Going beyond hate speech: The pragmatics of ethnic slur terms

Lodz Papers in Pragmatics 14.1 (2018): 25–43 Special issue on Narrating hostility, challenging hostile narratives https://doi.org/10.1515/lpp-2018-0002 Björn Technau The German Immersion School of New York GOING BEYOND HATE SPEECH: THE PRAGMATICS OF ETHNIC SLUR TERMS Abstract Ethnic slur terms (“nigger”, “kike”, “kraut”) and other group-based slurs (“faggot”, “spaz”) must be differentiated from general pejoratives (“asshole”, “idiot”) and pure expressives (“fuck”). As these terms pejoratively refer to certain groups of people, they are a typical feature of hate speech contexts where they serve xenophobic speakers in expressing their hatred for an entire group of people. However, slur terms are actually far more frequently used in other contexts and are more often exchanged among friends than between enemies. Hate speech can be identified as the most central, albeit not the most frequent, mode of use. I broadly distinguish between hate speech (central use), other pejorative uses (mobbing, insulting), parasitic uses (banter, appropriation, comedy, youth language), neutral mentioning (academics, PC), and unaware uses. In this paper, authentic examples of use and frequency estimates from empirical research will help provide accurate definitions and insight into these different modes that purely theoretical approaches cannot achieve. Keywords slurs, pragmatics, conversation analysis, hate speech, appropriation 1 Introduction At a time of right-wing populism and hate crimes on the rise (Amnesty International 20181), ethnic slur terms have become a central object of investigation in (applied) linguistics and interdisciplinary research (psychology, sociology, law, pedagogy, philosophy, among others). Most approaches to pejoration in the philosophy of language are either driven by moral values (Hornsby 2001; Hom and May 2013) or limit themselves to theoretical views, and thus fail to fully capture the reality of our speech communities. In order to provide an accurate description of the pragmatics of ethnic slur terms, we have to gather data from authentic contexts of use. Otherwise, erroneous assumptions arise such as the common supposition that ethnic slur terms are predominantly used (a) in hate speech contexts, and (b) by bigots towards the oppressed. My analysis of ethnic slurs is based on empirical data and follows studies such as those by Bartlett et al. (2014) who investigated the different 1 https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/research/2018/02/annual-report-201718/ Angemeldet | bjoerntechnau@gmail.com Autorenexemplar Heruntergeladen am | 24.09.18 23:29 26 Björn Technau Going beyond hate speech: The pragmatics of ethnic slur terms uses of slur terms by analyzing over 100,000 tweets on Twitter. The results of their study are in line with my own findings, which are drawn from conversation analysis and survey questionnaires (Technau 2018). When it comes to non-pejorative uses of slur terms, such as banter and appropriation, for instance, it is especially important to present empirical evidence of their high frequencies of use and to distinguish them from hate speech, “the native provenance of the word” (Nunberg, forthcoming: 62). 2 Slur terms and hate speech 2.1 Ethnic slur terms as group-based slurs Slur terms have been classified along different typologies and definitions (for a complex overview, see Nunberg, forthcoming: 4–8; Technau 2018: 3–11). For the purpose of this paper, let us simply distinguish between slurs that are group-based (ethnic slur terms and other group-based slurs) and those that are not, such as general pejoratives (“fucker”). Note that only for group-based slurs (“wetback”) we can find an NPC2 (“Mexican”). The question of whether we can find an NPC for a given slur term is closely related to the question of whether there is a certain (religious, ethnic, political, etc.) group of people (GP) that the slur term under consideration refers to or not. The intention to insult someone can be accomplished with all kinds of slurs, as they are all pejorative and offensive. However, group-based slurs stand out from other slurs due to a more complex semantics comprising a referential meaning component (Technau 2018: 73–99). Speakers cannot easily and convincingly justify that their use of a group-based slur was only expressive and not in reference to the denotated group at all, as the negative evaluation is based on GP membership, not on certain behaviors or attitudes, as in the case of “asshole”: “‘Asshole’ is a basic category of our everyday existence, our reflexive remonstrance for people who behave thoughtlessly or arrogantly on the job, in personal relationships, or just circulating in public” (Nunberg 2012: 22). While certain behaviors might be worthy of contempt (Richard 2008: 34), this does not apply to GP membership because, as Hom and May (2013: 295) observe, “there are no morally evaluable traits (good or bad) that are heritable on the basis of race, gender, sexual orientation, and the like”. We find different proposals in the literature on how to linguistically account for the complex meaning of ethnic slur terms. One of the suggested tools for their semantic analysis is the formula xy and despicable because of it, which has proved useful in a variety of approaches (Saka 2007; Richard 2008; Hom 2008; Vallée 2014). The negative evaluation, despicable because of it, is described by Vallée (2014: 82) as “a general, non-specific prejudice” against the denotated group xy. This is what makes group-based slurs suitable for hate NPC stands for non-pejorative correlate and can be defined as “the expression that picks out the supposed extension of the epithet but without expressing derogation toward members of that extension” (Hom 2008: 3). 2 Angemeldet | bjoerntechnau@gmail.com Autorenexemplar Heruntergeladen am | 24.09.18 23:29 Lodz Papers in Pragmatics 14.1 (2018): 25–43 Special issue on Narrating hostility, challenging hostile narratives https://doi.org/10.1515/lpp-2018-0002 27 speech contexts, as they serve as efficient tools for racist speakers to represent an entire group of people as despicable just because of being that group. 