnie Bramlett in 1979. In the same year, Costello's father published a letter in ''Rolling Stone'' defending his son against accusations of racism, stating "Nothing could be further from the truth. My own background has meant that I am passionately opposed to any form of prejudice based on religion or race... His mother comes from the tough multiracial area of Liverpool, and I think she would still beat the tar out of him if his orthodoxy were in doubt".

Historian Eugene Genovese, noted for bringing a Marxist perspective to the study of power, class, and relations between planters and slaves in the South, uses the word pointedly in ''The World the Slaveholders Made'' (1988).

The editor of ''Green Egg'', a magazine described in ''The Encyclopedia of American Religions'' as a significant periodical, published an essay entitled "Niggers of the New Age". This argued that Neo-Pagans were treated badly by other parts of the New Age movement.

Other languages

Other languages, particularly Romance languages, have words that sound similar to or share etymological roots with ''nigger'' but do not necessarily mean the same. In some of these languages, the words refer to the color black in general and are not specifically used to refer to black people. When used to refer to black people, these words have acquired varying degrees of offensiveness, ranging from completely neutral (as in Spanish ''negro'') to highly racist (as in Finnish ''Neekeri''). Examples of related words in other languages include:

*Dutch: ('negro') used to be neutral, but many now consider it to be avoided in favor of ('black'). ('little black one') can be amicably or offensively used. is always pejorative.
* Finnish: ('negro/nigger'), as a loan word ('Neger') from the Swedish language appeared for the first time in a book published in 1771. The use of the Finnish equivalent ('neekeri') began in the late 19th century. Until the 1980s, it was commonly used and generally not yet considered derogatory, although a few instances of it being considered to be so have been documented since the 1950s; by the mid-1990s the word was considered racist, especially in the metropolitan area and among the younger population. It has since then usually been replaced by the metonym 'musta' ('black erson). In a survey conducted in 2000, Finnish respondents considered the term 'Neekeri' to be among the most offensive of minority designations.
* French: is now considered derogatory. Although was the standard term for a ghostwriter, it has largely been supplanted by . Some white Frenchmen have the surname Nègre. The word can still be used as a synonym of "sweetheart" in some traditional Louisiana French creole songs.
*German: is dated and now considered offensive. ('black erson) or ("colored erson) is more neutral.
* Haitian Creole: is used for any man in general, regardless of skin color (like ''dude'' in American English). Haitian Creole derives predominantly from French.
*Italian has three variants: , and . The first one is the most historically attested and was the most commonly used until the 1960s as an equivalent of the English word "negro". It was gradually felt as offensive during the 1970s and replaced with and . was considered a better translation of the English word ''black'', while is a loan translation of the English word ''colored''.
*Portuguese: (as well as ) is neutral; nevertheless can be offensive or at least "politically incorrect" and is almost never proudly used by Afro-Brazilians. and are always extremely pejorative.
*Romanian: is derogatory;
*Russian: the word () has been commonly used as neutral word to describe black people until recent years. It can also be used as a synonym for underpaid worker, "" () means ghostwriter. Nowadays, a black person would often be described neutrally as "" (, 'black-skinned'), though the organization Help Needed instead recommends "" (, 'dark-skinned').
*Spanish: is the word for "black" and is the only way to refer to that color.
* Turkish: ''Zenci'' is a word for "black" but it is being used in a derogatory manner in a similar way as the word nigger.
*Bulgarian: Негър (''negar''), loaned from French ''nègre'', is considered a neutral word for black people in Bulgaria. Some publications and institutions use ''чернокож'' or ''тъмнокож'', but the use of ''негър'' is more widespread.

See also

* List of ethnic slurs
** List of ethnic group names used as insults
**Kaffir (ethnic slur)
** Blackfella
*'' Guilty or Innocent of Using the N Word'', a 2006 documentary
* List of topics related to the African diaspora
*"With Apologies to Jesse Jackson", an episode of '' South Park'' with a plot revolving around the word's extreme offensiveness
*Golliwog

Notes

References

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{{Ethnic slurs

1775 neologisms
African-American-related controversies
African-American society
American English words
Anti-African and anti-black slurs
English profanity
English words
Ethnonyms of African Americans