Randall Kennedy is a law professor at Harvard and author of many seminal books on race, law, history, culture, and politics. Please support this podcast by checking out our sponsors:
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EPISODE LINKS:
Randall's Website: https://hls.harvard.edu/faculty/randall-l-kennedy
N*****: The Strange Career of a Troublesome Word: https://amzn.to/3MbrXSC
Say It Loud!: On Race, Law, History, and Culture: https://amzn.to/3MfQWUT
For Discrimination: Race, Affirmative Action, and the Law: https://amzn.to/3BASZxZ
Race, Crime, and the Law: https://amzn.to/3pVtVyU

PODCAST INFO:
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Clips playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrAXtmErZgOeciFP3CBCIEElOJeitOr41

OUTLINE:
0:00 - Introduction
2:13 - The N-word
37:57 - The three N-words
1:04:30 - Education
1:17:32 - Critical race theory
1:28:06 - Racism and policing
1:35:26 - Racial profiling
2:04:59 - Racism in US history
2:22:57 - Affirmative action
3:06:24 - Martin Luther King Jr.

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Let's imagine you have a black rapper who invites people on stage, and let's suppose they invite a black person on stage, and they're perfectly happy when the black person is full out with their lyrics.

The white person is, you know, doesn't really, you know, sort of mystified, but it comes on stage and full out with what the rapper says, including the infamous N-word, and then the black rapper gets mad.

Imagine the white comedian who satirizes that, pokes fun at that.

And in poking fun at that, says the infamous N-word.

The following is a conversation with Randall Kennedy, professor at Harvard Law School and author of many seminal books on race, law, history, culture, and politics, including specifically on affirmative action, criminal justice, policing, and the topic explored extensively in this conversation, the single most powerful word and slur in the English language, the N-word, with a hard R at the end.

Randall has written a book with this word as the title, N-Word, The Strange Career of a Troublesome Word.

Please be warned that Randall uses this word throughout this conversation, deliberately and skillfully, to discuss its power and its role in the history of the United States.

I don't intend to shy away from controversial topics like these, and I'll work hard to handle them thoughtfully and thoroughly with respect and with empathy, Often with several guests who have very different perspectives on the topic.

In the end, I believe in the power of long-form conversations to heal divides by furthering understanding of human nature, of human history, and the full diversity of the human experience.

To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description.

And now, dear friends, here's Randall Kennedy.

You wrote a book whose title is The N Word, spelled out with a hard R at the end?

So let's start with the history of this word.

The book that you're referring to is Nigger, the strange career of a troublesome word.

The word dates back to the 16th, 17th century.

Basically Latin, basically Spanish, basically N-I-G, you know, black in various formulations.

We don't know actually how the term nigger became a slur.

So there were words that were close to N-I-G-G-E-R that were used in various ways.

And sometimes it was used in a way that seemed to be just purely descriptive.

We do know that by the early 19th century, it had become a slur, It had become a derogatory word about which people complained.

But exactly how that came about, not altogether clear.

So it's been 20 years since you've written the book.

What have you, what wisdom have you gained about this word since writing the book, and maybe having to interact with people, having to read, having to see, having to feel the response to the book.

This book has generated a lot of controversy.

It's probably generated more controversy than I had anticipated.

It has certainly generated more more different sorts of experiences than I had anticipated.

So for instance, I did not think that writing this book would prompt people to ask me to be an expert witness in cases.

And over the past 20 years, I've been an expert witness in a number of different cases.

I've been an expert witness in a murder case, in various cases of assault.

I've been an expert witness in cases involving Tort cases, intentional infliction of emotional distress.

I've been an expert witness in a number of employment cases.

I had not anticipated that, nor had I anticipated the extent to which people would get in trouble for using my book.

Every year, there are teachers who are suspended or who are fired because they will excerpt a chapter of my book.

Let's imagine, and I'm not imagining things, this has happened, a teacher is teaching, for instance, the Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn.

The word nigger appears in that book over 200 times.

The teacher, trying to be earnest, trying to be sensible, trying to be serious, will excerpt a part of my book to acquaint students with the history of the word and maybe the history of controversy involving the use of the word in this particular novel.

