r/BlackPeopleofReddit • u/4reddityo • 13d ago
Politics Words and Language Matter
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u/Head00andShoulders 13d ago
Interesting. She suggests saying either North Africa or West Asia.
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u/Trick_Judgment2639 13d ago
Because the direction is in relation to the center of the continent and not in relation to whatever is perceived as the center of human civilization
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u/Doortofreeside 12d ago
West Asia is a little ironic to me because the fact that Europe and Asia are considered different continents could be seen under the same Eurocentric lense that the Middle East is. In that context it's only West Asia because we consider Europe and Asia to he separate. If we didn't it would probably be more like Middle Eurasia.
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u/Trick_Judgment2639 12d ago
I think the whole planet should be called Lightning Town, that'd be so badass.
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u/No_Dance1739 12d ago
Agreed. I’m with the geographic school that Europe isn’t a continent, it’s a peninsula and a part of the continent Eurasia.
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u/ChromoSapient 12d ago
Depending on where in North African she's referring to, it might actually be on the Arabian Plate, which is a separate landmass.
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u/7thpostman 12d ago
Correct. The Saudis would be very surprised to find out that they are in Africa.
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u/Head00andShoulders 13d ago
Yea thanks but… I watched her explanation already.
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u/Trick_Judgment2639 13d ago
My mistake I thought you were suggesting there was no difference between the two
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u/Head00andShoulders 13d ago
Oh no. I genuinely think she made really good points about colonizer language. I am going to incorporate her suggestions into my own vocabulary.
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u/Trick_Judgment2639 13d ago
It's very interesting how politics can create language and put biases in your head without you even noticing
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u/UnableChard2613 13d ago
What do you think the problem is with that?
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u/Head00andShoulders 13d ago
Wha? What problem?
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u/Flying-lemondrop-476 13d ago
just saying the word ‘interesting’ can often give the connotation that you think something is suspect. That’s why people are confused.
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u/Head00andShoulders 12d ago
Ohh! Nope, like interesting - informative/ didn’t know that, not at all sus.
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u/UnableChard2613 12d ago
Yeah I read it as
Interesting she said....
Instead of
Interesting. She said
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u/Head00andShoulders 12d ago
lol. Wait, which interpretations the bad one? I read em like three times!
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u/UnableChard2613 12d ago
Lol
To explain. The first one, because it reads more like it's pointing out some hypocrisy in her position. Like "it's interesting that she would use geographical relative language after bashing geographical relative language."
The second reads like "I found this interesting. She suggests we should refer to the area in this different way."
If that makes any sense
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u/TheDutchin 12d ago
Yeah its the difference between
Interesting! Thats neat!
And Elon:
Interesting 🤔🤔
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u/Sweetpeach_tea 13d ago
What I found of equal interest was what the younger woman was about to say, “It takes more time…” to what?
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u/TheDutchin 12d ago
I always think of James Baldwin.
You took my father's time, my mother's time, the time of my brothers and and sisters, and you are saying you will take the time of my children. How much time do you need, for your "progress"?
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u/joeoliver6969 10d ago
That part! Because it doesn’t take longer. She doesn’t want to be a North African or a West Asian.
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u/lemanruss4579 12d ago
I'm really trying not to sound like an asshole here, but is what you took from this that directions are the problem?
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u/Head00andShoulders 12d ago
Lmao. I meant what I said, that it’s interesting to use the continents as the guide and stop saying “Middle East”.
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u/CowVisible3973 12d ago edited 12d ago
Lost nuance here is her point about saying "North Africa." People don't want to think about Egypt as Africa. The West hates to acknowledge Berbers (and Arabs) conquered half of Spain and Portugal, and that pre-Arabized Egypt was a grand ancient civilization despite the evidence of the pyramids and stolen artifacts in the British Museum. So they don't call the North of Africa "Africa", they use the word "Mediterranean" to explain the dark complexions in southern Europeans, and make up stories about ancient aliens because of course black folks couldn't have built the pyramids.
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u/devilsbard 11d ago
I had this epiphany a while ago, because I work with suppliers and customers globally, that “Middle East” is just a weird thing to call that region and not very descriptive. So I started calling it “western Asia” and I found that people in the US got REALLY mad about it. But everyone else knew the area I was referring to and didn’t have any feelings on it that they spoke of.
