|
Yolo Akili | www.YoloAkili.com | Decatur | GA | 30030 |
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Yoga by Yolo!
Report: Palestinians denied water
Sent to you by moya via Google Reader:
via BBC News | News Front Page | World Edition on 10/27/09
Israel is denying Palestinians access to the basic minimum of clean, safe water, Amnesty International says.Things you can do from here:
- Subscribe to BBC News | News Front Page | World Edition using Google Reader
- Get started using Google Reader to easily keep up with all your favorite sites
try to speed up hispanic assimilation
Sent to you by moya via Google Reader:
via stuff white people do by macon d on 10/26/09
Isn't it something how America still takes pride in being a "melting pot," a nation that draws strength from having such a diverse population? And yet at the same, paradoxical time, how it also still insists that immigrants assimilate as quickly as possible into a set of deracinated, bleached-out standards?
A couple of recent news items (described below) demonstrate how that assimilationist pressure gets applied to Latinos. For one thing, they're constantly told, in subtle and not-so-subtle ways, "Speak English!"
What is up with that, anyway? And why, especially, the vitriol that accompanies it? What's that anger all about, that it would even drive people to wear t-shirts like the one above? Surely someone else's struggles with the English language don't cramp the ordinary white person's life all that much, do they?
Actually, I think a lot of this white anger isn't really about annoyance with someone else's struggle with English. I think it's more about the browning of America, and the supposed threat that demographic change represents to some nostalgic white notion of a fading "real America."
It used to be that white people were more firmly in control of things, and didn't have to share center stage politically and culturally with darker people. But now that so many darker Americans seem insistent about intruding on white America, insisting that it live up to its own expressed ideals and all, a lot of white Americans are basically insisting in return that even though those intruders don't look white, they should at least act white.
A lot of white people complain about people who "can't speak English" because they're really kind of wondering whatever happened to immigrants who were more than eager to assimilate. How come they're not so anxious anymore to become just like us?
Exhibit A: It's recently come to the nation's attention that police in Dallas, Texas have been giving dozens of tickets (and a $204 fine) to certain drivers, for the horrendous crime of not speaking English especially well.
Yes, it is true that the police officers may have been confused about a law that applies instead to commercial drivers, and thus wrongly applied it to people driving cars. Nevertheless, what message do these tickets send to Latin Americans who live in Dallas?
Brenda Reyes, a political consultant and member of the League of United Latin American Citizens, puts her outrage this way: "It's the principle of the matter that there are police officers out there representing our city who actually think that it's a crime not to speak English."
It also seems to me that this injunction -- "Speak English! And since you don't speak it well yet, here's a hefty fine!" -- again has more baggage and emotion behind it than a mere concern or annoyance with linguistic ability. It also carries the weight of all that anti-immigrant sentiment that gets unjustly leveled at Latin Americans.
"Speak English!" also means "Stop speaking Spanish!" And so it's one of many ways of saying, "Stop being Hispanic." In that way, I imagine that this English-only thing can feel like the tip of a knife. Or in cases where authority is involved, as in the ticketing in Dallas, more like the tap of a police baton, which barely precedes threats of the taser, the handcuffs, and the gun. We'd prefer you leave, but if you're going to stay, then hurry up and assimilate, right now.
Exhibit B is an example of something I've written about before, the common white aversion to unfamiliar names. This aversion sometimes goes as far as the demand for different, "easier" names.
"Hotel owner tells Hispanic workers to change names":
Larry Whitten marched into this northern New Mexico town [Taos] in late July on a mission: resurrect a failing hotel.
The tough-talking former Marine immediately laid down some new rules. Among them, he forbade the Hispanic workers at the run-down, Southwestern adobe-style hotel from speaking Spanish in his presence (he thought they'd be talking about him), and ordered some to Anglicize their names.
No more Martin (Mahr-TEEN). It was plain-old Martin. No more Marcos. Now it would be Mark.
Oh the ironies. This story is full of them, isn't it? (Actually, I think it could make a great movie.)