2.2 Hate speech as the most central use When group-based slurs are used in hate speech contexts, we can assume that “what is said” and what is meant (Grice 1989) are actually in line with each other, which is also why I consider this use the most central of all. In other modes of use (section 3), speakers tend to play with word meaning. Hate speech, however, is about the denigration of people based on their GP membership, it is about the expression of hatred toward groups of people that are perceived to be in opposition to the speaker’s own group. The slurs are used referentially (xy/GP) in these contexts and also pejoratively (despicable because of it). Among the many hate speech definitions we find in the literature and in the form of various campus speech codes, let’s focus on the one given by the Legal Definitions and Legal Terms Dictionary of US Legal, Inc.3 Hate speech is a communication that carries no meaning other than the expression of hatred for some group, especially in circumstances in which the communication is likely to provoke violence. It is an incitement to hatred primarily against a group of persons defined in terms of race, ethnicity, national origin, gender, religion, sexual orientation, and the like. Hate speech can be any form of expression regarded as offensive to racial, ethnic and religious groups and other discrete minorities or to women. Note that group-based slurs are not explicitly included in this definition, however, due to their multi-layered meaning composition, they are reflective of what hate speech is always about (“the expression of hatred toward some group”; “form of expression regarded as offensive to racial, ethnic and religious groups and other discrete minorities or to women”), and therefore, they are readily used in hate speech contexts. Slur terms are not a necessary feature in a given instance of hate speech because “[l]anguage does not require the use of slurs in order to be hateful” (Bartlett et al. 2014: 8). This is illustrated by recent political, social and cultural developments in the world. In their latest annual report, Amnesty International speaks of the “politics of demonization [that have] become mainstream” (Amnesty International 2018: 12) and that “lead us only towards conflict and brutality” (Amnesty International 2018: 14). An example of this are the “efforts of US President Donald Trump to ban entry to all citizens of several Muslim-majority countries based on their nationality [which] was a transparently hateful move” (Amnesty 2018: 13). However, as Saul (2018) points out, politicians typically avoid racist statements that are too obvious as that would put their success in jeopardy; instead, some of them appeal to voters’ latent racism without their full awareness.4 They reach that goal by making use of dogwhistle 3 4 https://definitions.uslegal.com/h/hate-speech/ Given that most people do not (want to openly) consider or define themselves as racists, let alone their president. Angemeldet | bjoerntechnau@gmail.com Autorenexemplar Heruntergeladen am | 24.09.18 23:29 28 Björn Technau Going beyond hate speech: The pragmatics of ethnic slur terms terms (“inner city crime”, “welfare dependency”) or “racial figleaves”. The latter is coined by Saul (2018) to describe additional utterances providing “just enough cover for an utterance that would otherwise be seen as clearly racist. The figleaf serves to undermine the audience’s confidence that the racist utterance really is racist”. For instance, after claiming that Mexican immigrants are rapists, Donald Trump added the figleaf line “Some, I assume, are good people”, providing cover for the otherwise obvious racism in his speech.5 Other examples of hate speech have reached world-wide audiences, as well, as for instance in the case of the Charlottesville rally in 2017, where white nationalists used slogans like (1) “You will not replace us” clearly exhibiting their fear that outgroups might infringe on their supremacy. Verbal denigrations and dissociations are typically the first step in strategies of oppression, enslavement, or homicide (Biffar 1994: 249); they have always preceded acts of suppression (the Holocaust in Germany, the Apartheid in South Africa, slavery in the United States), and they supposedly rationalized the subsequent atrocities. “Whom we will oppress, we first demonize” (Delgado and Stefancic 2004: 23). According to the first study6 in Bartlett et al. (2014), ideologically driven uses that call for action are by far the least frequent mode of use of ethnic slur terms. The following tweet (Bartlett et al. 2014: 19) serves as an example: (2) The raghead/muslims will subjugate us FROM WITHIN… Bartlett et al. (2014) have empirically investigated the different uses of ethnic slur terms7. According to their studies, “there are approximately 10,000 uses per day of racist and ethnic slur terms in English (about 1 in every 15,000 tweets)” (Bartlett et al. 2014: 6). Their studies add evidence that ethnic slur terms are indeed used in very different modes, pejoratively and non-pejoratively, and that hate speech uses are actually comparatively rare. In the following, we will take a closer look at such uses that deviate from hate speech. 5 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TML2cApMueU Bartlett et al (2014) examined their data set (126,975 tweets containing ethnic slur terms, collected over a period of 9 days) in two different ways: (1) using a software platform (AAF) to isolate tweets of interest and then identify the different modes of use; (2) undertaking a detailed manual analysis of a random selection of tweets drawn from the same data. 7 To that end, they consulted a list of ethnic slur terms on Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ethnic_ slurs) and deliberately excluded other kinds of group-based slurs: “We have made the decision to focus this work on ‘racial, religious, and ethnic slurs’, and excluded homophobic, misogynist or other types of identity based slurs” (Bartlett et al. 2014: 4). 