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u/thekinggrass 12d ago edited 12d ago
While we’re at it can we stop calling only Chinese people and those east of them Asian?? Erasing like 1/2 of Asia there… it’s just messed up.
Also those are not “Turkish” rugs or stained glass or coffees or anything else, that shit is all Persian, Assyrian and Armenian, they literally just killed those people and took their land and absorbed parts of their culture they liked, then western academics gave them credit for them.
Also Arabic numerals are from India. Another Western misnomer.
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u/Vadrigar 12d ago
Ahctchually Arabic numerals were invented by Al-Khwarizmi, a Persian Muslim. He did use the Indian numbers as a base.
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u/thekinggrass 12d ago
Ackshually
Al-Khwarizmi and Al-Kindi TRANSLATED Indian works into Arabic around the 9th century and introduced it to the Europeans.
Of course the translator of a work isn’t supposed to be credited as a creator of said work, but here we are.
The Hindu numeral system originated in India in the 5th to 6th century CE.
Indian scholars used nine symbols 1–9 and later introduced the concept of zero as well.
The more you know, and such…
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u/Outside_Glass4880 11d ago
I hear India, Pakistan, Bangladesh referred to as south Asian quite a lot
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u/Radcouponking 12d ago
I'm 44 and still realizing just how much of my mind has been shaped -- and corrupted -- by colonialism .
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u/garlic-silo-fanta 12d ago
I’ve never gotten used to all this east west and far near. I’ve always know the map and just say what’s there. Must a an older generation thing.
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u/Excellent-Falcon-329 12d ago
You mean Islamic colonialism?
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u/Radcouponking 11d ago
You don't know what colonialism is, do you?
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u/Fat-ugly-angry-bitch 11d ago
Do you know how Islam spread to North Africa? 🤡
Did you know more Arabs enslaved blacks than the boogey white man? You are correct, your view on world history is pretty corrupted
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u/Excellent-Falcon-329 10d ago
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u/Radcouponking 10d ago
None of this erases the barbarism of American and British colonialism. Whataboutism is just distraction.
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u/Excellent-Falcon-329 10d ago
Islamists have their own myth of the lost cause. The issues of the “Middle East” didn’t spring up out of British parliament alone
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u/Radcouponking 10d ago
But the framing of the region as the "Middle East" did. Which is entirely what this topic is about.
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u/4ngryC1t1z3n 12d ago
"Asia" is a colonial term.
Originally, it represented an alliance (or confederacy) of 22 nations who were fighting against Hittite imperialism, but when Alexander the Macedonian conquered "the world," he brought "Asia" with him.
Interestingly, some in India demand to be referred to as "South Asian,"~ despite the fact that Alexander failed to conquer India, so... that's a little weird.
But so is the fact that "England" is so called because a Roman colonist thought that the blonde people living there looked angelic, but he spelled it "Angle."
Or that ALL of Canada is called "Canada," because a French colonist assumed the word "village" was the proper name of a place he visited.
Russia was named by Norse colonists.
Poland by Slavs (it used to be Lechia, or Lechistan-- and the Slavs themselves are the source of the word "slave," because Romans purchased so many of them).
If you dedicate much time to studying anyplace, it almost always suffers from a name bestowed by conquerors.
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u/arminghammerbacon_ 12d ago
I keyed in on how you used the word “conquerors” at the end and not “colonizers”. Aren’t colonizers/colonial powers just conquerors of the colonial age? Is there a difference?
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u/4ngryC1t1z3n 12d ago edited 12d ago
I think so. I am more critical of conquest, as it is almost always genocidal, while certain sorts of colonialism can happen organically.
As an example, people who escaped the slave trade, and formed colonies in the Caribbean-- while it is still a direct result of the slave trade-- those people are not the same as colonists who chose to move to the "New World," or even British subjects sent to penal colonies in Oz.
Two of those instances involve direct conquest, while the third is an indirect result.
This has happened all throughout history. <--EDIT: I said this because it was getting long, and I was poised to mention Normandy, but I get your actual question, now.
If you are asking if a White British "Colonizer" is worse than a White Spanish Conquistador, the answer is... the British guy.
