Can you read this and give your opinion?

At first I was offended because it looked like he was making a series of racist “jokes.” And then I saw the “n” word near the end. Whoa!

But then I saw the title of his book and realized that he’s merely pointing out how the English language is rooted in racist terminology.

Honestly, about 3 sentences in, I just got bored outta my gourd. I agree with @HungryGuy but it felt like overkill.
I think if a novel started in such a fashion, I would be ready to put it down and take a nap.

@Pandora @HungryGuy I see that he’s going over the top to prove a point. I’m wondering how people feel about the point he’s making.

I agree with @Pandora – I got bored with it and didn’t even finish it. Although I did go back and read the end after seeing @HungryGuy ‘s comment.

@Facade – Without knowing the context before hand, I think most people would start to read it and become enraged. But if you know the context going in, they’ll just say, “Okay, I get it…”

I think he’s trying to point out that our language incorporates a lot of phrases in which “black” has a negative connotation and “white” a positive one, and he wants us to think about why that is. How did it come about? And might it be affecting people’s subconscious opinions towards people of various races?

I personally don’t know enough etymology to speculate. I’m sure some of it is rooted in racism. I think it might also have a lot to do with day and night, though. The black of night has some sinister connotations because the darkness can be dangerous, crimes and accidents are more likely to happen, etc.

As for how I feel. I really could care less. Pointing out a problem in a language isn’t the same as offering up solutions to make it more sensitive. Just because something started a certain way does not mean that it should stay in the same format.
Let’s take the word niggardly. There is a whole hosts of words that can be used ( Synonyms: cheap, chintzy, close, closefisted, mean, mingy, miserly, stingy, parsimonious, penny-pinching, penurious, pinching, pinchpenny, spare, sparing, stinting, tight, tightfisted, uncharitable, ungenerous) that would not be considered offensive or thought to be offensive. So you have to wonder that a person using such a word may find pleasure in knowing that the word is not so familiar and can be used to slip interject there true sentiments.

He’s saying that a lot of words and phrases that incorporate the word “black” or terms for blackness have negative connotations. He has a point.

However, he is wrong to include “niggardly” here. That word does not originate from anything meaning “black”. It just happens to look like a word that does. According to the OED, its origin is probably from an early Scandinavian word for “miserly”.

I would give a niggardly praise for the author’s ability to put together pseudo racist phrases.
However it is a black day when you call our language racist.

I agree with @Mariah‘s sentiments. It’s interesting, and something to think about. It reminds me of the phrases “I jewed him down on the price” or “I got gypped”, which people used to use all the time without even thinking about the negative connotations for Jewish people or gypsies.

I think it’s funny. And the concepts behind “black and white” way preceded the mess of race relations.

On a side note, a comedian preceding Otis Redding at a performance at the Howard Theatre in DC back in the 60s when the audiences were almost entirely black did a very funny bit about the good cowboys wearing the black hats.

@Ron_C Worry about language can go too far. Not too many years back a white DC government spokesperson was fired for using the word “niggardly” perfectly correctly, because of a fear of political fallout from some people who might not have the word in their vocabulary. Even stating the definition in a followup did no good.

@anartist “fired for using the word “niggardly” perfectly correctly,” I remember that and was amazed at the stupidity involved in the whole process. Unfortunately the ignorant seem to rule the U.S.

Not too well versed in history, whether that of the English language and its evolution or what happened to people when where what, but while pondering this, I thought of something. As far as I know, (I’ll gladly stand corrected) while racism has always existed, the paragraph here seems to take cues from what came of the enslavement of the blacks in the Americas. I’m not entirely sure how many of those expressions or slangs were present in England when English was becoming a language and evolving as such. And if they were, they probably weren’t related to black people.
I’d have to agree with @Mariah on one of her points in this case, about the words and their connotations in this paragraph being related instead to something a bit more primal and universal (don’t get me wrong, I believe hatred to be VERY primal, but I think racism is an extension of it) to mankind when it comes to the construction of the language, and using it in relations to describe primal reactions. The night is fear, the day is relief, stuff like that. Burning usually sucks for example, because of the destruction it causes; blackening I don’t think has anything to do with blacks, unless someone is blatantly wanting to be as racist as possible. I’m pretty sure black cultures make similar relations in their original languages, anyway.
I see where this guy’s getting at, but you guys give me 45 minutes and I’ll write something similar, but I’ll use zombies and death as a metaphor for the downfall of something popular in the eighties, and then say that’s what English is based on.
Writing is a craft, (which I do not claim to own or practice, that zombie thing was a joke) and you can do anything with it. I hardly think that English is steeped in racism as we know it today, when you consider how it can be tweaked and played with, as well as its roots, back when the English were hunting mutant wolves and sticking swords in stones.
On the other hand, because writing and words are so versatile, I suppose part of their evolution could cater to what that guy suggests; but the language itself was not based on racism. I mean war is ancient, but languages were created so people could communicate, and that is far more older…albeit, barely.

Interesting. However, being an artist, colors or the absence of, have always been one of the greatest skills and one of the greatest ways to convey a message across visually. Black is heavy visually, white is lighter, blue does convey a cooler message yet scientifically blue fire is actually hotter than red (ironic yes?), green relates to serenity and all things natural. But you know some of the sentences for instance like this, “for I am a white man (marked by upright firmness)” you could insert any color and its super subjective. It’s important to read things like this but I wouldn’t consume it close to my heart. But then again it’s easy for me to decipher between others intentions.

I see what he’s trying to say but racism towards blacks was not why these words came to mean the things they mean.