6 Angemeldet | bjoerntechnau@gmail.com Autorenexemplar Heruntergeladen am | 24.09.18 23:29 Lodz Papers in Pragmatics 14.1 (2018): 25–43 Special issue on Narrating hostility, challenging hostile narratives https://doi.org/10.1515/lpp-2018-0002 29 3 Different modes of use 3.1 Pejorative, non-pejorative, and neutral uses When we look at authentic examples of use, some seem easier to be assigned to a certain category (hate speech) than others (banter). I broadly distinguish between pejorative, nonpejorative, and neutral uses. The latter category refers to academic or pedagogical contexts, in which slurs are metalinguistically reflected and usually only mentioned but not used. Nevertheless, it is an important category, as well, as these instances are among the sources that may inform our speech communities about a slur term’s individual degree of offensiveness (Technau 2016: 212). Examples of such instances can be found in speech codes that mention the prohibited expressions or in linguistic investigations of such terms, as for instance in: (3) [Cunt] is generally considered the most offensive word in British English.” (Culpeper 2011: 115) (4) [S]peakers have a pretty good understanding of the lexical, negative ordering of slurs (e.g. “nigger” is worse than “chink” is worse than “limey”, etc.). (Hom 2010: 175) Whereas hate speech, appropriation and metalinguistic reflections can be easily assigned to one of the three categories (pejorative, non-pejorative, neutral), it seems more difficult when slurs are used in (allegedly) humorous contexts, like in comedy or banter. “[I]t is a critical characteristic of humorously signalled discourse that any serious intention and any serious meaning can always be denied” (Mulkay 1988: 71). Also, the underlying speaker intentions are oftentimes multi-faceted. Even if the hearer acknowledges them as humorous, he still faces the complex task of figuring out if seriousness was hidden by the humorous turn, and if yes, to which degree (for the various cues that help a hearer arrive at their evaluations, see Technau 2017: 106–112). The outcomes of such evaluation processes are uncertain, and “the indeterminate nature of the boundary between serious and humorous content leaves that boundary open to social negotiation” (Mulkay 1988: 69). Considering the different meaning layers and audience interpretations, Weaver (2011: 252) speaks of “liquid racism” that is “difficult to collect or identify because it may escape or dissolve before it can be contained”. Pérez (2017) points out that in a society where racist talk has become taboo, public controversies concerning race rather occur under the guise of fun and humor. This way, racist sentiments and ideologies can be reinforced, and racist humor “remains widespread today across various social contexts and social institutions” (p. 957). In Technau (2018: 267), I propose the following categorization for the different modes of use (Table. 1). Pejorative uses are the most central modes of use, as they are “semantically basic, literal uses of slurring terms” (Jeshion 2013a: 251). Hate speech, however, stands out in this category and has to be distinguished from other pejorative uses. Insulting and mobbing, for instance, are usually not about the denigration of a whole group of people but about offending an individual (insulting), sometimes over a longer period of Angemeldet | bjoerntechnau@gmail.com Autorenexemplar Heruntergeladen am | 24.09.18 23:29 Björn Technau Going beyond hate speech: The pragmatics of ethnic slur terms 30 time and systematically (mobbing), e.g. in school or in the workplace (Embrick and Henricks 2013). Non-pejorative uses are parasitic in nature, as they build on the original pejorative uses, “their meanings parasitic on the literal use” (Jeshion 2013a: 247). In nonpejorative uses, speakers reach their goals via the pejorative meaning of the terms, for instance when they exploit it humorously or counteract an associated racist perspective. Croom (2013: 194) identifies non-pejorative uses within the target group (“the nonderogatory in-group8 use of slurs”) and distinguishes them from “(a) the paradigmatic derogatory use of slurs” and “(b) the non-paradigmatic derogatory use of slurs.” The latter category is what Jeshion (2013a: 238) calls G-extending uses, “[f]or example, a racist who knows that his taxi driver is Arabic and not African-American uses ‘Nigger’ in a way that is G-extending.” Table 1: Modes of use. expressive neutral pejorative non-pejorative Hate Speech Appropriation Insulting Mobbing Metalinguistic reflection Language planning Speech codes Humorous uses: Banter Comedy Other examples of this category include uses of “retard” and “faggot” in reference to nonmembers of the GP (non-referential uses). In such cases, speakers typically draw a connection to certain stereotypes about the GP and apply them to a target that is not a GP member. Jeshion (2013a) further identifies G-contracting uses where the targets are only represented by a certain subgroup of the GP, for instance, when Chris Rock says (5) “I love black people but I hate niggers.”9 8 Note that many authors (Jeshion 2013a; Croom 2014; Spotorno and Bianchi 2015; Popa-Wyatt and Wyatt 2017) equate GP membership with in-groups. In my own analysis of non-pejorative uses, I identify an in-group member via shared values and a target group member via GP membership. “In order to be a member of a certain in-group, one has to simply identify with that group (via shared values, for instance) and be accepted as such by the other members. A target group is the group of persons the slur term under consideration refers to semantically and often also targets in context” (Technau 2016: 191). 9 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f3PJF0YE-x4 Angemeldet | bjoerntechnau@gmail.com Autorenexemplar Heruntergeladen am | 24.09.18 23:29 Lodz Papers in Pragmatics 14.1 (2018): 25–43 Special issue on Narrating hostility, challenging hostile narratives https://doi.org/10.1515/lpp-2018-0002 31 I consider Jeshion’s G-referencing uses as the original convention and G-extending and Gcontracting uses as exploitations of this convention. Some G-extending uses seem to occur frequently enough to count as conventional uses, as well. However, as long as the speech community still has access to the referential meaning of a slur (“retard” vs. “idiot”), this mode of use must be analyzed as a deviation from the original convention, even if its frequency exceeds the original. 