Political Correctness and Racism Samples †MyAssignmenthelp.com

Question: Discuss about the Political Correctness and Racism. Answer: Political correctness is a term that is used to elaborate on the avoiding of such language or any action that will insult people who belong to the marginalized class. It also means refraining from such language that will insult a race or a gender (Paris, 2017). This essay will discuss at length how the words in a language have wider association with ideas and concepts. Language is used as a tool to derogate others and make them feel inferior. The word nigger is considered the most offensive racial slang in the words of the Merriam Webster Online Dictionary. Currently it is used rarely because of its racist implications in the wider society. The word nigger has become a taboo and is considered a very obscene word in English language. At one point of time, it had a neutral connotation that was used by whites. The racist form that is contemporary consists of same sequence phonetically as the previous form nigger and the present form is homographic. The second variant nigga exists in the community of African American and this word is different phonologically due to its ending which is pronounced as nigga. The word nigger is considered derogative as it refers to the slavish form (Winkelman, 2017). The word nigger refers to a dangerous animal that makes us go back to the early age when the Africans were viewed with derision. The African American community wants to ban the word nigga altogether. Much effort has been made in orde r to erase the word nigga from the dictionary of the African Americans. It is still used and is used mainly as a self-reference term. There is a lot of confusion regarding why they continue to use the term irrespective of the fact that it still continues to have negative implications associated with it. Terms like brother and sister can easily be used as an alternative but it does not have epithetic quality that is associated with the word nigger (Bible.ca, 2017). The whites do not have such explicit terms by which they refer to themselves. The word nigga has associations with the concept of survival and they were active recipients of diaspora experience. It involves taking a stance and then a person would be evaluated and placed in the social structure based on its connotations. There can be a positive or negative association coming with it. The word may perform an illocutionary function that that can either show approval and is a form of self-empowerment. Political correctness in the current decade has been blamed from issues ranging from helping terrorist to spoiling the Oscars. Miranda Devine has criticized Australian Year Award as a joke that is politically correct. According to Devine, an award should reflect a great nation however it has become an arena of social engineering with inclinations of the leftist party. An essential feature of Australian politics is their informal way of talking and direct mannerisms. One has to be extremely careful while using pejorative terms like Islam and ISIS (Smh.com.au, 2017). Political correctness is a major issue of contention that started from 1990s which mainly came out of the conservative quarters. According to them, the leftists control what other people say. Term like witch that is used for women is now held to be offensive. Women have right to do work without inviting any kind of ridicule from their male counterpart. Language is not just comprised of inconsequential letters (David, 2014) . The words in a particular language have sinister associations and a joke that is harmless to a person can be a cause of acute mental agony for other people. Words are packed with meaning and the way they have been used has wider meaning beyond its surface structure. Focus on protest and understanding rhetorical mechanisms will utterly help in facing the problem of double standardness (Hughey Daniels 2013). Political correctness refers to manipulating language that is aimed at changing manner of speech, feeling, acting and thinking. There is an ingrained psychological urge to consider ones group in a superior position. Human beings have a tendency of fitting in and this is what gives rise to the issue of manipulation of language to serve their own purpose. Emotions have to be controlled to a great extent so that ones language does not harm the sentiments and feelings of others (Ajsic McGroarty, 2015). It can hence be concluded that ones language is indicative of ones opinions and it is replete with deeper significance beyond its apparent meaning (Magnani 2016). Words have also the stamping of political parties and in the wider sphere, it is indicative of superiority, inferiority and contempt. It reveals how words have meaning beyond its surface and have deeper significance in the context of social structure, class and gender. References: Ajsic, A., McGroarty, M. (2015). Mapping language ideologies.Research methods in language policy and planning: A practical guide, 181-192. Bible.ca. (2017).Matthew 11:28-30 - Come Unto Me.Bible.ca. Retrieved 2 September 2017, from https://www.bible.ca/ef/expository-matthew-11-28-30(2).htm David, M. K. (2014). Language, power and manipulation: The use of rhetoric in maintaining political influence.Frontiers of Language and Teaching,5(1), 164-170. Hughey, M. W., Daniels, J. (2013). Racist comments at online news sites: a methodological dilemma for discourse analysis.Media, Culture Society,35(3), 332-347. Magnani, L. (2016). Political Correctness between Wise Stoicism and Violent Hypocrisy.Philosophies,1(3), 261-274. Paris, D. C. (2017). Political Correctness. Smh.com.au, J. (2017).Political correctness a great term to dismiss issues that become too hard or inconvenient.The Sydney Morning Herald. Winkelman, J. W. (2017). Discursive Responses to Black Lives Matter: White Fragility, Political Correctness, and Respectability Politics.