How To Call A Spade A Loaded Language

2.3.2 Loaded Language
Distortion of a certain race or history by the use of loaded language has been a common racist practice in the English language. The term "loaded language" refers to words, phrases, and overall verbal and written English language that carry either negative or positive, in our case negative, emotions or implications beyond its literal meaning. This usage of language is often used in order to degrade a particular ethnic population when used under the context of racism. In this paper, loaded language used against Native Americans would be looked at more closely. Loaded language has been and is still currently being used to describe Native Americans and to distort their history. And certain loaded words/phrases used under

This racist phrase has been used for half a millennium as it simply means, “to tell it how it is” and previously had no racist associations. The origin of this phrase can be traced back to the Ancient Greek phrase “to call a fig a fig and a trough a trough.” Erasmus, a humanist and classical scholar, translated the phrase from Greek to Latin and when doing so, changed the phrase to "call a spade a spade.” In its early form, the phrase had nothing to do with skin color or race as the spade referred to the gardening tool. However, according to Patricia T. O'Connor and Stewart Kellerman's book, Origins of the Specious: Myths and Misconceptions of the English Language, in the late 1920s during the Harlem Renaissance, "spade" began to evolve into code for a black person. “Spade” began to refer to the spade found on playing cards and the phrase "black as the ace of spades" became widely used. With this progression over time, the English word spade was transformed into a racial slur with anti-black

Unlike words/phrases that have been discussed in the previous sections regarding the development of racist connotations in words that had no associations to racism in its earliest forms, the latter is directly derived and originated from racial slurs. The word “gypped” means to cheat, swindle, or be cheated by someone else. The word was derived from the word “gypsy,” a racial slur towards Romani people. Use of this word implies that Romani people are cheats and swindlers who are often dishonest. Another example is the phrase “peanut gallery”, which is used to describe a group of people who criticize, usually by focusing on an significant detail. It is a racist term toward African Americans that suggests that they are cheap and rowdy. Back in the 19th century when segregation prevailed, the “peanut gallery” was the cheap seats in segregated theatres, where African Americans were allowed to sit. The phrase “no can do”, along with other broken English phrases, were used originally to make fun of how Chinese immigrants and others, who had English as their second or third language, attempted to communicate. The origin of the phrase “off the reservation” is also quite racist when looked at more closely. Although the meaning nowadays has become much more neutral and unoffending as it is defined as