Nigga = Female Chauvinist Pig

I am home in Ibadan and it’s hot. Although we have power, the fan is just circulating hot air. Left Lagos at 6 and got home just in time for breakfast, moin-moin straight off the fire, yum! Took a 3 hour nap and then ate a third of a really big water melon. Now I am watching an Oprah re-run on Galaxy TV (I wonder what type of arrangement the tv station has with MNET). Actually the show has ended and I am watching Pinky and the Brain (I looove cartoons!)

I had actually seen part of this particular Oprah show last year when it aired originally on MNET, it’s the one where she had the cast of ‘Crash’ on way before Terence Howard and the movie received their respective Oscar nominations. I remember then I was a bit disturbed at Don Cheadle, Terence Howard and Chris ‘Ludacris’ Bridges all defending the use of the ‘N’ word. According to Terence it’s all in the spelling. ‘Nigga’ is used in the African American community (especially amongst its males) to signify a close relationship, a friendship. ‘Nigger’ on the other hand is the ‘N’ word with a racial undertone. So it’s cool for one black man to call another black man ‘Nigga’ but it’s not cool to call him ‘Nigger’. Afterall the explanation I am still confused. On a totally unrelated note, something smells delicious, Princess is making ‘Gbegiri’ (Gbegriri is a Yoruba soup made from beans and eaten usually with ‘amala’ which is made from yam flour. It’s the main dish from where I come from, Ogbomoso, yum yum!) I side with Oprah when she says whichever way it is spelt and whatever it is supposed to mean, the ‘N’ word should be excommunicated from the English Lexicon. Don in arguing for the retention of the ‘a’ variation of the ‘N’ word said African Americans need to keep using the ‘a’ variation as a sign that we have liberated ourselves from the ‘er’ meaning. I was immediately reminded of the 'Female Chauvinist Pig', the phrase coined by Ariel Levy in her book of the same title published last year. The Female Chauvinist Pig, Levy argues, is 'post-feminist. She is funny. She gets it.' She asks: 'Why worry about disgusting or degrading when you could be giving - or getting - a lap dance yourself? Why try to beat them when you can join them?'

I don’t think White people call themselves ‘honky’ neither do Jews call themselves ‘Himey’ or Mexicans ‘Wetbacks’ whichever way it is spelt, and whatever it has been contorted to mean, why should African Americans insist on calling themselves ‘Nigga’? Whatever communication registers African Americans adopt, they really don’t need to validate the ‘N’ word in any shape or form (spelling or meaning) I am sure there are a host of other words with which to describe a close, 'brother from another mother' relationship. By insisting on using that word or its associates whatever it has been contorted to mean, you keep the original, derogatory meaning alive. You are really not beating anybody, you are joining them.

Oh and Sandra Bullock asked that while the subject was hot could somebody see about removing the word 'bitch' from the English lexicon? The way I see it, the female chauvinist pig will make that a really really hard task.