Quote:
Originally posted by Bill O'Rights
Now, back to to the very original topic. Now that Charlize Theron has won an Academy Award, for Best Actress, does that now make two African American women to have won that award?
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I thought he was using that to point to the original discussion about the term "African American." Which, though Charlize is certainly not black, she is.
In fact she is a recent and valid example of the semantic games we play to avoid saying "black," or whatever phrase is deemed offensive this week.
Back in the day "Negro" was considered a polite form of adress, "black" was insulting. At one point "colored" was a decent way to go. Now, "negro" would be offensive, "colored" would be offensive, and "black" is sorta okay; and, we officially prefer "African American." Charlize is a pretty good example of how using "African American" is flawed.
It's all one big semantic game <i>around</i> the important issues.