And that hotel owner said something else I've heard white people say several times before -- I just haven't gotten around to a blog post on it yet. Something like, "suspect that speakers of foreign languages are talking about them." What is up with that? It reminds me of yet another post I haven't done yet, something about how a lot of white people "get paranoid when they're around non-white people."
Fortunately, Larry Whitten's militant style has been countered with organized protests, and he's thinking about selling the place and leaving:
Former workers, their relatives and some town residents picketed across the street from the hotel.
"I do feel he's a racist, but he's a racist out of ignorance. He doesn't know that what he's doing is wrong," says protester Juanito Burns Jr., who identified himself as prime minister of an activist group called Los Brown Berets de Nuevo Mexico.
(The Taos News)
It's a little strange that this story took so long to get national attention, since the Taos News wrote about racial problems at the Whitten Inn over a month ago, as well as earlier protests: Among chants of, "Boycott," and, "We won't stand for racism," protesters of all ages carried signs and shared their feelings about Whitten and his policies. . . . most people in town are supportive of the protesters, and even white people in town have been bringing them food and water and honking in support.
Two Latinos specifically addressed Whitten's arrogant, paternalistic insistence on renaming his employees:
Emilio Sánchez, 12, said he stands behind the protest and wants to see Whitten leave town; he said he wouldn't consider working under the conditions Whitten imposed. "My name is not Timmy or Tom or anything," Sánchez said.
Martin Gutierrez, a fired employee, "says he felt disrespected when he was told to use the unaccented Martin as his name":
He says he told Whitten that Spanish was spoken in New Mexico before English. "He told me he didn't care what I thought because this was his business," Gutierrez says.
"I don't have to change my name and language or heritage," he says. "I'm professional the way I am."
Isn't that the problem, right there, with this "Speak English!" thing that white people do?
Again, it's not so much about annoyance with someone's English skills (which is an ironic, rather ridiculous annoyance, given that it almost always comes from people who can only speak one language). It's more about denigrating that person's heritage, and so ultimately, it's about denigrating who that person is as a person, as a human being. It's about implying that they're less of a human being than we are.
These two recent examples of assimilationist pressure are extreme, but they help to clarifly what many white Americans believe -- that Latin American people just don't belong here, and if they are here, then they should stop shoving in our faces that which makes them Latin Americans. We basically want them to suppress and deny themselves, all for our own convenience, and so that we can feel more comfortable and safe around them.
And I also think that at its worst, it's as if we're saying to them, even with a simple complaint about their English skills or their unfamiliar names, "Look, if we're ever going to accept you, you must become like us. But then, good luck with that. See, when you get right down to it, we are superior, and you are inferior."
Things you can do from here:
- Subscribe to stuff white people do using Google Reader
- Get started using Google Reader to easily keep up with all your favorite sites
City of Atlanta Celebrates New Recycling Program, Oct. 29
if you recycle you'll feel less guilty about buying stuff you don't need
Sent to you by moya via Google Reader:
via Atlanta INtown Paper by collin on 10/27/09
To celebrate the launch of this new program, city officials, Rehrig Pacific, Coca Cola, and RecycleBank will gather at The World of Coca Cola's Pemberton Place (the Greenspace between the World of Coca-Cola and the Georgia Aquarium) on Thursday, October 29th at 10 a.m. to give remarks and answer questions about the new program. The event will also feature automated recycling truck demonstrations and refreshments provided by Coca-Cola.
The rain location for the vent is the Bottle Cap Suite of the World of Coca Cola. Parking will be provided in the Pemberton Place parking deck between Centennial Olympic Park Drive and Luckie Street.
Things you can do from here:
- Subscribe to Atlanta INtown Paper using Google Reader
- Get started using Google Reader to easily keep up with all your favorite sites
Friday, October 23, 2009
Rape as a Pre-existing Condition
Sent to you by moya via Google Reader:
via Shakesville by Melissa McEwan on 10/22/09
[Trigger warning.]First it was domestic violence; now reports are emerging that insurance companies have denied coverage to survivors of sexual assault because "they had a pre-existing condition as a result of a rape, such as post traumatic stress disorder or a sexually transmitted disease." Christina Turner was denied coverage on the basis that she'd been given anti-AIDS meds after being raped to avoid any potential HIV infection.