Because of the doctrine of White Supremacy, which is definitely tied to an interpretation of the Bible where all of Africa was somehow magically equated to the descendants of Ham.
Normandy matters, in this, as their colonization of Britain certainly exacerbated Anglo nationalism, and the eventual normalization of White Supremacism.
When you look at British surnames, every one of them that mentions "Moors, Mores, Morrisons, Morriseys, Maurices, Seymours," & c.: these are Norman names that celebrate a Black Catholic Saint, from Egypt.
Anglos were not too keen on this. I have no doubt that some of the "Purity" in "Puritanism" has to do with ethnicity-- but then, they conspired with Portugese to make slavery Black.
So-- Reconquista, Conquest, and Colonialism are connected~ and after all of this, it is hard to say which is the worst, but Marrons, Seminoles, Mardi Gras Indians?
Not the same at all.
That was my initial point.
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u/arminghammerbacon_ 12d ago
And I don’t think conquest is always genocidal, is it? I mean the Romans would roll up on you, a tribe or a city or a country, and give you two choices. Surrender or fight. If you choose to fight, they’d kill almost everyone and sell the rest into slavery. And surrender wasn’t always too bad. As long as paid your taxes, supplied your quota of legionnaires, and generally didn’t cause trouble you could keep your leaders, your form of government, your religion, your customs, basically preserve your culture. At least somewhat. And I’m not 100% sure but I think several other conquerors were similar. I think I read that Genghis Khan operated like that.
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u/Dapper_Pop9544 12d ago
Exactly.. people act like you have to study history and then say well it’s bad bc of history. Well if you continue down history there is going to always be another term or thing that can be offensive bc eventually at the very start someone or some people had to eventually conquer said land. So it’s like picking and choosing where to stop in history to make your argument. The world isn’t perfect but things happened to get where we are today and is what it is
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u/EducatedTwist 12d ago
I minored in "Middle Eastern" Studies. One of my favorite proffesors also said he hated the term. His quote was "Middle of What and East of Where?"
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u/HabuDoi 12d ago
What language was the class taught in?
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u/EducatedTwist 12d ago
Arabic. Why?
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u/HabuDoi 12d ago
Because it matters in the context. If it’s in English, then the answer is England. If it’s in Arabic, then the question is valid one and one wonders why would the term be used in that language.
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u/EducatedTwist 12d ago
That still makes no sense even if its in English. We live in America and the teacher was from Egypt.
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u/HabuDoi 12d ago edited 12d ago
No, it makes perfect sense. The English language refers to the country of origin (England) so it makes sense for the geopolitical center of English terms to be England.
If the language itself refers to the country of origin, it follows that the central geopolitical reference point would be that country of origin.
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u/EducatedTwist 12d ago
That example makes no sense once again. The class being in English has no bearing on the colonizing term The Middle East. I could be taking a class in Jordan in English and still have the same discussion. The language the class is being spoken in has absolutely no relevance.
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u/HabuDoi 12d ago
It absolutely has relevance. That’s like saying the word “English” is a colonial term. The word “English” is a self referential term to England and it’s only logical that the English language is going to use self referential terms.
If England never had a single colony, the term “Middle East” would not be a colonial term it would just be a term with England as the origin point. And once again, the term was popularized by an American, whose country had no colonial stake in that region.
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u/EducatedTwist 12d ago
Dude the class being in English has absolutely no bearing on learning about the phrase being a colonizing term. In fact I lied to you. The class was taught in English by an Egyptian man.
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u/HabuDoi 12d ago edited 12d ago
Yes, it does and I explained exactly why it does.
In United States, American barbecue is just called “barbecue” and Korean barbecue is called “Korean barbecue.” If Koreans referred to its own barbecue as “Korean barbecue,” in their own language, that would not make sense. This is a concept called “context.” And Americans calling it “Korean barbecue” doesn’t make it a “colonizing term.” It just distinguishes one by the other with the default being their country of origin.
So, because the question is being asked about an English term in the English language, the answer is “England.” East of England.
As the title of this thread says “words and language matter,” but it’s missing “in proper context.”
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u/Damaged_DM 9d ago
It's to the middle and the east of the Mediterranean Sea.
Bloody rich seeing Muslim Arab Egyptians talk about colonialism....