The teacher will give it out, hand it out to the teachers, hand it out to students, and there have been a number of teachers who've been suspended or worse because of that.

Students will get upset, go home, tell their parents.

Their parents will storm to the school and say that this is terrible.

The teacher is, quote, using the word nigger in an offensive way.

And oftentimes administrators will basically abandon the teacher.

And whenever this comes to my attention, I write, I'll write the superintendent of schools or I'll write the principal or sometimes I'll write an opinion editorial piece for the local newspaper.

But every year there are teachers who are disciplined for using my book.

And what is the nature of the letter or the op-ed that you write on why they shouldn't be disciplined?

Or if they, to the degree they should be or shouldn't be?

There's not been 1 case, There's not been 1 case that has come to my attention in which it was even remotely sensible for the teacher to be disciplined.

And what I say is that, number 1, frankly, I go through, what I write is almost a synopsis of my book.

Number 1, this is an important word in American history.

It's a word that has typically been used in a terrible way.

It's a word that is part of the soundtrack of racial terrorism in the United States.

I mean, if you're interested in knowing the real history of the United States, if you're interested in knowing about lynching, if you're interested in knowing about the way in which black people have been terrorized in the United States, you need to know this word.

So you need to know why it is that people are upset about the word, but it doesn't end there.

You have to know that, And if you know that, then that knowledge should equip you to be careful.

It should equip you to know that, to know the range of context in which this word appears.

But again, it doesn't just end there because especially young people, you tell that to young people, they nod, they read, they understand that.

But then they turn on their radios and they turn on, you know, they listen to Spotify, they listen to their, some of their favorite entertainers.

They hear the word nigger or nigga being used in a lot of different ways and so they need to know about that as well.

How does 1 explain the fact that Dick Gregory, Dick Gregory was a comedian, activist, friend of Martin Luther King Jr., a true activist.

I mean he had a very, a flourishing career as an entertainer that he abandons in order to struggle for racial justice throughout the United States and including the deep South.

How does 1 explain the fact that he wrote several memoirs, but his first memoir is called Nigger, a memoir.

How does 1 explain the way in which, How does 1 explain Richard Pryor?

Richard Pryor's best album is That Nigger's Crazy.

Well, was Richard Pryor trying to put down black people?

1 can only explain that by getting deeper into the word, by understanding that yes, this is a word that has been used in a derogatory way, this is a word that has been used to put people down, this is a word that has been used to terrorize people.

But you also have to know that this is a word that has also been put to other uses.

There are artists, there are entertainers who have used this word like Dick Gregory used it to put up a mirror to American society and say look at this word and look at the terrible way in which it's been used.

We're not, no euphemism, no asterisk, no N-word, no nigger.

Now we want you to look at that and we want to talk about that.

James Baldwin, there was a documentary about James Baldwin a couple of years ago, highly lauded documentary.

The title that was given to this documentary was, I am not your Negro.

Anybody can go to YouTube right now, take a look.

James Baldwin said, I am not your nigger.

Well, you know, James Baldwin wasn't, again, he wasn't trying to cover up anything.

He wanted people to face the facts of American life.

And it seems to me that if you're a teacher and you want to have your students face the facts about American life, well, you've got to grapple with the word nigger.

Now let me just quickly say, you know, teachers have a tough job, and if we're talking about students, of course there's a wide range of students.

Am I saying that 1 ought to give my book to kindergartners?

No, kindergartners are probably not ready for such a book.

Third graders, probably no, Not third grade.

If we're talking, however, about people in the 10th grade, do I think the 10th graders can read my book?

11th graders, 12th graders, people in college.

Teachers in law schools have been disciplined for, because the word nigger has come out of a teacher's mouth.

In a couple of cases recently, teacher would be reading a court opinion.

The word appears in the court opinion, the teacher pronounces the word, ah.

You know, students get up, leave in a huff, report the teacher.

There's some instances in which teachers have been, under those circumstances, have been disciplined.

And frankly, in many of these instances, it's not only, it's stupid.

I think that some of these instances in which teachers have been disciplined, absolutely stupid.

People say, well, the teacher used the word.

It'd be 1 thing, it'd be 1 thing if a teacher looked at a student and called the student nigger.

