The first thing I thought of reading this was how you could write the exact same about the rural midwest US. I was the only kid in my class who had ever seen a black person face to face, and that was because I lived in Florida first. My grandma still calls to warn us to stay inside if a non-white person is spotted near town (usually a utilities guy fixing power lines). They just have no experience with the wider world and know only the stereotypes they echo back and forth to each other.
The peace corp warning does a good job framing it as it is, but it’s important to remember that “innocent” ignorance can still carry real violence and hatred.
Yuuuup. Mom came from a small Midwest town. Only black person was the town gardener. Incredibly sheltered and literally did not know any black people.
When she moved it was the best thing that happened to her. (Own words)
She had a black friend where she moved and was shocked to see her harassed by a store owner. When she asked her friend about it she said “girl this is every day”.
Profound life changing experience but not everyone is willing to change and learn.
For me it brought back memories of volunteering for a development agency as a white European in rural Cambodia.
Most people from the villages who came to the hospital I worked at had never seen a white person. Many were scared of me and my colleague because they were convinced we were ghosts. Every day people were pointing at me and shouting over the whole street or the market “Look! A white person!!” (Not in so polite words, though). And often small street stalls and businesses refused to talk to us, because they didn’t stop/listen long enough to realise I try to speak Cambodian (Khmai) with them.
I’m not saying this is racism towards me, a white person. But I feel the reaction towards the “unknown” might be similar.
For just about all former soviet states, the N word is the term used to describe black people, because the word imported from Europe to describe Africans. It doesn’t have the connotations or baggage that westerners attach to it. Diddo for blackface and sambo imagery, it’s usually used more out of ignorance than malice.
Oh dear God, let me tell you, I feel my bones tickling when I read this. All these flashbacks of my parents meeting other Russian people and, all of the sudden, casually dropping the n word in conversations in public and me just freezing and praying no one overheard them. I mean it was with no mean intent (as you wrote, more like ignorance paired with custom) but if someone heard them, then they didn’t understand the context and only heard them say n*ger.
You can not say these things do not have “the connotations or baggage” (how dismissive) that “westerners attach to it.” The N word is an English word with one use, dehumanizing people of African ancestry. Blackface and Sambo imagery are also borne of white supremacist ideals and dehumanizing Africans. That is specifically where this stuff comes from. There is no alternative interpretation. You could maybe say someone is ignorant of the history of the N word, but if you are not racist garbage, the intent of blackface and Sambo imagery is very clear without needing a history lesson. Acting as an apologist for racists is functionally the same as being racist. I’m sure you’ve heard the expression about having dinner with 9 Nazis. 10 Nazis are having dinner.
Yes they can in fact say this. You do realize english is not the only language that exists or ever existed right ? Or that northern american culture is not hegemonic (yet) ?
Niger/nigra/nigrum is a latin word that simply means black or dark without all the prejudice attached to it in english, and believe it or not, variations of that root word still exist in a shitload of european languages and dialects to signify the exact same thing : a color.
To claim as you do that the denigrative usage of the word is the only understanding some farmer from the depths of the Urals should have is frankly preposterous.
What’s preposterous is the number of people who get upset, make excuses, and try and throw it back when I call out racism. Before I paste what I said in another comment, I’d like to point out that I specifically said that some non native English speakers may be ignorant of the history of the n word. Anyway:
While I understand the similarity with the latin languages, as it shares that origin, it is its own word. The actual word is being used, not words that sound alike, as it was exported by colonial powers.
What a load of shit. One of the ways that we can communicate across languages and cultures is via imagery. Blackface and Sambo imagery isn’t limited by USA hegemony. It’s pretty clear the meaning. You didn’t address that at all.
American culture is interwoven with the black slavery history, most of the rest of the world is not. So no, they don’t have that baggage when it comes to black face or the like. Like you don’t understand the Indian caste system, for example.
Making them out as racists is stupid if you stop to think about it and not just give kneejerk reactions. Not everyone is as obsessed with race like Americans.
I am only going to be expanding on your discussion of the N-word specifically, and not the larger discussion. While the N-word is abominable in English, because the word for black in a lot of languages came from the Latin word “nigreos”, a lot of languages have words that sound like the N-word but are not. The word just means the color black. That’s just the etymology of the Latin word. If you have personal experience living in those areas then I’ll definitely add more weight to your comment, because I haven’t.
While I understand the similarity with the latin languages, as it shares that origin, it is its own word. The actual word is being used, not words that sound alike, as it was exported by colonial powers. I don’t have to have lived there to be aware of its use. Hell, anyone that read the post is now aware, there wasn’t any confusion as to what was stated in the peace corps document.
Reminds me of the photos of Asians going to Africa and getting racially stereotyped for their eyes
Crazy. Can’t even imagine what it would be like to be a person of color or black in the Russian army.
Damn… welcome to the Slavic region, I guess.
If there’s a consolation price, at least you’re not Roma - or as they’re so “warmly” called, “the gypsies”. They have snow 0% rights, especially in Romania, the country that has fucked the Roma people a thousand times over.
European racism is so fucking old world that it’s not even nazi. Nazism is relatively fresh and young. This is old European imperialism.
you’re fundamentally wrong in two points, comrade.
- Romania isn’t slavic. quiet obviously by its name alone.
- European racism really got traction in the 19th century with the popularisation of science and biologist pseudolegitmization of it. that isn’t much older than nationalsocialist ideology.
Not all “Slavic” countries are the same. Not all regions are the same. Western Slavs (Czech Republic), Southern Slavs (the Balkans), and Eastern Slavs (Russia) are all different. No one is going to call you the n-word in Prague any more than they would in America.
The issue with Ukraine is that they have no tourism from outside the region so even well meaning people will not know how to act. They might ask if you know LeBron James or whether you can play basketball, just to strike up a conversation. They literally don’t know that’s insulting.
Think about what you know about Ukraine:
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They’re in a war.
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They like vodka.
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…
Sunflowers/ sunflower oil is produced in abundance
wheat/flour also
chernobyl is there
Stalins soviet unión starved it’s people to death
the people could have chosen a leader to lick putins ass, but instead chose democracy and voted in a former comedian
2016 (14?) armed forces looked like a cast off of old soviet era gear, they saw what was coming and changed/started modernización
And also one of my absolute favorite paintings is from there (the second one still is, they relocated it at the start of the war)
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reply_of_the_Zaporozhian_Cossacks
Huh…im no scholar but i know a little more about Ukraine than i thought.
Right but that’s also hard to start a conversation with. Like if you ask them, “Hey is Chernobyl really that bad?” they might get offended. The average Ukrainian is not proud of that.