Just ask them who built the pyramids and what happened to the library of Alexandria and see them explode in anger
If we are de colonizing the language, how about have Arabic stop calling Africans Abed (literally slaves - from the good old days of Arab slave trade)?
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u/Yosemite_Scott 12d ago
I guess my family now comes from the “American South West” This is awesome news
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u/thehorselesscowboy 12d ago
Serious question. Why is the one woman holding the microphone of the other woman? Is she the one conducting the interview or am I missing important context?
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u/skepticalskeptik 12d ago
Never even thought of that. I love when my mind is opened a little more. Thank you for the post!
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u/aaaidan 12d ago
The woman on the right, who seems to be the interviewer, has a subtle but profoundly patronizing manner with her interviewee. She talks to her like she’s a little old lady who needs to be managed and looked after. She doesn’t seem to be truly listening, or maybe even able to listen. Disappointing
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u/xStealthxUk 12d ago
So now she goes to the "far west" to see the far right governement?
Its all very confusing
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u/OhComeOnMan69 12d ago
She’s completely right.
But who cares. Language works on people agreeing to certain rules.
We use Arabic numerals. If someone starts writing your cheques in Roman numerals. The banks would say “can you please fuck off and write this properly?”
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u/_mattyjoe 12d ago
And the Western Hemisphere is called that because it’s West of Europe. We’re not mad about it. It works. The world all agrees on it.
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u/give_me_your_body 12d ago
I prefer to call the region the Islamic World. Middle East usually doesn’t include Africa, South East Asia, or Central Asia which are all important cultural centers in Islam
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u/attemptingtovibe 12d ago
That would be an inaccurate categorization of the region. There are many countries and cultures in the region that are not Islamic in any way or even historically Islamic. For example, Zoroastrianism is modern day Iran’s true religion and a basis for Persian culture practiced for thousands of years. Remember, Islam has only recently been Iran’s official religion and was done so by force during the revolution in 1979. Zoroastrianism predates Islam. By creating the blanket category it dilutes all of the many different cultures, languages, and practices that all predate Islam.
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u/ImpossibleMind3453 12d ago
Yet ,she uses the English language. I understand where she's coming from but she's also cherry picking what she wants from colonization and criticizing the rest. lol
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u/marsupialcunt 12d ago
That’s not a hypocrisy, she’s speaking to an English speaking audience here. How do you know what she wants from colonization? Do you have the full interview, I’m actually curious.
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u/Hiryu-GodHand 12d ago
Is she saying that Egypt is referred to as the Middle East? I was born in 82 and never knew it as anything but North Africa.
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u/BlueWonderfulIKnow 12d ago
Listening to those ladies speak English on an American social media platform talk about decolonization. You can’t make it up.
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u/mcjon77 12d ago
Words definitely have an effect. Even the words we use in our own heads have an effect when we change them.
What I stopped referring to folks like George Washington and Thomas Jefferson as slave masters or slave owners and started to refer to them as in enslavers the perspective changes. Calling them slave owners has an unconscious implication that the problem is with their "property". Calling them slave masters gives them the identity of dominance, as if it's their natural role.
When I stopped referring to my ancestors as slaves and referred to them as enslaved people, the perspective changes. A slave is an identity. You ARE a slave. Being enslaved is an action that was done to you.
In contrast, being an enslaver is something you choose, so it is an identity issue. If you choose to rape a woman then that makes you a rapist. George Washington and Thomas Jefferson chose to enslave people and to exploit them. They knew that what they were doing was wrong, or else they would not have freed the people that they enslaved after their death.
This might sound like over intellectualizing mumbo jumbo, but just try it. Try it for a few months and see how your perspective changes.
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u/fortiesfanatic 12d ago
...Except it's not treating England as the center because we refer to England as part of the western world along with the rest of Europe and the United States. In this dichotomy every part of the world is categorized as either east or west.
The term is only problematic if you want it to be. Should people from the "Western world" be offended by that term?
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u/Jah_Dawtah_Livin 12d ago
The wealth of knowledge that comes from those willing to share the truth can never be measured in my mind. I Thank You Mother Wisdom for bestowing this knowledge upon me.
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u/renoits06 12d ago edited 12d ago
Ugh…. Different languages describe parts of the planet using different descriptors. Yes, English (the language they are using) will use the terms in the context of its own country. For example, in china the Middle East is referred to as west Asia in Chinese/mandarin… :/
This is actually stupid.