That'd be 1, that'd be, you know, fine, Discipline, that's teacher, that's bad.

You don't have, none of these are cases in which you have an individual who is a stranger to another individual and this word just sort of comes out.

What we have here is a class involving a person who is a teacher interacting with students talking about subjects in which it would be perfectly understandable why this word would emerge as a subject of conversation.

Now under those circumstances, it's somehow wrong for a teacher to utter this word?

And I said that 20 years ago, I say it even more emphatically now.

Still, it is 1 of the most powerful words in the English language, and there's a kind of responsibility that we as humans should have with words, with statements.

That word, if not used skillfully, if not used competently, even when just read from a legal transcript, can do more harm than good.

I agree with what you say, yes, words are powerful.

And so I am certainly not suggesting that people be lax.

I'm not suggesting that people be irresponsible.

It's precisely because words matter, however, that we need to be willing to face words and grapple with words and talk about words and talk about the history of words, precisely because words matter.

And among other things, it seems to me, it's important to understand that words can mean different things in different contexts.

It's not the case that a word means the same thing in every context.

And when you, again, intonation of voice means something.

If I say, that person discriminates, and I'm obviously being disapproving, implicitly what I'm saying is that person distinguishes between things on an unjustifiable basis, and that's a bad thing.

On the other hand, that person has discriminating taste.

That means that the person differentiates in a way that shows that they understand the difference between excellent, good, and not so good.

So words can have different, you know, words can mean different things in different contexts.

It seems to me that that's something that actually we ought to recognize.

Well, some words enter this territory of being a slur and it seems like when they cross the line into being a slur, there's the number of contexts in which it's okay to mention it exponentially decreases, right?

No, no, I'm gonna resist that a little bit because the whole idea of slurs, Slurs change.

Yankee was a slur in 18th century United States.

Slur today, New York Yankees, I'm a Yankee fan, I'm a Yankee.

Queer, queer, you know, you know, and this is In my lifetime, there was a time, you know, you queer and people would really run away from it.

And then thank goodness, gay liberation movement, gay liberation movement, basically, we're not gonna run away from this.

We're gonna grab this quote slur and we're going to affix it to ourselves and we are going to repurpose it.

Now, the word queer is, again, can it be a slur?

And it seems to me that it's important for people to know about how a word, a symbol, in some context can be a slur, in some context doesn't have to be.

So the whole idea of what's a slur, That's a complicated idea in and of itself.

It's, if I may say, almost fascinating how language evolves.

But if we were to kind of have a minute by minute evaluation of the most powerful, intensely slur-like words in the world, I think the N word with a hard R at the end, which is the title of your book, is number 1 on that list.

Well, probably so, and of course, that's 1 of the reasons why I wrote a little book about it.

Yeah, but it hasn't, even since you wrote a little book about it, it seems like it's maintained its number 1 status.

Maybe queer was in the top 20, I don't know, for a while, and now it's sliding into the top

The origins of this book, I clearly remember.

I was at my office, and I was thinking about lecture topics.

And I get invited to give lectures from time to time.

And I was thinking, well, what might make for an interesting lecture?

And all of a sudden, the word nigger popped into my mind.

Now this is a word, I've grown up with this word.

I mean, there's never been a time in my life when, at least in my conscious life, in which this word's been absent.

I mean, in my household, for instance, in my household, my parents are black people.

My parents were refugees from the Jim Crow South.

I was born in the Deep South, South Carolina.

In my household I heard the word nigger used in every possible way.

I also heard it used with respect to people who were praised.

My father, I clearly remember my father, whom I revere.

And I grew up hearing this word in various ways.

And so I was thinking to myself, God, where did this word come from?

And 1 of the first things I did, I clearly remember just jumping up out of my seat, running up to the library, Oxford English Dictionary, when did this word first appear in English?

What was the history of the word, and then what really sort of grabbed my attention is I went, I get my computer going, and I asked the computer system, give me every case, every federal court case in which this word appears, thousands of cases.

And then I said, oh my goodness, this is really interesting.

And then I started just cataloging all the different cases.

There came a point, I'd say probably about a month into this, I compared the usage, I compared the number of times nigger came up with other sorts of slurs.

