Pulitzer Prize-winning artist Kendrick Lamar gave the world a lesson in pragmatic linguistic competence recently, when he halted a live performance after a white fan he invited on stage failed to check herself while rapping along to “m.A.A.d City.”
The rapper was performing at the Hangout Festival in Gulf Shores, Alabama, and had been inviting fans to rap along. A white woman named Delaney took the mic and then repeated the numerous N-words found in the “m.A.A.d City” lyrics, prompting Lamar to stop the music. Delaney, who had already shown a remarkable amount of confidence, seemed confused. “Aren’t I cool enough for you? What’s up, bro?”
While fans boo’ed, Kendrick said, “you got to bleep one single word, though.”
Who can or can’t say the N-word, particularly the version that appears in rap, continues to be a debate worth having evidently.
Linguistics student Aliah Luckman, offered a terrific explanation as to why the word is problematic last spring, right around the time Bill Maher was forced to apologize for making a “house nigger” joke in a televised exchange with an utterly startled Senator Ben Sasse (R-Neb.)
In a tweet stream now shared more than 41,000 times, she explains in extraordinary detail how damaging the slur has always been, how the diminutive form “nigga” came to be, and how to assess when controversial words can be used:
“[P]ragmatic competence is the ability to use language appropriately under various circumstances. These circumstances include the purpose for communicating, the relative status of those communicating, and the location of communication.”
So, even if Delaney’s black friend says it’s okay to say “my nigga” in their home, Delaney should not feel it’s okay to use the word at the mall. Or anyplace else. And if Delaney accidentally belts out the word performing a track in front of God, her neighbors, and Kendrick Lamar, she should apologize.
When Delaney was confronted with her mistake, she apologized. “I was used to singing it like you wrote it,” she said. Pragmatic competence delayed, not deferred.
Last fall, the writer Ta-Nehisi Coates fielded the question of why white people can’t use the N-word during an event at Evanston Township High School in Illinois. His response was extraordinarily helpful.
He began by saying that it’s normal for certain subcultures to use terms that other people don’t, but this one word seems to pull people up short. “The question one must ask is why so many white people have difficulty extending things that are basic laws of how human beings interact to black people,” he said.
In other words, Why do you feel entitled to this word in either its vile or repurposed form?:
“The experience of being a hip-hop fan and not being able to use the word ‘nigger’ is actually very, very insightful. It will give you just a little peek into the world of what it means to be black. Because to be black is to walk through the world and watch people doing things that you cannot do, that you can’t join in and do. So I think there’s actually a lot to be learned from refraining.”
“The experience of being a hip-hop fan and not being able to use the word ‘nigger’ is actually very, very insightful. It will give you just a little peek into the world of what it means to be black. Because to be black is to walk through the world and watch people doing things that you cannot do, that you can’t join in and do. So I think there’s actually a lot to be learned from refraining.”
It’s a fact that a fan named Rohan Ghosh seemed to grasp. Ghosh wowed the crowd immediately before Delaney but opted to move the mic away from his mouth at N-word time to avoid even the slightest chance that it would tumble out. All that time practicing alone in his room finally paid off.
Lamar gave Delaney a second chance, and she finished her performance N-word free.
“Be a Rohan, not a Delaney,” said the crowd, driving the lesson home.
Clearly, refraining is a journey. One white raceAhead reader says that her young teen girls have taken to substituting the word “neighbor” when they rap along with their favorite stars. “It’s weird, but it works,” she says.
It is weird. But the pragmatic competence it shows is laudable.
Although some words are not for everyone, redemption is. If you make a mistake, apologize, learn, and do better. Neighbor, we gon’ be alright. Do you hear me, do you feel me? We gon’ be alright.