3.2 The use of ethnic slur terms With their empirical studies, Bartlett et al. (2014: 24–25) are able to identify six different modes of use of ethnic slur terms:10 I. Negative stereotypical attitude (ascribing physical or behavioural attributes to an individual or group, directly or indirectly) (6) Cannot believe some pikey shit stole the seat from my bike today! #thecheek #stillfuming II. Casual use of slurs (derogatory but no physical or behavioural attributes ascribed; term can be swapped out for a neutral term without affecting the meaning of the tweet) (7) having an emosh breakdown because i cant play harry potter : @@@ fucking pikey controllers not working why ps1&2 fukin pikey why :((( H E L P III. Targeted abuse (tweeted directly at a specific person; includes casual uses and negative stereotype uses) (8) @^^^ Hahahahahah thts alll u got fucken bitch like go fucken suck a cunt like I said bitttch ass nigga u fucken spic wetback Beaner (9) @^^^ you dirty little spick! IV. Appropriated (sarcastically or straight) (10) Omg I love being a spic :D (11) I'm a dirty paki and I'll blow up London in 5 years #ha V. Non-derogatory (descriptive or otherwise neutral; not hurtful or derogatory) 10 They excluded tweets that were lacking important information on preceding conversations or GP membership of sender / receiver, as well as tweets in which the slurs were reflected metalinguistically. Angemeldet | bjoerntechnau@gmail.com Autorenexemplar Heruntergeladen am | 24.09.18 23:29 32 Björn Technau Going beyond hate speech: The pragmatics of ethnic slur terms (12) @^^^ yeah u shud tbh [to be honest]. Coz not eating doesn't help. Just don't eat paki food. It's not the best when ur Ill VI. Offline action (ideologically driven; incitement to action and violence) (13) Attention all white boys, come and holla at some real niggas. RT @^^^: Me and @^^^ on our white boy search. (14) #101HispanicWaysToDie Come across the border Spic bastard *loads shotgun* Interestingly, it is category V that accounts for the greatest share of tweets by far:11 “Slurs are most commonly used in a non-offensive, non-abusive manner: to express in-group solidarity or non-derogatory description” (Bartlett et al. 2014: 7). In numbers: “[O]f the 10,000 tweets employing racial/ethnic slurs every day, 7,000 are employing them in a nonderogatory fashion” (Bartlett et al. 2014: 48). Category III, however, comprises relatively few tweets – 500 to 2,000 per day, “a prevalence of directed racially or ethnically prejudicial tweets of about 1 in 75,000 tweets in the English language” (Bartlett et al. 2014: 49). [E]thnic slurs are used as markers of group identity over twice as often than they are used as (apparently) prejudicial terms. (Bartlett et al. 2014: 40) Of [the] relevant tweets, we estimate here that over 70 percent can be classed as using these words as markers of group identity, as opposed to indicating racial/ethnic prejudice per se. (Bartlett et al. 2014: 48) These results contradict common assumptions about the pragmatics of ethnic slur terms, as for instance “that the utterance of slurs is […] derogatory in most contexts” (Croom 2011: 343). Nunberg (forthcoming: 2) also points out that both pejorative and non-pejorative uses of ethnic slur terms are rarely in direct address to a target that is present in the context of utterance. Following these insights, we have to reject two assumptions about the pragmatics of ethnic slur terms: (1) that they are predominantly used pejoratively, and (2) that their pejorative uses are mainly constituted by insulting speech acts in which speakers directly address individual GP members. Threats of extralinguistic violence (category VI) account for less than 100 tweets per day in the study by Bartlett et al. (2014). Category II comprises modes of use where speakers do not intend to cause offence; these account for 5-10% of the data set.12 What becomes obvious here is that we have to approach and analyze the single slur terms individually. “Different slurs are used very differently. One of the most common terms, ‘whitey’ is more often used in a non-derogatory, descriptive way compared to other terms, such as ‘coon’ or ‘spic’” (Bartlett et al. 2014: 7). Hence, it seems more likely 11 The automated analysis estimated a share of 70%; the analysts’ classification resulted in 47, 5% and, after adding category II, casual uses, in over 50%. 12 In my questionnaire survey (Technau 2018), participants rated the degree of offensiveness of some given slur terms on a 6-point Likert scale from not offensive at all to extremely offensive. For the item “Neger”, 10% of participants opted for not offensive at all, whereas for “Nigger”, no one chose the neutral level. Angemeldet | bjoerntechnau@gmail.com Autorenexemplar Heruntergeladen am | 24.09.18 23:29 Lodz Papers in Pragmatics 14.1 (2018): 25–43 Special issue on Narrating hostility, challenging hostile narratives https://doi.org/10.1515/lpp-2018-0002 33 to cause unintended offence with some slurs (“negro”) than with others (“nigger”) (Anderson and Lepore 2013: 25; Technau 2016: 200). Almost 50% of the German speaking participants in my questionnaire survey (Technau 2018: 113) assign the highest degree of offensiveness to the item “Nigger”; in contrast, only 19% of them assign the same degree (extremely offensive) to the item “Neger”. 3.3 Banter and appropriation As non-pejorative uses have the highest frequency, let us conclude this section by looking at two instances of such uses in more detail: banter and appropriation. Both of these phenomena are highly complex and deserve to be investigated astutely and with regards to authentic examples of use. Many authors (Saka 2007; Croom 2013; Anderson and Lepore 2013; Hom and May 2013) identify non-pejorative uses only within target groups. However, as empirical data and conversation analysis show (Technau 2013, 2018), the success of non-pejorative uses is not always dependent on the speaker’s GP / target group membership, but it is always dependent on the speaker’s solid relationship to the hearers and/or his membership in a certain in-group. Attitudes and modes of use cannot be properly drawn from the sexuality, skin color, nationality, or religion of the speaker. There are members of target groups who are indeed prejudiced against their own group themselves, and there are members who are strictly opposed to any kind of use of these terms, regardless of whether it