I had never heard Randall Kennedy speak until last week when he appeared on Fareed Zakaria’s Global Public Square. I was impressed. Until then, I had only a vague notion of who he was - a prominent African-American public intellectual. I now understand that he is a law professor at Harvard University and the author of a number of books, including, memorably, Nigger: The Strange Career of a Troublesome Word (2002).
Like any white person with at least a minimal sense of decency, I feel a certain measure of discomfort writing that title, given the prominence of the racial slur that is its subject. But I decided to write it out despite my discomfort. And I think I’m going to have to read the book in its entirety, given my interest in sociolinguistics and racial relations.
The n-word (by which I will identify it from now on) is peculiarly harsh in its impact. No other racial or ethnic slur carries the nasty punch that the n-word does. I’ve long believed its uniquely nasty quality reflects the viciousness of racial oppression itself. The reason for this, as far as I can tell, is that when used by a white person, it automatically calls up the cruelty and injustice of racial oppression and does so approvingly. To use that slur is to say through subtext, “You, black person, are stuck in a lowly category that allows me to look down on you every time I glance your way, and you have to accept it because that’s just the way things are. So, screw you.”
The word, in other words, is not simply an insult in the way that words like scumbag, dipshit, and asshole are. It’s an ethnic slur that echoes the dark spirit of an entire social order, a grossly unjust and cruel social order. This order is the source of the word’s poison. Those who use it are, consciously or not, strutting and preening themselves while trampling on the injured limbs and pummeled bodies of the system’s victims.
I have noticed in my lifetime that the n-word has replaced the f-word as the most unacceptable item in polite conversation. This is a good thing, and it reflects some of the positive changes that Professor Kennedy noted in his GPS remarks. Kennedy also noted that many of the phrases we use today have been weaponized and so have lost their usefulness in our current efforts to push social improvements further along. According to him these no longer useful terms include racism, structural racism, and, of course, critical race theory.
I agree.
It seems to me that the biggest issue facing us since the upheaval of the Trump years is best framed not as black vs. white, but as fair play and decency vs. malpractice. The key issue is the survival of the democratic institutions that we rely on to promote justice. The central political question should be, “Is your party for democracy and fair play or against them?”
If I were advising Democratic party leaders on future elections, I would recommend putting more emphasis on America’s longstanding promise of democracy and justice for everyone, and less emphasis on fighting racism per se. The Republican party is trying to cast Democrats as anti-white by coughing up the idea of critical race theory and claiming it lies at the heart of the Democratic party. For Republican propagandists the hope is that they can make white Americans feel inherently criticized by the Democrats. Their scheme is aimed at driving moderate whites away from the Democrats and into the GOP.
Let’s not take the bait. The real issues are not race, nor criticism about race relations, but justice and democracy. The Republicans have aligned themselves against both of these with their slew of new restrictive voting laws. Let’s fight them with all we have, not across the black-white seam, but on the front where we are sure to win, the fair play and decency divide. The Republicans have rejected these American values and that’s where we should be hitting them hardest. I can’t speak for Professor Kennedy, of course, but my sense is that he would agree with this approach.
Professor Randall Kennedy