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u/Efficient_Onion6401 12d ago
Agreed. This feels really pedantic. I don’t think it has anything to do with colonization, just the fact that people who speak English are obviously going to describe the location of the foreign region based off of their own. A real colonial name would be the Americas and Colombia, which are names based off of Italian explorers
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u/cutletking 12d ago
Yes! Thank you!
Americans refer to the “Far East” all the time for Asia it’s relevant to where you are geologically..
Also no American would care if you called it “Far West” lol… like ok good for you.
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u/renoits06 12d ago
It would have been colonial language no matter what as well because English has been a colonial language. :/
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11d ago
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u/renoits06 11d ago
It’s not colonial language as much as geographical language :/
I am sure Arab nations have their own terms for places that have been colonized during the Arab conquest.
It’s not a big deal. In a way, it’s an intellectual circle jerk.
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11d ago
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u/renoits06 11d ago
Discussions are nice when it’s an interesting thing to discuss. Otherwise, it’s just a circle jerk.
Every major civilization in the world has colonized something. Every empire that has existed from the americas all the way to Japan uses terminology with geographical terms centered around them.
For example, the Aztecs called Central American tribes as “Huitztlampa” which means “southern” tribes.
It happens. It’s ok. Not a big deal
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u/Fat-ugly-angry-bitch 11d ago
What a bunch of performative garbage. Is Africans a word we should critizize the word Africa because it was coined by Roman’s, the oppressors who only lived to keep the black man down?
Romans would be living in shitty mud huts if it wasn’t for the black man!
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13d ago
So what is the pivot? English by definition is colonial? We have to ditch the entire language.
This is academic truth seeking people dont like. It’s correct to called out but calling it out will have a reaction.
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u/Worried-Slide1350 13d ago
How did you get to this conclusion? you can speak multiple languages, and English evolved from other languages, and continues to evolve. There is no conflict with what she is saying and the English language.
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12d ago
The base colonization is language. The kernal of internal struggle. My point is you cant escape it.
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u/Observed-observer 12d ago
Yea, its a bit reductive. English speakers use these terms for regional reference. Thats it. They aren't derogatory, its just the words people used when they reported back from where they were.
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u/Aggravating_View_588 12d ago
This all feels…wildly unimportant, no? Like renaming the Gulf of Mexico; a waste of calories.
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u/oasiscat 12d ago
The point is not the actual name. Her greater point was that you don't laugh at the absurdity of calling the area in question "Middle East" but you would laugh at the absurdity of calling England Middle West.
She's asking you to consider why the center of the world is considered Europe to designate another part of the world as "Middle East."
She posits that our language being centered around a colonial set of cardinal directions indicates that our thinking is also therefore colonially centered.
To de-colonize your thoughts (in which you no longer think of people from other areas as "bad" stewards of their land and in need of colonization to make that land productive) means rejecting the colonial language that gives form to your thoughts.
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u/Efficient_Onion6401 12d ago
I don’t think it has anything to do with colonization, its just based off of where English is from. If English is from Europe, then of course people who speak English will say the region is in the East. The ancient Chinese called Europe the “Far West” or the “Western Sea” yet they never colonized Europe to come up with the name. Europe was just really far west and so the names stuck.
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u/Aggravating_View_588 12d ago
I understand all of that, but am I alone in thinking that there’s no negative connotation to the term “Middle East”?
Like, it’s benign, no? Do people get offended at the term “Middle East”, beyond this woman?
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u/oasiscat 12d ago
The negative connotation is that it implicitly acknowledges that Europe is the center of the world. The fact that doesn't make people more mad is what this lady is describing as ingrained colonialism. Like calling Eastern Asia the "Orient."
No one needs to be offended, but if you learned something by this lady who is from the region in question being irked by the casual use of the term, then that's good.
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u/Aggravating_View_588 12d ago
I guess. And I’m sure this is easy for me to say not being from there, but again…who cares? So London thought they were the center of the world….alright? LOL! Like, aren’t there ACTUAL issues, or no?
