# Check my intuition here--the N word was never respectful, correct? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 28, 2013, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/check-my-intuition-here-the-n-word-was-never-respectful-correct/662135 "2013-06-28T16:21:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2013, 1:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/check-my-intuition-here-the-n-word-was-never-respectful-correct/662135/81 "2013-07-02T13:05:24Z")
> [@jayjay](#): > > Both of those examples are from British authors and either during or soon after the British colonial period, so they could be considered a separate issue from American use of the word. _Childhood’s End_ is not during or soon after the British colonial period, and the story was first published in America. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2013, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/check-my-intuition-here-the-n-word-was-never-respectful-correct/662135/82 "2013-07-02T19:32:22Z")
> [@pulykamell](#): > > I don’t think anyone is arguing that it wasn’t an everyday word in certain circles at a certain time. The question is was it ever respectful? That, and I quote: “in the fifties and sixties, many black people demanded to be called ‘nigger’ as a term of respect.” That just sounds nuts. Agreed. My mom, raised in _de facto_ segregated Elizabeth, N.J. in the Thirties and Forties, had a beloved maid/cook who she still refers to, from time to time, as a Negro, “because that’s what Betty called herself” (my sisters and I have pretty much given up trying to correct her). But my mom would never, ever use the word “nigger.” That was low-class and hateful, she was taught, and as I learned to my great embarrassment when I, as a very little kid repeating playground chatter, once used the word. > [@Shodan](#): > > …In Arthur C. Clarke’s novel _Childhood’s End_, after the aliens arrive, “n\*gger” has become the commonly accepted term for black people. It didn’t sound plausible to me either… I reread _Childhood’s End_ a year or so ago, and remember no such reference. Perhaps it was edited out of later editions? It would be particularly surprising to me if Clarke used the word, as IIRC he made it a point to have the last surviving human being on Earth, Jan Rodricks, be black. ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2013, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/check-my-intuition-here-the-n-word-was-never-respectful-correct/662135/83 "2013-07-02T23:56:10Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > _Childhood’s End_ is not during or soon after the British colonial period, and the story was first published in America. > > Regards, > Shodan The British colonial period largely ended with India’s independence in 1947 (and could be said to have lasted until Belize declared independence in 1981, with the Falklands War being the last gasp). Childhood’s End was published in 1953. And Clarke was British, regardless of where the story was published. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2013, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/check-my-intuition-here-the-n-word-was-never-respectful-correct/662135/84 "2013-12-30T14:50:40Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > Two anecdotes from literature - > [ul][li]In Arthur C. Clarke’s novel _Childhood’s End_, after the aliens arrive, “n_gger" has become the commonly accepted term for black people. It didn’t sound plausible to me either.[/li][li]In C.S.Forrester’s excellent novel The General, there is a brief aside where someone refers to a candidate for a promotion by saying "works like a n_gger, and plenty of brains”. This is the only example I have encountered in which the term is used as part of a compliment, and it is not addressed to, or in the presence of, any black people. [/ul]I have heard the term used semi-descriptively. My late grandmother told use that, in her youth, she referred to Brazil nuts as “n_gger toes" and to the balcony in movie theaters as "n_gger heaven”. But she recognized, later, that this was offensive, and AFAIK no black person ever requested to be addressed as “n\*gger” - first it was Negro, then colored, then Afro-American, then black, then African American.[/li] I just re-read L.M. Montgomery’s “Rainbow Valley,” a volume in her Anne of Green Gable’s children’s book series, and was astonished to see the expression “work like a n\*gger” used by a child. Apparently in early 1900’s Canada, the expression was commonplace and not offensive. ---
**Author:** ![D.E.S.K.Top668](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f07891/32.png) [@D.E.S.K.Top668](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/D.E.S.K.Top668)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2013, 2:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/check-my-intuition-here-the-n-word-was-never-respectful-correct/662135/85 "2013-12-31T02:05:21Z")
> [@Annie-Xmas](#): > > I just re-read L.M. Montgomery’s “Rainbow Valley,” a volume in her Anne of Green Gable’s children’s book series, and was astonished to see the expression “work like a n\*gger” used by a child. Apparently in early 1900’s Canada, the expression was commonplace and not offensive. No offence, but “commonplace” and “not offensive” are not the same thing. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2013, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/check-my-intuition-here-the-n-word-was-never-respectful-correct/662135/86 "2013-12-31T02:14:16Z")
Quite true. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2013, 3:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/check-my-intuition-here-the-n-word-was-never-respectful-correct/662135/87 "2013-12-31T03:35:38Z")
> [@Annie-Xmas](#): > > Did anyone here read _Gone With the Wind_? The term was an everyday word. Yes. And at one point in the novel, after Scarlett uses the word, she then realizes that her mother would have been scandalized at her doing so, because her mother was very prim and proper, and that kind of language was _unladylike_. ---
**Author:** ![Hey\_Hey\_Paula](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/85e7bf/32.png) [@Hey\_Hey\_Paula](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hey_Hey_Paula)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2013, 4:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/check-my-intuition-here-the-n-word-was-never-respectful-correct/662135/88 "2013-12-31T04:11:25Z")
> [@cochrane](#): > > I grew up in Pennsylvania in the 60s and was taught that “nigger” was rude and disrespectful and never to be used. “Colored” and “Negro” were considered to be acceptable terms, though. I grew up in Southern California in the 60’s, and I was taught the same thing. Reenforced by the fact that Grandma (my great-grandmother) would have slapped us kids upside the head if she caught us using that word! ---
**Author:** ![Eonwe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eonwe/32/240_2.png) [@Eonwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eonwe)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2013, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/check-my-intuition-here-the-n-word-was-never-respectful-correct/662135/89 "2013-12-31T04:26:10Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > I know the word was used casually without a lot of animus in many times and places, but the claim at issue was that some black people in the fifties and sixties _demanded_ to be called “nigger!” [Don’t Call Me Nigger, Whitey](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vn27lIzAHV4), Sly and the Family Stone, 1969. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2013, 4:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/check-my-intuition-here-the-n-word-was-never-respectful-correct/662135/90 "2013-12-31T04:47:18Z")
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