"It's difficult enough to make sure that rape victims take the drugs," said Diana Faugno, a forensic nurse in California and board director of End Violence Against Women International. "What are we supposed to tell women now? Well, I guess you have a choice - you can risk your health insurance or you can risk AIDS. Go ahead and choose."There is, unfortunately, much more at the link.
Again, I ask: Why the fuck are we supposed to care if health reform drives these conscienceless, antipathetic, human-hating, profit-driven, bottom line-obsessed, money-grubbing, piece-of-shit insurance companies out of business?
[H/Ts to Shakers J0lt, Becca, Mad Gastronomer, and Maria P.]
Things you can do from here:
- Subscribe to Shakesville using Google Reader
- Get started using Google Reader to easily keep up with all your favorite sites
Tyler Perry x Morehouse x Real Black Men
Sent to you by moya via Google Reader:
via Model Minority "Thugs, Feminists and Boom Bap" by M.Dot. on 10/23/09
Speaking to my homie Jonzey the other night, I was trying to convince
her to go see Good Hair, she refused. I said you must go to see
Sharpton's clear disdain for and anger towards Black women
and our budgetary practices around our hair.
She mentioned that she wasn't going for precisely that reason. That she is
not interested in seeing something where Black women get trashed.
I was silent because I have been there, in fact I live there.
She is a filmmaker and she said that she is tired of other filmmakers projecting
their issues onto Black people and Black women, Tyler Perry specifically.
Here is the line that got me,
"If Tyler Perry is more comfortable walking around wearing dresses thenShe believes that White filmmakers project their issues on to Black people
he should make a movie about THAT, instead of projecting his shit onto us."
and Black male filmmakers project their issues onto Black women.
I had one of those blog synergy moments and asked her, well have you seen
what has happened at Moreouse this week with regard to their dress code?
Morehouse announced a dress code this week that was pretty much
no do rags, no sagging, then the last rule,states no pumps, no dresses,
no tunics.
I instantly thought of Tyler Perry and how Morehouse's reaction to
how some men dress, as evidence of why he won't make that movie.
Simply stated, Tyler Perry will not make that movie because the women who
pay to see him dress up like a Black grandmommas would not support a film
where he talks about why he feels most comfortable dressing up like a
Black Grandmomma. I then decided, after looking at the Sandra Rose
site and reading the comments that I needed to have a conversation
with Moya, because this represented a great teaching moment.
Tyler Perry's movies make Black women and White people feel comfortable,
oh, don't trip, we aren't the only ones in the movie theater. If he makes a movie
about why he feels most comfortable with in dress, this would make many
Black women and White folks incredibly uncomfortable.
Below is the interiew.
Renina Jarmon: Why is it acceptable for a Black school to heavily
regulate the gendered nature of clothing?
Moya Bailey: I don't think its acceptable though I do believe in a dress code
(sometimes). I think for k-12 and I could even say in college, a dress code
that's designed to counteract the hypersexualization of youth and to limit the
expression of certain exclusionary class markers makes a lot of sense to me.
Dress codes don't have to be gender specific and students could be able to
wear a range of clothing across genders regardless of their perceived sex.
Unfortunately, this Morehouse dress code is being used to reinforce a very
classed and heteronormative idea of what a black man should look like.
RJ:Does this have to do with the origins of the school as a place rooted
educating and grooming Black civil society?
MB: I definitely think this policy is connected to some old school politics of
respectability. Black people have historically tried to model the norms
of dominate culture, hoping that this mimicry would afford equal treatment
as opposed to subjugation. "Good" black men don't wear high heels or
sagging pants. There's been a lot of talk about how heels or sagging
pants won't fly in corporate America, as if to say the ultimate goal for
Morehouse men is to become black versions of the CEO's and capitalists
that are destroying communities of color with unliveable wages, gentrification,
environmental racism, and hazardous working conditions. That said, a lot
of work has been done to ensure that folks can wear what they want to
wear in corporate America. Non-discrimination policies, while not
indicative of the work climate necessarily, provide employees rights
to dress as they see fit and if employers have a problem, provide legal
means through which employees can act.