is a pejorative or non-pejorative use.13 Aside from that, we find examples of non-target group members successfully using these terms non-pejoratively among their friends. “Banter is a social phenomenon most prominently accomplished through mock impoliteness. It is a common human means to entertain as well as to establish, confirm, and strengthen friendly relations” (Technau 2017: 99). A crucial characteristic of banter is the combination of provocative and playful aspects that we can analyze on a continuum from social bonding to dissociation. The assumption of such a continuum is necessary, given the diverse interpretations for one and the same banter activity by both people directly involved in the activity and those that are not (such as out-group analysts).14 In the following banter example, we find a heterosexual speaker echoing homophobic attitudes in reference to his homosexual friend, in the presence of their mutual friends. At the time of recording (November 2010), the speakers are all in their late twenties and friends for some 15 years. Accordingly, they look back at a long conversation history and have developed in-group “There is an ongoing movement within the African American community to ban the use of nigga. But despite efforts to erase the term from the active lexicon of African Americans, it continues to find considerable acceptance and use as a term of self-reference among African Americans” (Rahman 2012: 2). 14 “The interpreter is embedded in his or her own culture(s) which is also an influence on the analytical process. […] An important issue that the analyst needs to bear in mind is that the expectancies and evaluation of rituals differs greatly across societies” (Kádár and Bax 2013: 74). 13 Angemeldet | bjoerntechnau@gmail.com Autorenexemplar Heruntergeladen am | 24.09.18 23:29 Björn Technau Going beyond hate speech: The pragmatics of ethnic slur terms 34 rituals and styles including typical elements of youth language15 (hyperbole, irony, breach of taboo, neologisms, fictionalization), serving entertainment purposes and bonding experiences. The transcript starts in the middle of a casual conversation of the friends about their aversion to (paper) cuts. In this context, Bernd refers to his needle phobia he experiences every time he goes to donate blood in the local hospital (1–2). Torsten takes this opportunity to touch upon the controversial question in Germany of whether homosexuals should have the right to donate blood in the first place. He ostensibly assumes the perspective of the opponents in this discussion by apparently accusing his friend of donating his impure pansy16 blood. (15) “spendest auch noch dein UNreines TUNtenblut.” (8) Transcript: Tuntenblut [Pansy Blood]17 Informal get-together of close friends in a private apartment, Mainz (Germany), 11/10/2010 Speakers: Bernd (29), Niko (29), Torsten (29), Steffi (27) 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 oder JEdes mal beim blut spenden. ich muss mich JEdesmal so überwinden [und finds JEdesmal-] and every time I do blood donations. Every time I have to force myself [and every time I find it-] Torsten: [ja, es sei denn du bist so‘n GEIler penner der-] [for sure, unless you are one of these homeless jerks who-] Steffi: [pickst des?] [does it sting?] Bernd: "PIckst des?" da si- ich ne viertel stunde an dieser FEtten nadel hänge, ja. da krieg ich auch, ich krieg JEdesmal schwitzige hände (un so). "Does it sting?" – this fat needle is in my arm for like 15 minutes, so yeah. I get sweaty hands and stuff. Torsten: spendest auch noch dein UNreines TUNtenblut. shamelessly donating your impure pansy blood. all: HAHAHA Torsten: [mit dem man e(h)eh nichts anfangen kann.] [which is useless anyway.] Bernd: HOHOHOHOHO Torsten: dein entARTetes blut ((alveolar trill)) Bernd: 15 Shared knowledge is conducive to the development of innovations and their establishment within in-groups. In the literature, youth language is considered very actively engaged in the production and adoption of innovations (Keller and Kirschbaum 2003: 142; Fritz 2006: 47–56; Neuland 2008: 75–88). 16 In my survey study, 84.2% of participants defined the GP of German Tunte along the lines of a male homosexual acting effeminately (Technau 2018: 94–95, 99). According to the Urban Language Dictionary, English “pansy” refers to “[a] sissy, fag, fairy, or one that is generally unmanly.” (https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term =pansy). 17 Transcription conventions by Selting et al. (1998). Angemeldet | bjoerntechnau@gmail.com Autorenexemplar Heruntergeladen am | 24.09.18 23:29 Lodz Papers in Pragmatics 14.1 (2018): 25–43 Special issue on Narrating hostility, challenging hostile narratives https://doi.org/10.1515/lpp-2018-0002 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 35 your degenerated blood Bernd: [HAHAHA](3.0) Torsten: des kippen die grad WEG wenn du da raus bist. once you leave, they’ll just pour it out. Niko: [hahaha, des kommt in schrank] [hahaha, into closed storage] Torsten: ja(h)a, gena(h)u: gluck gluck gluck, hehehe ((onomatopoetic)) yeah, exactly: glug glug glug, hehehe Bernd: [HAHAHAHA] Niko: schwule ni(h)ch no homos all: HAHAHA Torsten: so'n eimer: "schwul" imagine a bucket: "gay" all: HAHAHAHA The ad hoc construed nominal compound, Tuntenblut (8), comprises two elements: a group-based slur denotating male homosexuals (Tunte) and the word blood (Blut) that functions as the head of the compound. The combination of these two elements implies that the blood of homosexuals is different from the blood of non-homosexuals. This implication is further intensified by the use of the modifier unrein (impure) that devaluates the quality of the blood of homosexuals.18 Torsten dissociates himself from this view through his word choice, in particular his use of the slur that contrasts with his non-homophobic attitudes known by his friends. Presumably, one of his goals is to entertain and achieve humorous effects, and he seems successful in this regard: His friends laugh about his contribution (9). Torsten wants his provocative remarks to be interpreted in the humorous mode; he integrates laughter into his utterance when ironically stating that the blood of homosexuals is useless anyway (10).19 The most obvious means20 of distancing himself from the homophobic statements occurs when he eventually imitates the voice of Adolf Hitler via an exaggerated alveolar trill (12), thus clearly marking his utterance as an echo of attitudes Torsten himself is actually opposed to. The association with Nazi Germany is additionally made clear by the adjective entartet [‘degenerate’], used in the Third Reich to vilify modern art and applied here by Torsten to Bernd’s blood. Through this obvious absurdity, Torsten ridicules the attitude of those who declare the blood of homosexuals unfit for donation. He makes clear that he is opposed to the discrimination of homosexuals (with regards to blood 18 See Baider (this Special Issue) discussing the concepts of impurity and abjection in her analysis of the anti-LGBT discourse. 