Derogatory Language

Although slurs are conventionally defined as derogatory words, it has been widely noted that not all of their occurrences are derogatory. This may lead us to think that there are "innocent" occurrences of slurs, i.e., occurrences of slurs that are not harmful in any sense. The aim of this paper is to challenge this assumption. Our thesis is that slurs are always potentially harmful, even if some of their occurrences are nonderogatory. Our argument is the following. Derogatory occurrences of slurs are not characterized by their sharing any specific linguistic form; instead, they are those that take place in what we call uncontrolled contexts, that is, contexts in which we do not have enough knowledge of our audience to predict what the uptake of the utterance will be. Slurs uttered in controlled contexts, by contrast, may lack derogatory character. However, although the kind of context at which the utterance of a slur takes place can make it nonderogatory, it cannot completely deprive it of its harmful potential. Utterances of Beyond the Conversation: The Pervasive Danger of Slurs 709 Organon F 28 (3) 2021: 708-725 slurs in controlled contexts still contribute to normalizing their utterances in uncontrolled contexts, which makes nonderogatory occurrences of slurs potentially harmful too.

Verbal derogation is not only a linguistic but also, and perhaps more importantly, a political phenomenon. In this paper, I argue that to do justice to the political relevance of derogatory terms, we must not neglect the social practices and structures in which the use of these terms is embedded. I aim to show that inferentialist semantics is especially helpful to account for this social embeddedness and, consequently, the political relevance of derogatory terms. I am concerned with specifying the linguistic and political aspects of terms that are at the core of derogatory language use. I explain them with the help of Brandomian inferentialism which tends to be quickly dismissed or ignored in discussions about the meaning of derogatory terms. My inferentialist account is in line with Lynne Tirrell's broader inferentialist framework for understanding derogatory communicative practices. I provide the semantic details of her broader inferentialist view and thereby aim to show that inferentialist semantics is a promising theory which cannot be neglected in further discussion of meaning and politics in derogatory language use.

Slurs and derogatory terms are (1) supported by various social practices, institutions, norms and ideas, including other discriminatory expressions, representations, acts and attitudes toward the target group, and (2) legitimate social practices and institutions, embodying and manifesting existing discriminatory norms, thereby maintaining and reinforcing the social practices in question. These expressions are also (3) a social practice that collectively subordinate others who are currently being discriminated against and oppressed in that society as a group, while identifying the speaker with the dominant group, reconstructing and strengthening them as “us”.
In the following, we review Lynne Tyrrell's argument, which uses inferentialism to analyze hate speech and derogatory terms (sec. 1). Then we confirm the significance of focusing on the aspect of complicity (sec. 2).

In this paper we present a reconstruction of Davidson’s (2015) demonstration account for quotations in the gesture semantics framework of Ebert & Ebert (2014). The paper has two related goals: the first is to provide support for Davidson’s (2015) quotation as demonstration approach (as reconstructed by Maier, 2017; cf. Clark & Gerrig, 1990), motivating the additional demonstration condition postulated by Davidson (2015) with the general account of gestures by Ebert & Ebert (2014). The second goal is to provide empirical evidence for the quotation approach of free indirect discourse (FID) (Maier, 2015, 2017) and Davidson’s (2015) demonstration approach for quotation in general by way of a rating study in which we looked at the interaction of perspective-taking at the linguistic level with perspective-taking at the level of gestures.

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Your article is protected by copyright and all rights are held exclusively by Springer Nature B.V.. This e-offprint is for personal use only and shall not be self-archived in electronic repositories. If you wish to self-archive your article, please use the accepted manuscript version for posting on your own website. You may further deposit the accepted manuscript version in any repository, provided it is only made publicly available 12 months after official publication or later and provided acknowledgement is given to the original source of publication and a link is inserted to the published article on Springer's website. The link must be accompanied by the following text: "The final publication is available at link.springer.com".

also thank the anonymous referee for this journal. 2 Warning: throughout this paper I will be using slurring expressions. It should go without saying that in no way I endorse the attitudes, beliefs or perspectives associated to their use, nor the way they depict the people targeted by them. They will only be mentioned for the purpose of the work. 3 More precisely, neutral counterparts are relatively less derogatory than their associated slurs. The phenomenon of the potential derogatory force of neutral counterparts can be observed in the historical evolution of slurs. An apparently neutral expression referring to a marginalized out-group can be gradually tainted by the contempt that the community of speakers hold against it until it becomes an unaccepted way of referring to them: a slur. Consider the differences in derogatory connotation between a paradigmatic slur like the N-word, a former neutral counterpart for the same class, now tainted ('black') and the current politically correct neutral counterpart, 'African-Americans' or 'African-descendants'.