RJ:Are the people on Sandrarose.com aware that they sound like white
folks who didn't want their children to attend integrated schools in the
1950's? [Sandra Rose sounds like some of the birthers, denying the
presidents right to BE the president].
respectability. Black people have historically tried to model the norms
of dominate culture, hoping that this mimicry would afford equal treatment
as opposed to subjugation. "Good" black men don't wear high heels or
sagging pants. There's been a lot of talk about how heels or sagging
pants won't fly in corporate America, as if to say the ultimate goal for
Morehouse men is to become black versions of the CEO's and capitalists
that are destroying communities of color with unliveable wages, gentrification,
environmental racism, and hazardous working conditions. That said, a lot
of work has been done to ensure that folks can wear what they want to
wear in corporate America. Non-discrimination policies, while not
indicative of the work climate necessarily, provide employees rights
to dress as they see fit and if employers have a problem, provide legal
means through which employees can act.
RJ:Are the people on Sandrarose.com aware that they sound like white
folks who didn't want their children to attend integrated schools in the
1950's? [Sandra Rose sounds like some of the birthers, denying the
presidents right to BE the president].
"buttercup24 Says:I'm glad they are taking a stand. I've said numerous times I don't have a problem with other people's lifestyles but some people take it too far. If you are a gay man keyword is MAN. Act like one and the same thing with women. The saggy pants thing too. Save that for the knuckleheads on the street who aren't going anywhere."
Dhoward1913 Says:
They should withdraw!!!! Why the hell would you go to Morehouse with that tomfoolery? These folks are out of control. Gay is one thing, but dressing like a woman…..and to the point that the school has to give guidelines. Damn, if you going to Morehouse you obviously want to get a degree and work in the public sector. You can't dress like that in the public sector. Only hairsylist can do that.
MB: "A man can't lead another man wearing a dress." this quote is so deep and so
problematic to me. I'll break it down.
1. What constitutes appropriate dress for men and women is always shifting.
What's masculine one day can be feminine the next. Don't folks know the
history of high heels?
2. Read Bailey's Cafe by Gloria Naylor. Tell me then if a man can't lead
another man wearing a dress.
3. There's an assumption that for a man to be taking seriously he needs
to be marked as such. There's something silly about a man in women's
clothing. Why? Is it because men don't take women seriously? If we
change the phrase to " A woman can't lead another woman wearing pants,"
the statement very obviously breaks down.
What is it about masculinity that is so fragile that it becomes
questionable when cloaked in a dress?
RJ: Why do we assume that just because Black men weren't visibly gay
on Morehouse's campus that they, haven't been there historically?
MB: Girl, I don't know! And this is the thing about all black institutions, the
church, school, family, community, etc. There is an understanding that
there are queer black folks in these spaces but traditionally folks have
tried to argue via politics of respectability, "Hide yourself." Black queer
people can be present just not visibly so or at least not so visible as to
call attention to themselves. We have this false notion that hiding queerness
will some how make us more respectable more deserving of being
treated like human beings if we don't deviate from the norms that mainstream
(read: white) society created for us.
RJ: Is the subtext in the conversation that some hetero sexual black women
attend Spelman with the intent of finding a husband and a visible Black
gay male population stifles this possibility?
MB:Maybe but I don't think this is about heterosexual black women as much
as it is about making the homosocial nature of a school like Morehouse
not be read as homoerotic. What I mean is that Morehouse as a school
that wishes to claim a majority heterosexual student body, has anxiety
around the visible presence of gay students. What will people think if they
see black men rocking the latest jimmy cho's or sporting saggin' pants
etc. What is so interesting is that the dress code slices both ways.
