If I were black, I would prefer “colored” as opposed “black” or “African American”. “Colored” sounds more…well…colorful to me.
That brought back memories. I used to work for a black guy who would tell ignorant people this all the time.
He had a similar response for when someone would say “you people”.
His name was Leroy Ceasar. I learned a lot from that man.
Dutchman: The “pretentious and vaguely sneering” was my impression of American cultural usage, in response to the GQ asked – by no means a condemnation of individuals (except, perhaps, Ms. Lohan).
“Low Country” is not a reference to the “Low Countries” of Europe, but rather to the regional term for the Coastal Plain of the Carolinas and Georgia, where an elderly white matron might use “Colored” with no intent to defame but because it was the culturally courteous usage she grew up with. My landlady’s mother, who died a couple of years ago, was precisely the sort of person I had in mind – “Truman did a good thing for the Colored folk” [in desegregating the military] is a quote I can remember from her, and should evidence the attitude I was trying to distinguish.
I’m quite happy to take the word of the NAACP quoted in the second post above. Just because a word is outmoded does not necessarily make it offensive.
My grandmother used the word colored up to the day she died. But she was born in 1900 so she had an excuse.
You probably wouldn’t, since you’d be more aware of the racial baggage attached to the word instead of just thinking about how it sounds.
Yes, I was generously assuming she meant “president of color”.
Has anyone confirmed that she actually said that? I heard the audio clip, and she mumbles so much over that word, that I can’t tell what she said. Sounded more like “kinda” than “colored” to me.
The phrase “Black is Beautiful” was widely used in the 60s and 70s, IIRC. The people who used it most often were not white people.
When and why did the use of the word “Negro” go out of use?
And why do Black people have to be called African-American? Why can’t they simply be called American, if they are citizens of America? Why do we have Irish-American or Italian-American, etc., etc. I expect any day now people will begin to refer to me as Texan-American. I won’t like it, either.
Texan-American is redundant. Besides, I sort of like the Irish/Italian/Armenian/Japanese/African-American thing. In my mind, it underscores the idea that anyone can come here and be an American (and yes I do realize that most Africans did not come here by choice).
I live in southern California and most African-Americans I know prefer to be called “black”. Not sure if this is true in other places though…
If anything, he’d have even more right to the term “African American” than anyone else.
My grandparents generally use the term “colored”, but then, they were all born in the late 1910s, early 1920s, so it’s pretty much acceptable for them, wouldn’t you say?
“Black” is outdated? Without exception, every single black man that I know refers to himself as “black.” The vast majority of black women I know do, too. There are only a couple – and they stick out due to being odd – that insist on “African-American.”
At home, we call black people “negros” but only when speaking Spanish.
I couldn’t figure out which post you were responding to, but what I remember in the 60’s and into the 70’s was Black with a capital B. People still use black but not Black as a proper noun, as though it were a nationality.