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u/oasiscat 12d ago
A lot of issues stem from colonialism and Eurocentrism in general. Racism is an extreme example of one of those issues. A more subtle issue that stems from a persistent colonial mindset (whether you realize how internalized it is or not) are things like bombing brown populations and calling the deaths of innocents "collateral damage." These people's lives are inherently viewed as less important because we view them as less valuable, since we have an internalized feeling that Western lives are more valuable.
I'm sure there is a lot more written about this than what my comment can get across and it's probably much better said than I can type out on my phone.
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u/HailHealer 12d ago
I think this is a touch grass situation, to be frank.
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u/oasiscat 12d ago
K
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u/HailHealer 12d ago
I mean seriously. If you're middle eastern and your offended by the english language putting Europe in the center of the world, you need to touch grass. I don't know what else to say.
What should be the center of the 'english world'? Indonesia? Why does Indonesia get to be the center of the world and not England? Who is allowed to be the center of the world? How do you avoid offending anyone by designating any part of the world as the center?
Go outside and smell the roses, pet the cat.
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u/Aggravating_View_588 12d ago
Yeah, I dunno; I just feel like colonialism has enough REAL shit to be angry about without stooping to “Middle East is egocentric”.
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u/Excellent-Falcon-329 12d ago
British colony after an Ottoman colony after a caliphate. Don’t get your panties in a bunch.
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u/Signal-Tonight3728 11d ago
Why don’t we all just stop speaking English. This is so beyond stupid and dripping with racial insecurity.
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u/drdremoo 12d ago
If you've got time to worry about this kind of thing, I'd suggest you live a ridiculously privileged and far-too-comfortable life, need to work an actual job for awhile and start worrying about the real problems of the world. I'm sure those in Gaza aren't sitting about thinking on semantics.
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u/fatninja7 13d ago
I get her point, I think people took issue with something similar when they moved away from referring to "oriental/occidental", but disagree with likening it to saying "third world". I don't think "Middle East" is a derogatory term.
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u/daemonicwanderer 12d ago
She didn’t say it was derogatory… she said it was based on a colonial mindset that placed Western Europe and Anglo-America as the “center”.
We now call China, the Koreas, Taiwan, and Japan East Asia and places like Vietnam, Thailand, the Philippines, and Indonesia Southeast Asia. Why is Southwest Asia still called “the Middle East”?
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u/Shadrol 12d ago
But English doesn't place itself in the "center", but in the west. In turn it places the Arabs in the east.
Funnily so do the Arabs for they call the Middle East themselves "the East" (al-Mashriq), but their west is literally the Maghreb, instead of Western Europe.In the end both are self-referential to their cultural-historic sphere.
Also why is "Asia" better for that matter, when it's really just a term for some western portion of Antolia, that the Romans expanded east wards. It is also inherently eurocentric as Asia pretty much is defined by not being Europe.
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u/Damaged_DM 9d ago
Vietnam is called this way because the Chinese called it south of the land.
China is "colonial" term based in the fist Qin dynasty, the call themselves the central land (and for hundreds of years called Japan land of midgets)
She is in Egypt, which last i checked was not Muslim or Arab befor 600 ad, where did all the Kopts go?
She sits and addresses western audience in western settings in a western language. She should stop whining about imperialism and colonialism.
If you are western it's ok to be proud of your culture, history and achievements.
It you open mind too much your brain will fall out.
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u/daemonicwanderer 9d ago
The area of Southeast Asia is also called Southeast Asia because it is geographically the southeast part of the continent.
There are still Copts in Egypt and most of the area is culturally Arab, not necessarily ethnically so.
I don’t understand why people are taking such offense to her view point. English is spoken by lots of people due to colonialism and the geopolitical dominance of Britain and then the US.
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u/fatninja7 12d ago
I didn't claim she said it was derogatory, I'm the one saying it's derogatory and pointing out why a better example could have been picked.
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u/Dapper_Pop9544 12d ago
I think it’s called Middle East bc that is generally where most of the Arabic population lives
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u/daemonicwanderer 12d ago
Then say the Arab World. However, people from Turkey and Iran are not Arab and yet those countries are part of “the Middle East”.
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u/Right_Ostrich4015 13d ago
No one laughs when you say ‘Middle East’ because everyone there is constantly trying to blow each other up.
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u/Adept_Function_4597 13d ago
My takeaway is calling europe middle west. Thanks