They want to rid themselves of a working class hypermasculinity that is
expressed through baggy clothing as well as a feminine (read: queer)
aesthetic that also troubles a more conventional mainstream black
middle class masculinity. It seems much more prudent to begin to
have conversations about black masculinity and all that could be
rather than create a reactionary policy that brings attention to
the conservative and no-liberatory vision of the school.
as it is about making the homosocial nature of a school like Morehouse
not be read as homoerotic. What I mean is that Morehouse as a school
that wishes to claim a majority heterosexual student body, has anxiety
around the visible presence of gay students. What will people think if they
see black men rocking the latest jimmy cho's or sporting saggin' pants
etc. What is so interesting is that the dress code slices both ways.
They want to rid themselves of a working class hypermasculinity that is
expressed through baggy clothing as well as a feminine (read: queer)
aesthetic that also troubles a more conventional mainstream black
middle class masculinity. It seems much more prudent to begin to
have conversations about black masculinity and all that could be
rather than create a reactionary policy that brings attention to
the conservative and no-liberatory vision of the school.
RJ:What are Black people scared of?
MB: I think black people are afraid of their own queer desires. It's so
interesting that homosexuality is so threatening in our communities
that we'd rather institute draconian policies that limit all that we are or
who we could be out of fear. Homosexaulity and heterosexaulity are
recent concepts that don't effectively convey the diversity of human
sexuality, gender or biological sex. We hold tight to the notion that two
sexes, produce two genders which lead to two orientations but history
and our current world refute this at every turn. but we hold on. We hold
to these notions that ultimately imprison us and do nothing to transform
the world into what it could be. It's our desire to hold onto values, that
were never ours by the way, that keep us locked in a push/pull that is
not transformational or edifying.
RJ: Any other thoughts?
5 gay students who may or may not be wearing heels. How about
the number of sexual assaults that involve Morehouse students
and women in the Atlanta University Center? I can tell you it's way
more than five. How about the virulent homophobia and sexism that
goes unquestioned in the student body and in the administration?
As a feminist, I also want to call high heels into question as not
necessarily being indicative of a liberatory politic. Heels hurt your feet
and can even destroy them over a long period of time. I think it's interesting
that this ultra feminine footwear can be reclaimed as transgressive when
in some ways I think it can be the epitome of a hegemonic hetero-patriarchal state.
For more reading:
The difference between gender and sex
Elizabeth Gates's article in The Daily Beast: Morehouse College's Gay Tragedy
Article in the Paper Tiger, Morehouses newspaper: Is Gay the Way?
Latoya Peterson article at Racialicious: LA Times Explores Being Gay at Morehouse
Jason Harrell on Keith Boykin.com: Black and Gay at Morehouse
Interesting?
What does it mean that this is what Morehouse chooses to focus on?
Why Black folks sound like white 1950's or 2009 birther racist?
Did you know that Black MBA students can't wear locks or cornrows at Hampton?
This is material because they have a 5 year undergrad/MBA program.
What are we scared of?
Thoughts?
Things you can do from here:
- Subscribe to Model Minority "Thugs, Feminists and Boom Bap" using Google Reader
- Get started using Google Reader to easily keep up with all your favorite sites
Thursday, October 22, 2009
reachingtheshore: everythingharrypotter: (via malfoyy)
Sent to you by moya via Google Reader:
Things you can do from here:
- Subscribe to guerrilla mama using Google Reader
- Get started using Google Reader to easily keep up with all your favorite sites
Call for papers: Society for Disability Studies conference in Philadelphia i...
Sent to you by moya via Google Reader:
via Media dis&dat by BA Haller on 10/22/09
From the Society for Disability Studies:SDS 2010, 22nd Annual Conference Call for Proposals
Dates: June 2-5, 2010
Host: Institute on Disabilities, Temple University
Location: Howard Gittis Student Center, Temple University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Submission Forms: All proposals must use the SDS CFP submission form available at the 2010 SDS conference site
Proposal Deadline: Midnight EST, December 15, 2009
THEME: DISABILITY IN THE GEO-POLITICAL IMAGINATION
The development of global studies has increasingly called for a cross-cultural and comparative approach to questions of marginalization, stigma, diaspora and resettlement, labor and exploitation, climate change, and the world-ranging production of impairment and disability from violence, inhumane treatment, crumbling infrastructure, and environmental degradation. A significant amount of scholarship also examines new resistance cultures and the galvanization of global networks as members of diverse disability communities try to navigate productive collaborations across newly wired cybernetic systems and claim the possibilities offered by globalization. New opportunities and new problems abound around forging transnational communities, increased mobility, health and charity tourism, the implementation of universal rights, increased transparency of states and organizations, better community-based rehabilitation, and more varied work possibilities.
