Spanish slurs and stereotypes for Mexican-Americans in the USA: A context-sensitive account of derogation and appropriation

Abstract

Slurs such as spic, slut, wetback, and whore are linguistic expressions that are primarily understood to derogate certain group members on the basis of their descriptive attributes (such as their race or sex) and expressions of this kind have been considered to pack some of the nastiest punches natural language affords. Although prior scholarship on slurs has uncovered several important facts concerning their meaning and use -including that slurs are potentially offensive, are felicitously applied towards some targets yet not others, and are often flexibly used not only derogatorily to convey offense towards out-group members but also non-derogatorily to convey affiliation with ingroup members-the literature remains largely focused on slurs that typically target African Americans (nigger), male homosexuals (faggot), and sexually active females (slut). Since no account of slurs that typically target Hispanics or Mexican-Americans has so far been proposed, here I offer the first systematic and empirically informed analysis of these that accounts for both their derogatory and appropriative use. Importantly, this article reviews over a dozen Spanish stereotypes and slurs and explains how the descriptive attributes involved in a stereotype associated with a slur can contribute to the predication of certain content in the application of that slur toward its target in context. This article further explains how the psychological effects of stereotype threat and stereotype lift can be initiated through the application of a relevant slur towards its target in context as well. Resumen: Las expresiones peyorativas tales como spic ('spic'), slut ('zorra'), wetback ('espalda mojada') y whore ('puta') son expresiones lingüísticas que se entienden principalmente para minusvalorar ciertos miembros de un grupo sobre la base de sus atributos descriptivos (como la raza o el sexo). Se ha considerado que las expresiones de este tipo conllevan algunos de los puñe-tazos más desagradables que el lenguaje natural puede proporcionar. Aunque la literatura especializada sobre expresiones peyorativas ha descubierto varios hechos importantes en cuanto a significado y uso -entre los que se incluyen que tales expresiones son potencialmente ofensivas, apuntan efectivamente hacia unos objetivos pero no hacia otros, y con frecuencia se utilizan con flexibilidad no sólo despectivamente para ofender a miembros por fuera de un grupo, sino que también de forma no despectiva para afiliar con miembros dentro de un mismo grupo-, tal literatura sigue centrada en gran medida en las expresiones peyorativas que típicamente apuntan contra los afroamericanos (nigger 'negro'), los homosexuales varones (fagot 'maricón'), y las mujeres sexualmente activas (slut 'zorra'). En tanto que no se ha propuesto al momento dar cuenta de expresiones peyorativas dirigidas contra hispanos o mexicano-americanos, en este trabajo se ofrece el primer análisis sistemáti-co y empíricamente informado de tales expresiones, tanto en sus usos despectivos y de apropiación. Es ...

The semantics of slurs: A refutation of coreferentialism

“…This article additionally introduces the notion of a conceptual anchor in order to adequately account for the relationship between slurs and descriptors actually evidenced in the empirical data, and further considers the inadequacy of common dictionary definitions of slurs. This article therefore contributes to the literature on slurs by demonstrating that previous accounts operating on the assumption that slurs and descriptors are coreferential expressions with the same extension, and that they thereby have the same meaning or content, are inconsistent with empirical data and that an alternative account in accord with Croom (2011Croom ( , 2013aCroom ( , 2014b better fits the facts concerning their actual meaning and use. 2…”

“…For a paradigmatic or prototypical musical work may typically or for the most part have a chorus and acoustic instruments, but could still be felicitously and informatively categorized as music even if it did not have a chorus or acoustic instruments, provided that the category MUSIC is that which is still most strategically apt among other options (for example, RECIPE, KOALA, and so on) available to that speaker for their current cognitive or communicative purpose. So with regard to slurs, my proposal here follows Croom (2011Croom ( , 2013aCroom ( , 2014b in adopting a family resemblance conception of category membership to account for the fact that the felicitous application of the slur faggot need not be restricted to male homosexuals (Szekely, 2008), that the felicitous application of the slur guido need not be restricted to Italian Americans (Troyani, 2013), and that the felicitous application of the slur nigger need not be restricted to African Americans (MacDonald, 1999;Rock, 1996), or more generally, that the felicitous application of a slur S need not necessarily target someone instantiating an associated neutral descriptive attribute G (Croom, 2014c, fn. 20;Croom, 2011, p. 352-357;Croom, 2013a,b).…”

“…20;Croom, 2011, p. 352-357;Croom, 2013a,b). More specifically, the alternative approach proposed by Croom (2011Croom ( , 2013aCroom ( , 2014b suggests that the expression nigger (identified as N below) can be usefully understood as a family resemblance (rather than classical) category consisting in a constellation of prototypical attributes (identified as a 1 -a 10 below) such as the following:…”

“…In order to account for cases of linguistic appropriation (for further discussion of slurs and appropriation see also in Rahman, 2012;Bianchi, 2014;Croom, 2013aCroom, , 2014bCroom, , 2015b, I further suggest that if, for instance, an in-group African American speaker X is intending to communicate that they are sufficiently similar to some hearer Y insofar as X and Y are both attributed a 1 , a 4 , and possibly other attributes (such as a 5 and a 6 , or a 9 ), and if X and Y know each other well-enough or have established enough common ground to understand that X does not dislike or consider themselves superior to Y and does not intend to communicate that Y possesses most of the other (typically negative) attributes belonging to N, then X as an in-group speaker might strategically choose to employ N as the category that most efficiently and economically predicates the intended (shared) attributes of Y , such as a 1 (African American), a 4 (commonly the recipient of poor treatment), and possibly other (positive) attributes -such as a 5 (athletic or musical), a 6 (sexually liberal or licentious), or a 9 (a survivor, tough, or aggressive) -at least to the extent that N is better for this than other categories that are afforded to that language-user (Croom, 2010a,b). In contrast with other classical accounts of slurs that incorrectly assume that the possession of some criterial attribute is essential for x to be considered a member of N (see, for instance Camp, 2013, p. 338, 342 fn.…”

“…In contrast with other classical accounts of slurs that incorrectly assume that the possession of some criterial attribute is essential for x to be considered a member of N (see, for instance Camp, 2013, p. 338, 342 fn. 16), the alternative account of slurs proposed by Croom (2011Croom ( , 2013aCroom ( , 2014b and expanded upon here maintains (in accord with the family resemblance account) that, for example, although different individuals that are referred to by the slur nigger are very likely to share different subsets of attributes (for example, a 1 -a 10 ) with other individuals also referred to by this slur (due to common knowledge of how this expression is typically used) it need not necessarily be the case (for the sake of the felicitous application of that slur) that each and every slurred x must share some criterial attribute with every other slurred x (for further discussion of interesting cases see also Sweetland, 2002, p. 514;Croom, 2011, p. 356;Croom, 2013a, p. 199). Rather, what is of importance on this alternative family resemblance account is that the use of a slur by a speaker may be considered a strategically apt enough or optimally relevant lexical choice for their purposes in a particular cognitive or communicative context.…”