Expressive terms such as "idiot" or "asshole" are known to occur in free indirect discourse (FID). When so used, their pejorative content reflects the protagonist's rather than the narrator's point of view. This paper broadens the discussion of derogatory terms in FID by looking at occurrences of slurs, such as the N-word. The two main approaches to FID, namely, the two-context approach and the mixed-quotation approach, are discussed and evaluated in light of these novel data.

When we speak about the language, two things come to mind: one of them is Austin's speech act theory ascribing performative power to language: to say something means to perform an activity. Secondly, the linguistic turn that opened a new perspective in our understanding of language, which is not understood merely as a tool for describing reality, but rather as a constituent of reality and an element conditioning cognitive processes. Language builds our social and cultural reality, and the values and judgements present in reality become inseparable part of the worldview of the users of language.1
According to Rae Langton, some speech acts "rank women as sex objects, having merely instrumental value, denying or ignoring women’s qualities as full human beings, qualities such as dignity, intelligence or autonomy"2 Such speech acts take place when we categorise members of particular group as inferior or worse in some way and serve purpose of subordinating such individuals, depriving them any form of power, influences and rights. In her article Free speech, media speech, and objectifying speech Langton speaks that objectifying speech acts take form of images (static or film), writing or utterances presenting women as things, reducing them to (sexual) organs, ascribing them instrumental sexual value, depriving them of their dignity, intelligence and autonomy. Fashion magazines, advertisements and other media communicates seem to cause widespread objectification and sexualisation of women3, showing them that the only way they will ever matter in society or as human beings, is when they reduce themselves or allow others to reduce them to role of mere objects. Not only their success is possible in carrying out inferior or stereotypical functions, which leads to underrepresentation of women in public sphere but also makes sexual violence transparent, so it is not even identified as violence.
Speech acts of such wide range as media communicates and advertisements hugely influence the way women are perceived by the society, and the social roles, positions and functions attributed to them. Objectifying speech acts are able to change or perception of social norms related to sexual violence, self–acceptance of women, silencing women and weakening recognition of their abilities and credibility. Langton proposes that we should think about norms that should rule the communicates addressed to mass recipients. If speech acts are to be based upon respecting rights and equal status of other people, therefore humanity needs education based on the ideal of participation in political and social spheres by all genders.

1 Richard Rorty, The linguistic turn
2 Rae Langton, Free speech, media speech, and objectifying speech.
3 op. cit. 1

T. A. Tsebrovskaya
В статье рассмотрены методы, применяемые для структурно-семантического и этнолингвистического анализа дерогативно маркированных этнонимов современного английского языка. Предложенная методология исследования базируется на социокультурном, структурно-семантическом и этнолингвистическом аспектах изучения языковых единиц на основании анализа теоретических трудов отечественных и зарубежных ученых, а также лексикографических источников.
The article describes the methods used for the structural-semantic and ethnolinguistic analysis of the derogatory marked ethnonyms of modern English, particularly American, British, Canadian, Australian and New Zealand English. The proposed research methodology is based on the socio-cultural, structural-semantic and ethnolinguistic aspects of the study of language units based on the analysis of theoretical works of domestic and foreign scientists, as well as lexicographical sources.
Ключевые слова: дерогативно маркированный этноним, методология, современный английский язык, этническая идентичность, валентностный анализ, семантический треугольник Огдена-Ричардса, языковая картина мира.
Keywords: derogatory marked ethnonym, methodology, modern English, ethnic identity, valency analysis, Ogden-Richards semantic triangle, linguistic picture of the world.

Summary. The paper focuses on the conceptions of ethnic bias and ethnocentrism, their interrelation with linguoculturology and grounds of the necessity of their close study together. Ethnic bias has urged new colloquial culture forming either positive or negative image for both a separate personality and an ethno-racial group in general.

Прежде, чем перейти к рассмотрению проблем функционирования дерогативно маркированных этнонимов на современном этапе развития английского языка, определим, что задачей представленной статьи является изучение дерогативно маркированных этнонимов с позиций этнолингвистического направления языкознания: вычленение лексем американского варианта английского языка на основании их исторических, национально-культурных, этнических и психологических особенностей в этнолингвистическом пространстве.