This year's Society for Disability Studies conference features the theme "Disability in the Geo-Political Imagination" to spur ongoing efforts in interdisciplinary analyses. Such a theme arrives at a timely moment in the wake of the signing of the United Nations Charter on the Rights of People with Disabilities by leaders in 140 nations (including, most recently and somewhat belatedly, the United States). As a result of the emergence and ratification of this convention, disability has become a more visible topic within the public sphere. Nations, perhaps including the United States, that previously undervalued disabled populations now contend with what it means to be truly inclusive. Likewise, Disability-advocacy organizations now seek to make further claims upon the state as a guarantor of rights and liberties. This SDS conference theme includes proactive responses to the critique that disabled populations, particularly those which are disproportionately poor and people of color, are ill represented, under-analyzed, and under-theorized, in the context of global studies. As the local and global may be seen as inflecting each other, so can questions of disability, race, class, and gender.
Disability studies explores the distance that exists between popular representations of disability as tragic embodiment, and politically informed disability cultures that define themselves against such devaluing views. Authors of panel and paper proposals will ideally feature new ways of conceptualizing people who experience disability as social actors connected or disconnected on a global scale. In particular, the SDS Program Committee seeks entries from those areas of inquiry that resist, revise, and re-imagine contemporary understandings of human differences and embodiment such as critical race studies, feminist/womanist studies, class-based analyses, queer studies, trans-gender studies, and other critical perspectives linked to social justice initiatives.
While all proposals and topics are welcome, this theme encourages submissions that attend to local conditions, including those in our host city of Philadelphia, within a global context and to cultures of empowerment and resistance within the complexity of global exploitation and opportunities.
Questions about the application process or other administrative matters may be directed to the SDS Executive Office at conference@disstudies.org.
Overall questions can be directed to either of the Program Committee Co-Chairs:
David Mitchell, Temple University, dmitchel@temple.edu
Devva Kasnitz, University of California, Berkeley, devva@earthlink.net
To read the full CFP, review application guidelines, or to submit a proposal, visit: http://www.disstudies.org/conference/2010/cfp.
Things you can do from here:
- Subscribe to Media dis&dat using Google Reader
- Get started using Google Reader to easily keep up with all your favorite sites
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
xkcd - A Webcomic - National Language
Sent to you by moya via Google Reader:
Things you can do from here:
- Subscribe to guerrilla mama using Google Reader
- Get started using Google Reader to easily keep up with all your favorite sites
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
There's a Rep for that...
Sent to you by moya via Google Reader:
via Blog for Democracy by Catherine on 10/17/09
Walking Up Now has a great take on the now famous iPhone "app" commercials.
h/t: ER
Things you can do from here:
- Subscribe to Blog for Democracy using Google Reader
- Get started using Google Reader to easily keep up with all your favorite sites
"When a person of privilege is accused of having been negligent (or racist, ...
Sent to you by moya via Google Reader:
via guerrilla mama on 10/20/09
"When a person of privilege is accused of having been negligent (or racist, or sexist, or…), a classic move we often see is the accused dissolving into sobs. They will berate themselves, they will proclaim how terrible they feel, they will soak your t-shirt with their tears. In other words, instead of owning up for whatever they did and focusing on the pain they caused – and how to reduce it – they completely focus on their own pain. In fact, they revel in it"- Anita Tedaldi, Guilt and White Privilege | Love Isn't Enough - on raising a family in a colorstruck world
Things you can do from here:
- Subscribe to guerrilla mama using Google Reader
- Get started using Google Reader to easily keep up with all your favorite sites
Friday, October 16, 2009
"When I feed the poor, they call me a saint. When I ask why so many people a...
