Are you woke?
I have tripped over this word several times in my recent reading. Being a word nerd and English teacher (same thing?), I was intrigued enough to go searching for some information. Sure enough, Professor Google led me to a website, Bustle, where writer Maddy Foley explained “woke” and its background.
At the beginning of her article Foley observes that unless you are “very much removed from social media” you have likely seen the term for the last several years. (Well, that explains why I am coming late to the party.) While it has been part of AAVE (African-American Vernacular English) for decades, it seems to have entered mainstream awareness after the death of Trayvon Martin and the rise of the #BlackLivesMatter movement.
Foley notes that #Stay Woke “often accompanied social media posts about police brutality, systematic racism and the industrial prison complex.” The phraseology urges readers “to look past the provided narrative of events while checking their own privileges and assumptions. #StayWoke reminds readers that there is more than one reality in the United States.”
The Oxford English Dictionary added “woke” to its lexicon of words in 2017. It traces the history of the word to the 1800s when it meant the act of not being asleep. In a statement announcing the inclusion of the word, the dictionary said: “By mid-20th century ‘woke’ had been extended figuratively to mean ‘aware’ or ‘well-informed’ in a political or cultural sense.” It went on to explain that in the past decade the meaning has been “capitulated into mainstream use with a particular nuance of ‘alert to racial or social discrimination and injustice.” As is standard with dictionary entries some examples of usage are included: “We need to stay angry and stay woke;” “Does being woke mean I have to agree with what all other woke folks say should be done about issues in the black community?” “The West Coast has the wokest dudes.”
When I first read the word “woke,” and understood it in its most modern meaning, I wondered if it would retain its earlier definitions. Sometimes words get new meanings which are added to the list of older meanings, and sometimes the older meanings go by the wayside. “Awful” once meant something that inspired awe; now it means something bad or terrible. “Gay” used to mean merry or happy; now it is usually associated with being homosexual. “Thongs” used to be another word for flip-flops; now thongs are a type of underwear.
My investigation of “woke” led me to an argument some are having about the cultural and social aspects of this particular word as well as some others. The debate is about cultural appropriation: should the dominant culture be using words and phrases from another culture? By bringing such words into mainstream use, are we destroying the words? As one writer put it, These words are “killed … due to overuse and general lack of understanding of how to use these words.”
I understand this argument and can see how a word used by one culture could easily be used in a clueless or, worse, thoughtless, insulting way. Words are powerful and can easily be spoken in a hurtful way. Just look at our present political climate.
I’m glad I investigated “woke.” It offered me the chance to think about language, and I was reminded to be aware of other cultures. In addition, it caused me to rethink my aversion to social media. I am pretty sure I will continue to avoid it, but now I see that even social media has its uses.
Norman Knight, a retired Clark Pleasant Middle School teacher, writes this weekly column for the Daily Journal. Send comments to [email protected].
