He speaks so well!
CVK
I was watching CNN this morning and they were doing a story on the trial of John Allen Muhammed, the man accused of sniper attacks in 2002. John Lee Malvo is the young man who was allegedly his apprentice/partner in the attacks, and I swear to god within a two-minute story, the word “articulate” was used at least five times to describe him.
The man is 21 years old. He’s not a child. He wasn’t raised by wolves. There’s no reason he wouldn’t be articulate. Why is this always a label ascribed to young black men? I think it’s definitely one of those subtle forms of racism: people basically expressing surprise at the fact that a young black man knows how to form whole sentences and use multisyllabic words.
S.O. wrote:
Oh please. If you keep looking for ways to be insulted, you will keep finding them. Have you ever talked to 21 year olds nowadays? White, black, Asian, whatever. I am always amazed if I meet a 21 year old who is articulate.
And how can you be so sure it’s race driven? Maybe it’s “I can’t believe a guy that would randomly murder innocent people is so articulate.”
Seriously, are you coming to the defense of Malvo? Is “RACE” so important that you would take the side of scumbag murderer against society in general. Who is really “addicted to race” here.
Posted 24 May 2006 at 12:54 pm ¶
P.Moore wrote:
I don’t know about you, but I love it when black snipers are articulate. It makes them scary and endearing at the same time.
Kidding.
Is it racism though? Maybe it depends on who it’s coming from. My sister and I discuss this a lot. Though we are of course both biracial, we still get surprised when an “articulate” black person engages us in conversation. I don’t know that it’s racism. I just know where I grew up and the lack of education that was in my community. When I meet an “articulate” black male, I feel good about it. Because I am black.
But of course, my reaction is a symptom of the problem in this country.
Posted 24 May 2006 at 12:56 pm ¶
gatamala wrote:
yes….sigh…
When…I ask you, when… is this adjective used with any other person? I have never heard a comment on someone’s speech that is not black (no, discussions on ESL is not appropos here). Even if a non-black person were inarticulate, would anyone even call them on it?
P Moore, your reaction as someone who is part black (& thus in part articulate) is definitely a symptom of many problems that this country has
Folks lacking in education tend to be inarticulate. However, who says “he speaks so well” about a Bronx born white American who says “youse”????
Posted 24 May 2006 at 1:36 pm ¶
P.Moore wrote:
Gatamala,
Couldn’t agree with you more.
But…anyone ever find it funny how Africans are portrayed as regal, kingly, etc. a la Coming To America? Americans are willing to accept African accents because it’s foreign, and thus “exotic”. But blacks in America get treated entirely differently.
S.O., you’ve got to chill. Scumbag murderer or not, it doesn’t hide the fact that race plays into the news about him. Sure he’s a sniper. But he’s still black and “articulate”. What is a black businessman in America? Black and “articulate” also.
Posted 24 May 2006 at 2:26 pm ¶
Merq wrote:
I’m officially in love with gatamala. Her posts are consistently on the money (and “articulate.” heh).
Sorry, P. Moore, but it is racist. People mistake “racist” for hateful. A racist notion is not necessarily indicative of a racist person.
And S.O.?
See the thread on “oversensitive” Halle. People like you sicken me.
Posted 24 May 2006 at 2:46 pm ¶
mw wrote:
So the first time I read this, I also thought you all were looking for racism. I was surprised he was articulate simply because he was a young murderer– a murderer who premediated his acts day in and day out. This leads me to assume he is uneducated and thus has a limited and slanted vocabulary.
Then I realized I was being prejudiced against murderers and I chuckled and realized he couldhave easily grown up in a middle class neighborhood and been in the top percent of his class and still become a rampaging sniper.
Then I asked myself if I would have assumed he was uneducated and grew up on the streets if he had been white.
I didn’t like my answer.
Thank you for being borderline paranoid with these analyses.
Posted 24 May 2006 at 4:47 pm ¶
Jeremy Pierce wrote:
While I would resist calling this racism without some clarifying modifier (which would be greatly misleading given that it’s unintentional racism), I think MW’s comment shows why there is a sort of racism going on, just not the kind that it’s effective to call racism without explaining yourself very carefully (because many white people don’t know how to hear the word without the connotations of hate).
I don’t think it’s true that this word is only used for young black men, however. I have seen media types use call Ann Coulter articulate, for instance. She’s as white as you get, so whatever is going on there is not racism.
Of course, it could be something similar to racism if people don’t expect hot blondes to be articulate. I don’t think that was what was going on in context, however. I think she was being compared with political commentators who have a following but aren’t quite as good rhetorically as she is. So Ann Coulter and Al Franken are articulate, as opposed to (say) Michael Moore, Sean Hannity, Bill O’Reilly, or Rush Limbaugh.
So I don’t think it was Hot Blondeism in her case. It may have been Political Commentatorism. Even so, it does suggest some sort of surprise that she would be articulate, which fits with the sense that most instances of calling young black men articulate involves a similar assumption.
Posted 24 May 2006 at 6:51 pm ¶
Ben wrote:
Why is this always a label ascribed to young black men? Because many young black men - in a higher proportion than in the other age groups, races, *and* gender - speak in a way that can be described (uncharitably but not inaccurately) as inarticulate. I agree that it’s patronizing and inappropriate to call attention to the unexpectedly competent manner in which someone speaks his native language, but the expectation itself is not unfounded.
Oh, and to gatamala: at the risk of stating the obvious, nobody says “he speaks so well” about a Bronx-born white American who says “youse” because, well, he says “youse.”
Posted 24 May 2006 at 7:11 pm ¶
Ben wrote:
Jeremy, did you mean to imply that Ann Coulter is hot and articulate?
I don’t know which is more appalling.