So for instance, kike, K-I-K-E, long time derogatory word for Jews.

There was a time in which the word appeared, but nothing like the infamous N-word, nothing.

What about, and then I just, you know, let me just take a look at all the other slurs.

Nothing came close, not even remotely close, to nigger.

And I think it has something to do with, I think it has something to do with the uniqueness of the color line particularly as it pertains to African-Americans.

I think that The fact that nigger sort of occupies such a unique status among slurs, I think that's a reflection of the unique stigma that has been imposed on African Americans.

It's hard to know the chicken or the egg why 1 word is able to so distinctly and clearly encapsulate this struggle between races that is throughout American history.

I mean, they didn't have to probably be so, but it came to be that way.

It became that, and not only that, not only that, but of course, The nigger spurred other slurs.

Well, I think Yoko Ono, I think, had something to do with that song.

So, I mean, it is a slur that has spawned other slurs.

And again, this is, that's why, as you indicated a moment ago, this is a quite unique term.

are you deliberate in you saying this word?

So let me just say from a personal experience, maybe my upbringing, where I came from, in my daily life, I don't think I've ever heard that word with a hard R said as often, used clearly in my life, said, I've heard it today more than I have ever heard in my entire life.

And I think there's a few people who listen to this, that will be listening to this and be very uncomfortable.

I would say not in a bad way, probably in a good way.

I'm uncomfortable now and I am almost introspecting and trying to figure out why am I uncomfortable.

And I think even the title of your book is making me think that.

Just looking into my own mind and trying to understand, wow, words have power, and why does it have so much power?

And by the way, not only are the people listening to this sweating, this will be on YouTube in part.

And YouTube, the people on the other side will be sweating, what do we do with this?

First, that's right, I mean, am I deliberate?

I deliberately wrote a book called Nigger, The strange career of a troublesome word.

But the title could have been N-Word versus public.

The title could have been a book about a word that causes pain to many people.

Did I want a title that would be provocative?

Did I want a title that would grab people?

I'm a writer, I want people to read what I write.

Well, I mean, If you wanna put it like that, yes.

I mean, I'm sure that when people write books, they think really hard about their titles and they try to get a title that will grab people's attention.

I know people, respect people very deeply who never, as a matter of principle, never utter this word.

And I've talked with people, I've had people say, you know, I read your book, let's talk about it, but let's be very clear, I'm not gonna use the word.

I've had many conversations with people who've asked me not to use the word.

I was on a, the first time this came up was a book tour.

It was 20 years ago when the book first came out and I was on 1 of these call-in shows early in the morning.

Time came to call in, 07:00, I call in at 5 of 7.

Right before I go on, the host of the show says, oh, by the way, we have a strict policy here at the station, we never use this word.

And I said, well gosh, I wish you had told me this earlier.

Does this mean then that you're never going to pronounce fully the title of my book?

And I had to make a choice right then and there.

I went on and I abided by the station's rules and fine, we had a perfectly fine conversation.

The American language is a very supple language.

I do not get angry with people who don't, they say as a matter of principle they're not gonna use the word, fine.

I'm willing to, I understand where they're coming from and often I will defer to their wishes.

All I say is I want people to understand where I'm coming from.

I'm not just using this word willy nilly.

There is a reason for why I'm saying what I'm saying, there is a reason why I use the word.

Can you make the case why using the word is a good idea and can you make, can you steel man the case why it's a bad idea?

Who said that you saying this word out loud is actually causing a lot of harm.

Not like harm because people's feelings are hurt, but increasing the amount of racism and hate in the world.

Yeah, critics, let's start with the critics.

1, again, going back to when the book was first published, I remember going to, the first bookstore I went to, and I talked about the book, had a very, you know, talked, asked questions.

And the last comment, wasn't a question, but the last comment was made by an elderly black man.

I called on him and he said, I've listened to what you've had to say and I appreciate what you've had to say.

And I remain unconvinced because when I was coming up, this word was used to put me in the back of the bus.

And this word was used to prevent me from voting.

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Randall Kennedy: The N-Word - History of Race, Law, Politics, and Power | Lex Fridman Podcast #379