Sent to you by moya via Google Reader:
via guerrilla mama on 10/16/09
"When I feed the poor, they call me a saint. When I ask why so many people are poor, they call me communist."- Dom Helder Câmara, late archbishop of the Brazilian diocese of Olinda and Recife. Wednesday, Oct. 13 was the 10th anniversary of his death. (Source: Guardian via OffTheMap (via sharethetaste) (via bmckinney) (via amberlrhea) (via champagnecandy) (via bowfolk)
Things you can do from here:
- Subscribe to guerrilla mama using Google Reader
- Get started using Google Reader to easily keep up with all your favorite sites
What We Talk About When We Talk About Language
Sent to you by moya via Google Reader:
via FWD/Forward by meloukhia on 10/16/09
There are a lot of things we talk about when we talk about language, of course, but it's worth highlighting something important: when we talk about language, we don't talk about what it used to mean, or what it is supposed to mean, or what you think it means. We talk about how society uses language, right now. Because it's the social use of language which can turn language into a weapon, and it's the engrained nature of ableist language which makes it so harmful.
One of the most common defenses I see of ableist language is "well, it doesn't mean that anymore."
So, my question is, what does it mean?
One of the things I like to do when I am illustrating why language is exclusionary is I plug in a commonly-known original meaning of the word in question into a sentence. Let's take "lame," which is generally taken to mean "has difficulty walking" or "limps," although the original use was actually just "broken."
So, if someone says "this television show is lame" and you turn the sentence into "this television show has difficulty walking," it doesn't really make sense, right? Just like when you say "this social activity which I am being forced to do by my parent is a homosexual man," it doesn't really make sense. And this should tell you something. It should tell you that the word you are using has an inherently pejorative meaning.
Which means, actually, you're totally right when you say a word "doesn't mean that anymore." In fact, it's gone from being a value neutral term used to describe a state of being to being a pejorative. A pejorative so universally accepted that you can expect users to understand exactly what you mean when you say it. When you say "this television show is lame" you mean it's bad, not worth your time, boring, etc., and here's the trick: People understand that meaning and they derive it from the word that you have used, because that word is universally accepted as objectively bad.
People often accuse people like me of being "language police." I've been informed that addressing exclusionary language is limiting, too restrictive, etc. That's not actually the case. Being aware of my own language use has, in fact, enriched my use of the English language, because it has forced me to actually think about what I am saying and how I say it. And I grew up in the household of an English professor, so I know my English.
Instead of using an exclusionary pejorative, why not find a word use which actually describes what we mean?
That guy who cut me off at the intersection the other day wasn't an idiot. He was arrogant, perhaps. He may also have been reckless, thoughtless, careless, unobservant, or possibly just a moldering toe-rag. But he wasn't an idiot. So, why would I use the word "idiot" to describe him? And why would I tolerate that word from someone else?
Using inclusionary language is actually fun. You get to explore the roots of words you use, you get to find new and exciting words to use, and you get to learn more about the structure of a language you speak every day. It constantly amazes me to see how quickly exclusionary terms trip to my tongue when I'm in a hurry, because they are so ingrained as appropriate pejoratives. I'm actually relishing the process of eradicating them from my spoken and written language, because I love words and language play.
And I loathe essentialism. I loathe "well, it's a value neutral term." No, it's not. If it was value neutral, it would not be in use as a pejorative. I loathe "no one really means that anymore." Yes, they do, because if they didn't, they would use a different word. Just like no one calls a "train" an "iron horse" anymore.
Things you can do from here:
- Subscribe to FWD/Forward using Google Reader
- Get started using Google Reader to easily keep up with all your favorite sites
Thursday, October 15, 2009
UtneReader.com: 50 Visionaries Who Are Changing Your World
Utne Reader
This page was sent to you by: moyazb@gmail.com
50 Visionaries Who Are Changing Your World
50 revolutionary inventors, innovative environmentalists, vociferous outcasts, and intrepid reformers with an unwavering, inexhaustible sense of purpose in their work.
moyazb@gmail.com wrote:
Yay for the wonder twin and my advisor!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)