Posted 24 May 2006 at 7:19 pm ¶
John wrote:
Was Ann Coulter’s “Treason” an articulate contribution in America’s political debate?
Posted 24 May 2006 at 7:49 pm ¶
gatamala wrote:
Ben let me clarify…If a Bronx born guy did NOT say youse, would anyone compliment his speech patterns?????
merq — awwww {kiss}
Posted 24 May 2006 at 9:13 pm ¶
Jeremy Pierce wrote:
I don’t actually think she’s all that attractive. I do think she’s rhetorically effective in a way that involves a real skill with language that’s above and beyond many commentators (Hannity comes to mind). I don’t think her views are all that carefully arrived at. She isn’t exactly known for understanding the opposition and taking into account its legitimate points.
Ben, the point wasn’t that no white person could be complimented for being articulate. It’s that you wouldn’t normally expect it unless the person was assumed to be bad with language in some way, as is often the case with young black men. Regardless of how many young black men do not speak what’s considered standard English, it’s no reason for assuming of any particular black young man that he doesn’t. That’s the problem here, because only with that assumption do you get the right sort of surprise that brings forth the comment that he is articulate.
You can say all that and agree with pretty much everything in this post even if you think that young black men ought to be encouraged to learn to speak standard English for the sake of making something of themselves. Regardless of how many do or should, it’s bad that we assume any black person to be incapable of speaking standard English. White people tend to default to that, unfortunately. (I should say that you can also agree with this point even if you think there’s nothing wrong with the dialect linguists call Black English. Even if it doesn’t matter what dialect you speak, larger society uses the more standard English, and it’s an insult to assume that someone who was raised with a different dialect can’t also learn to use that standard one.)
Posted 24 May 2006 at 10:06 pm ¶
eric daniels wrote:
Who cares he murdered people in three states and had half of the eastern seaboard on total alert where sports events were cancelled. This country is so obessed with Black Males as either threats or beasts of burdens that they are surpised that a young black male can form a complete sentence without saying “you know” it seems like the only black people they know are entertainers and althletes. I would rather have this society just leave black males alone but it’s either we are obessed with..
1. violence
2. white women
3. materialism
4. overthrowing the goverment
5. bitter and angry
there has been more trees dedicated to the Black Male than has been in making him a part of society So as a black male who just “lives in amerika’ LEAVE US THE HELL ALONE !!!!! 15 million of us would appericaite it.
Posted 25 May 2006 at 12:49 am ¶
mtevc wrote:
it’s the same backhanded racist comment i get when people hear me and they can’t process intelligence coming from an “ethnic” person…the comments like: “color doesn’t matter” and “i always forget that you are even black”
Posted 25 May 2006 at 1:37 pm ¶
gatamala wrote:
Or.. “I don’t really consider you black”
Posted 25 May 2006 at 1:51 pm ¶
the joy princess wrote:
I like to help my white friends ( a combo of those who are really aware and others who are still prone to slip up and say something stupid) sharpen their racial awareness sometimes and so I’ve been known to describe someone white as articulate, lol. They ALWAYS pick up on it, lol. For instance, at dinner one night, we had a pretty chatty white waitress, when she was gone from our table, I smiled and said, “Wow, Kathy is sooo nice and she’s so articulate.” They picked up on my use of the word and I engaged the less aware ones in a Sesame Street level convo about use of the word when it comes to black people, especially — ending with Chris Rock’s insightful little joke about Colin Powell being “articulate.”
Posted 25 May 2006 at 3:22 pm ¶
Merq wrote:
or… “you’re not loud like other black guys… [awkward pause] well, you know what i mean.”
Posted 25 May 2006 at 3:44 pm ¶
candy wrote:
Yes, being called articulate, or he speaks so well, is passive racism. Because, they have this preconceived notion that when we open our mouth, we have to sound like JJ.
It’s not only offensive to black males, but to mexican males, and older asian men.
Posted 25 May 2006 at 8:26 pm ¶
Anonymous wrote:
I’m a little confused with the Ann Coulter admirer’s post.
He says Ann Coulter’s hot, but also says she’s not attractive.
He says Ann Coulter’s articulate, then admits she doesn’t understand/take into account opposing views. Being articulate is more than vocabulary, sentence structure, creativity.
IMO she is not an articulate debater. She made a career out of pushing buttons.
Posted 26 May 2006 at 3:32 pm ¶
me. wrote:
he’s jamaican we speak standard english when not using our dialect.if we’re speaking with americans.americans **** turds
Posted 28 May 2006 at 8:57 pm ¶
Anonymous wrote:
Maybe people expect young black men to be inarticulate because the majority of black men they encounter are inarticulate. The majority of black men I encounter are so (I live in Atlanta). I know that most of these inarticulate guys have sufficient intelligence to be articulate if they choose, but that they were probably raised without elocution being a priority and didn’t take steps on their own to correct it. When you see 9 young, black males who are inarticulate, if the 10th one is articulate, it will break the trend and stand out to you, even if only a little bit. My white family says about my black husband things like, “He’s not black.” I try to explain to him that he is black, he identifies as black, and genetically and culturally, he is black, even if as a Trinidadian his black culture is different than our African American culture. Black culture can be more than one thing…but here in the ATL, black culture usually contains come sort of anti-intellectualism, and when that becomes your definition of black culture through repeated face-to-face and media exposure, it’s hard to pull yourself out of that. Thus, articulate black males become a surprise.
When meeting a black american, my husband usuallly gets asked immediately where he’s from, as though they need an explanation for his standard speech. People often guess he’s from California or elsewhere out west. I’ve never been to CA. Maybe the dialect is markedly different out there?
Posted 13 Jun 2006 at 4:33 pm ¶