19 Through his laughing, the speaker invites participants to laugh with him; and, conversely, the recipients confirm the switch to the humorous mode and accept it through their own laughter. “In the course of such negotiations, both teller and recipient use laughter to establish and display the meaning of their interaction” (Mulkay 1988: 117). 20 The various means of marking an utterance as banter are complex and only partly covered here. “In the production of mock impoliteness a bundle of properties is required in which pitch accent, intensity, duration, voice quality (but also segmental properties such as glottal stops, non-verbal vocalizations such as laughing, or gestures such as smiling) are the most important components” (Andreeva et al. 2016). Angemeldet | bjoerntechnau@gmail.com Autorenexemplar Heruntergeladen am | 24.09.18 23:29 36 Björn Technau Going beyond hate speech: The pragmatics of ethnic slur terms donation). The banter subject (Torsten) further creates the fiction of the donated blood being discarded once Bernd leaves the hospital facilities (14). His humorous intentions are again successfully achieved: The banter object (Bernd) laughs about the (entertaining) fiction, and the banter audience (Niko) develops it even further by adding some closed storage to the story where the blood of homosexuals is allegedly stowed in the hospital (15).21 Torsten additionally imagines a bucket with a label “gay” (20). The fact that all of the participants are laughing here (21) may indicate their appreciation of the banter, however, laughter alone is not a reliable indicator, as it can also be employed as a mere “face-saving I-can-take-ajoke laugh” (Goffman 1955: 315).22 It is the close relationship between Torsten and Bernd that enables Torsten to apply a slur term for homosexuals to his homosexual friend Bernd without displaying a negative attitude toward the addressee and/or his GP. Their strong friendship is expressed and maybe even consolidated through Torsten’s word choice, because “through violating the niveau of politeness it is indexed that a relationship has such a firm foundation that it is no longer dependent on politeness or courtesy” (Kotthoff 1996: 306). Many authors consider non-pejorative uses only possible within target groups (Brontsema 2004; Saka 2007; Croom 2013; Anderson and Lepore 2013; Hom and May 2013, among others), however, authentic examples of use like the one just given provide us with a more comprehensive picture of the reality of our speech communities. The success of a non-pejorative use is not always dependent on the speaker’s GP membership, it is always dependent, however, on the speaker’s friendly bonds with his audience and the hearers’ knowledge of his friendly intentions and attitudes. “Since non-pejorative uses are about confounding the underlying (racist/homophobic/sexist/etc.) ideas, they do ultimately hint at the speaker’s opposite attitude” (Technau 2017: 111). As “one of the main discriminators of camaraderie” (Leech 2014: 239), banter also shares some important characteristics with appropriation. As we have seen above, for instance, banter can be about the echoing of attitudes that the speaker is actually opposed to, and this is something crucial for appropriation contexts, too. The use of group-based slurs in banter and appropriation contexts is parasitic in nature and accordingly comprises pragmatic meaning. Even if the frequency of non-pejorative uses of a certain slur term may exceed the frequency of its pejorative use, the convention of the racist (homophobe, antiSemite, etc.) must still be considered central, as it is this convention that is exploited by speakers in their non-pejorative uses. 21 The success of banter does not only depend on the speaker but on all recipients, not only the directly addressed. “The banter target(s) (and/or the banter audience) must approve of the positive intentions behind the banter activity, through laughter for instance, because otherwise contrary effects might be triggered and the relationship jeopardized. Thus, the target (and/or the audience) finalizes the banter activity and determines its success” (Technau 2017: 102). 22 In the course of our cognitive and communicative development, we do not only acquire laughter as a direct expression of amusement but also for social reasons, including the ability to exaggerate, hide and feign laughter (Glenn 2003: 17). Angemeldet | bjoerntechnau@gmail.com Autorenexemplar Heruntergeladen am | 24.09.18 23:29 Lodz Papers in Pragmatics 14.1 (2018): 25–43 Special issue on Narrating hostility, challenging hostile narratives https://doi.org/10.1515/lpp-2018-0002 37 3.4 Adjusting the definition of appropriation In the literature, appropriation is mostly seen as a non-pejorative mode of use that is reserved for members of the target group. I endorse the definition given by Bianchi (2014): [A]ppropriation is the practice of reclaiming from racists, homophobes and misogynists powerful tools of discrimination by subverting their meaning. Community uses do not erase hateful and contemptuous meanings, but keep evoking them in contexts where the speakers’ dissociation from derogatory contents is manifest. (Bianchi 2014: 43) Examples of appropriation include the non-pejorative use of “faggot” among homosexuals (Bianchi 2014), the non-pejorative use of “nigger” among African Americans (Brontsema 2004), and the non-pejorative use of “paki” among Pakistanis (Bartlett et al. 2014). In some instances, such uses have led to