Posted by
Andrews on Thursday, February 28, 2008 10:11:59 PM
One evening, many years ago, I found myself almost alone in a neighborhood bar, talking to the bartender, a friend of mine who was 100% Blackfoot, and a tourist who was half Zuni and half black. As I am a very, very tiny bit Cherokee (or so family legend tells), the conversation turned to people with an Indian heritage, and we discovered that we had all come independently to the same conclusion. Each of us, at some point, had decided that the term "Native American" is worthless. Not just because, technically, anyone born in the Americas is a "native" American, but because it is no more accurate than Indian. All three of us agreed that anyone wanting to be accurate would do better to refer to the specific tribe to which someone belongs, otherwise, the familiar term "Indian" is no more or less insulting and inaccurate than "Native American", so why adopt a new, strange, and somewhat inaccurate term which has no advantage over the older, familiar word?
Since then, I have discovered a PC neologism that is even worse, that being "African American."
Why is this such a bad word?
First, it is often used as a simple substitute for "black", being inserted where black would appear previously. But this does not always work, and, with an inattentive writer, you sometimes end up with silly phrases such as "British African-Americans" to describe blacks from England.
Second, as the phrase above shows, it makes it very hard to describe race when referring to foreigners. Black and white can be applied to any nationality, but, if we must use "African-Americans", how do we describe someone black from England? An "African-Englishman"? And if they are from the continent of Africa are they "African-Africans"?
Third, it wrongly implies that the continent of Africa is entirely populated by blacks, which is simply incorrect. From Arabs in the north to the whites scattered throughout the continent to the many Asians living in former British colonies, there are many non-blacks who have resided in Africa for generations, yet, should they migrate to the US, they would not become "African-Americans".That makes little sense, forcing them to lose their African identity simply because PC dogma dictates the mistaken belief that "African" and "black" are synonyms.
Given all these problems, I just cannot bring myself to use the silly phrase "African-American". Even the clumsy "person of color" which preceded the popularity of African American was a better choice. (Though the closeness to "colored person" made it sound horribly old-fashioned.) At the time, I thought changing "black" to "person of color" was a strange decision, and made most sentences quite awkward and ugly. Now, however, having lived for years with "African-American", I would welcome a return to "person of color".
Better yet, can we just keep "black"? It was not an offensive term, and I never understood the need to abandon it. It is descriptive, it makes a nice parallel to "white" (which is still used), and I don't see how it could possibly offend anyone.(It is no more inaccurate a description of people's complexion than "white" is, and few are offended by being labeled "white".) I know that it is in the nature of PC beliefs to have to change terms every few months, as inevitably someone gets offended by any given existing word and we are forced to adopt a somewhat less offensive replacement (until the next aggrieved party arises), but in this one case, can we get some sort of waiver?
Barring that, can someone at least come up with something less completely silly than "African American"? Almost any alternative has to be better.