a semantic change that turned formerly derogatory terms into neutral terms (“gay”, “queer”).23 It must be due to such developments that some authors go even further in their definition of appropriation and include the feature of a political intent on part of the speakers to achieve semantic change. They see appropriation as a mode of use “by which some victim group attempts to change the conventional meaning of some term” (Saka 2007: 146), “as a means of neutralizing their offensiveness” (Jeshion 2013b: 250). This feature in the definition, however, limits the scope of appropriation to a very restricted number of uses and makes the phenomenon look rather marginal. The intention to achieve semantic change (the elimination of the pejorative meaning component of a group-based slur) mainly applies to historic examples in which activist groups such as Queer Nation or authors of books such as Cunt: a Declaration of Independence (Muscio 2002) clearly articulate their “goal as value reversal” (Brontsema 2004: 9). The success of such endeavors is uncertain, because “revolutionary intent does not pre-determine the future of a word” (Brontsema 2004: 11), and “words that marginalized groups have appropriated can be resignified yet again in hateful contexts” (Wong 2005: 763). As Jeshion (2013a: 253) rightly points out about the effects of appropriation on word meaning, “[t]he details of how such uses become widespread, public, and eventually conventionalized requires extensive discussion.” Such a comprehensive discussion is still missing in the literature and, therefore, the assumption of one specific intention in all appropriation contexts (the long-term goal of turning a groupbased slur into a neutral term) is lacking an empirical basis. Non-pejorative uses by target group members are widespread and backed by a much wider range of intentions. The 23 Such developments are gradual processes that pose challenges for their (empirical) investigation. This is examplarily demonstrated by the different views we find in the literature on the development status of “queer”: Hughes (2010) considers the word a proper slur; Jeshion (2013a) conceives it as polysemous; and for Bianchi (2014), “queer” is already a neutral term that has lost its pejorative meaning altogether. Angemeldet | bjoerntechnau@gmail.com Autorenexemplar Heruntergeladen am | 24.09.18 23:29 38 Björn Technau Going beyond hate speech: The pragmatics of ethnic slur terms speaker’s membership in the respective GP renders the non-pejorative reading easier24 and thus contributes to the high frequency of non-pejorative uses by GP members.25 In order to account for the high frequency of such uses and the wide range of underlying speaker intentions, we have to further differentiate the non-pejorative uses by target group members. Spotorno and Bianchi (2015: 244), for instance, propose a distinction between “A. Friendship contexts – where the non-derogatory use has no conscious political or cultural intent […]; B. Appropriation contexts – where civil rights groups reclaim the use of the slur as a tool of deliberate political and social struggle”. The given examples in the literature, however, seem mostly reflective of what is termed “friendship contexts” here and thus fail to actually match the proposed definitions of appropriation. With their nonpejorative uses, (target group) speakers typically intend to display and solidify group identities; they echo and ridicule discriminatory attitudes to achieve humorous effects and bonding experiences. In addition to that, empirical studies by Galinsky et al. (2013) show that self-labeling makes speakers and their entire GP seem more powerful in both their own and the hearers’ perspectives. The perception of more power then in turn has an effect on the degree of offensiveness of the particular word being used for self-labeling, “weaken[ing] its stigmatizing force and even revalu[ing] it, transforming the very words designed to demean into expressions of self-respect” (Galinsky et al. 2013: 2020). This correlation between power and offensiveness is also revealed by the studies of Henry et al. (2014) who present empirical evidence that the individual degrees of offensiveness of group-based slurs are relative to the social statuses assigned to the respective GPs in society. Accordingly, Jeshion (2013a: 246) points out that the use of “nigger” causes more damage than the use of “honkey”, “in part because the former occurs against the background of current widespread racism, history of slavery, and historical civil rights struggles for African-Americans, and nothing comparable for Caucasians.” This again shows that we have to analyze slur terms individually and allow for a variety of differences in their meaning and effect. Even though “[a]sserting that nigger is the superlative racial epithet – the most hurtful, the most fearsome, the most dangerous, the most noxious – draws one into the difficult and delicate matter of comparing oppressions, measuring collective injuries, prioritizing victim status” (Kennedy 2000: 87), we still have to recognize such individual differences between the slurs when analyzing their meaning and use. “Nigger remains one of the few genuinely taboo words for the majority of people” (Hughes 2010: 152); “while it may be acceptable for ASD [American Slave Descendants] to use it freely, it is off-limits to whites” (Brontsema 2004: 15). The word stands out from other (group-based) slurs due to its extreme level of offensiveness. Studies have pointed out these differences in 24 “[T]he more features that the interlocutors share in common, […] the less likely it would be that derogation would occur between them” (Croom 2013: 193). 25 “[M]any empirical studies show that the diffusion of appropriated uses of slurs is far more extended than the deflationary perspective suggests, and cannot be labeled as merely an ‘exception’ of no particular social or political import” (Spotorno and Bianchi 2015: 244). Angemeldet | bjoerntechnau@gmail.com Autorenexemplar Heruntergeladen am | 24.09.18 23:29 Lodz Papers in Pragmatics 14.1 (2018): 25–43 Special issue on Narrating hostility, challenging hostile narratives https://doi.org/10.1515/lpp-2018-0002 39 offensiveness (Jay 2009; Hom 2010; Leech 2014) and brought empirical evidence of “nigger” being among the most offensive words (Technau 2018: 113–117). In his recent stand-up comedy, “Woke-ish” (Netflix Original 2018), Marlon Wayans refers to his white friend as “nigga”26 and explains to him why whites cannot use the nword themselves: (16) Look, nigga: Nigger was a word that was used to hurt black people’s feelings, to demean us and make us feel less than everybody. But see, brothers, we took that word and we transposed it. We remixed it. And we took our pain and we turned that shit into positivity. And we took the word nigger and turned it into a term of endearment. (21:59– 22:26) The only exception Wayans allows is when he is close friends with a white person (“I gave him a nigga pass ‘cause I knew him my whole life […] and I love him like a brother”, 28:36–28:43). When Saka (2007: 145) derives speaker attitudes from skin color in his analysis, his binary distinction overlooks a variety of deviating cases, for instance, when nigger is referred to non-blacks (Croom 2013: 196) or when it is used melioratively by white speakers (Croom 2011: 350). 4 Concluding remarks Ethnic slur terms (“kike”, “kraut”) and other group-based slurs (“faggot”, “cunt”) refer to certain groups of people (GP) and have a non-pejorative correlate (NPC): “Jew”, “German”, “homosexual”, “woman”. They are well suited for hate speech uses because hate speech is also about the denigration of people based on their GP membership. However, group-based slurs are not a necessary feature of hate speech, neither is hate a necessary feature of all modes of use. In hate speech contexts, group-based slurs are conventionally used referentially and pejoratively (xy and despicable because of it). This is different in other contexts of use where the terms are applied to non-members of the target group (non-referential uses) or to people for whom the speaker has an affection (non-pejorative uses). Some of these deviating uses occur so frequently that they can count as conventional as well, as for instance the use of retard in reference to a person that is not mentally challenged, or the use of “nigger” in some African American communities (appropriation). However, even if the frequency of such uses exceeds the frequency of the pejorative use, the convention of the racist (homophobic, anti-Semitic, etc.) speaker must be considered central, as it is this convention that is exploited by all other uses in order to achieve their power and various effects. In order to understand the pragmatics of slur terms, we have to account for individual differences in their frequencies of use, their modes of use, and their pragmatic effects. We 26 There is empirical evidence for “nigga” having a lower degree of offensiveness than “nigger” (O’Dea et al. 2014). Angemeldet | bjoerntechnau@gmail.com Autorenexemplar Heruntergeladen am | 24.09.18 23:29 40 Björn Technau Going beyond hate speech: The pragmatics of ethnic slur terms can achieve that by gathering empirical data and by analyzing authentic examples of use from a variety of different contexts and in both written and spoken language. Research methods such as conversation analysis, survey studies, laboratory experiments, and computer-aided analysis will provide us a better understanding of how these words are used, by whom and why, and how they develop over time. The investigation of slurs is not only of interest with regards to linguistics; it promises to provide insight into our social identities, emotions and needs, it has legal implications and might offer solutions at a time of hate crimes on the rise. References Amnesty International. 2018. 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Gießen: Gießener Elektronische Bibliothek. Technau, Björn. 2016. The meaning and use of slurs. An account based on empirical data. In Rita Finkbeiner, Jörg Meibauer & Heike Wiese (eds.), Pejoration, 187–218. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Technau, Björn. 2017. Aggression in banter. Patterns, possibilities, and limitations of analysis. In Silvia Bonacchi (ed.), Verbale Aggression. Multidisziplinäre Zugänge zur verletzenden Macht der Sprache, 97–130. Berlin: de Gruyter. Technau, Björn. 2018. Beleidigungswörter. Die Semantik und Pragmatik pejorativer Personenbezeichnungen. Berlin: de Gruyter. Vallée, Richard. 2014. Slurring and common knowledge of ordinary language. Journal of Pragmatics 61. 78–90. Weaver, Simon. 2011. Liquid racism and the ambiguity of Ali G. European Journal of Cultural Studies 14(3). 249–264. Wong, Andrew D. 2005. The reappropriation of tongzhi. Language in Society 34(5). 763–793. Online media Legal Definitions and Legal Terms Dictionary of US Legal, Inc. Hate Speech, https://definitions.uslegal.com/h/hate-speech/ (accessed 7/29/2018) Netflix. Marlon Wayans, “Woke-ish” (Netflix 2018) Urban Dictionary. Pansy, https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=pansy (accessed 7/29/2018) Youtube. Chris Rock, “Black People vs. Niggaz” (Bring the Pain, 1996), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f3PJF0YE-x4 (accessed 7/29/2018) Youtube. Trump Calls Mexican's Rapists, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TML2cApMueU (accessed 7/29/2018) Angemeldet | bjoerntechnau@gmail.com Autorenexemplar Heruntergeladen am | 24.09.18 23:29 Lodz Papers in Pragmatics 14.1 (2018): 25–43 Special issue on Narrating hostility, challenging hostile narratives https://doi.org/10.1515/lpp-2018-0002 About the Author Björn Technau is Director of the German Immersion School of New York in Brooklyn. His research interests include the semantics/pragmatics interface, pejoration, multilingualism and sociolinguistics, with a focus on conversation analysis. In 2018, Björn's book on the semantics and pragmatics of offensive words was published with de Gruyter. As a linguist, Björn has held various positions, including Research Associate at the Research Center of Social and Cultural Studies Mainz (SoCuM), Language Consultant at the Goethe-Institut New York, Research Associate at the German Linguistics Department at Mainz University, and DAAD Lecturer at Nanjing University (China). Address 416 68th Street Apt 5D, Brooklyn NY 11220 United States e-mail: bjoerntechnau@gmail.com Angemeldet | bjoerntechnau@gmail.com Autorenexemplar Heruntergeladen am | 24.09.18 23:29 43