How did "Woke" become a devisive term? A discussion on Language and its evolution.

[scoobdog]

So, it's not particularly important which CNN opinion piece this came from but here is the link to it.  In essence, the author is pointing out how conservatives have turned a word that was essentially create as a term meant to be used inside of the Black community.  That got me to thinking about my own experience with the written word and how each is a layered concoctions of encapsulated experiences, something that often muddles the use of every day idioms, phrases, and even racist slurs.  The term itself if fairly benign:  just as you would expect, it's slang that simply means "to be aware," but that is also the source of both its power as symbolic term of oppression and its cynical use as a pejorative.

[Insipid]

I am not reading a CNN opinion piece, but I recall flat earthers using the term on themselves to mean being a believer. Funny how that has fallen out of fashion.

[stilgar]

Pretty sure fox said it and than all the morons latched onto it. Just like every new word they learn.

[scoobdog]

Here's were this is coming from:

Way back when I was an undergrad researching a paper, I came across a fairly seminal work by poet and teacher Susan Stewart, On Longing.  It delves on multiple elements in a writer's toolbox, however for this paper I was particularly interested in a discussion of symbolism and totems.  As you may or may not know, dollhouses (those eponymous constructs that typically house a random collection of Barbie and Bratz dolls in the corner of the living room) descend from a centuries old tradition of European land owners building replicas of their homes to, essentially, show of their wealth.  As I was researching this for my paper, something stood out in Stewart's exploration of these miniature testaments to greed and privilege:  these doll houses weren't simply symbolic of the classism the depicted, they were living emblems themselves.  It occurred to me that there was a parallel to be made with the simplest linguistic element and these emblems.  If a dollhouse can age from an extravagant representative of one's current wealth to a memorial of a bygone age and past glory, can a simple word do the same?

To explain how this would work, you have to see a word as not being a static icon in its own right.  Some fairly common words that we use have fairly rich histories that may not even have origins in the language they're primarily used.  For instance, we all know the word "fascism" derives from Benito Mussolini and his attempt to emblemize the bonding of disparate people behind a common unifying element with a symbolic implement from the Ancient Roman Empire.  Mussolini's idea was subsequently coopted by Nazi Germany and its core element, strength in numbers, to justify a totalitarian state, but before Mussolini himself adopted it, it was actually an Etruscan term identified with a city state's king as opposed to local magistrate.  The fasces is an axe whose handle and shaft are tightly woven inside a bundle of reeds that prevents it from breaking, and it's symbolic of that king's power being strengthened by his subjects.  As a symbol of a bronze and iron age feudal warlords, it's highly antiquated, but this bundled axe clearly has relevance in a modern world where poisonous and deadly ideas are protected from being broken by its adherents.  As such, the term fascism can (much to the chagrined of its adherents) incorporate White Supremacy in modern day America even if the term is technically defined as a political ideology.

[scoobdog]

Now, before we get ahead of ourselves, this doesn't mean words mean whatever we can conceivable want them to mean.  There is a core symbol and then there is the context that frames that show symbol, so like the dollhouse, the fasces was created specifically to symbolize one thing but the context including when it was first created gives it actual meaning by connecting the world to that symbol .  The point is that the core symbol exists in its own space, to be viewed by whomever sees it in his or her own space.  DeSantis, standing behind his bully pulpit, sees a word like "woke" in how the world was created - specifically by black people becoming aware not just of their circumstances but their own agency in their circumstances. He doesn't, however, account for the context with which it's used such as how the word exists in a real world space.

If you follow the use of "wokeism" in the public discourse, you might get the wrong idea of what it means.  It's used to describe anything from reparations to "drag queen story hours," often with the implication of minorities using their agency to exert control over society itself.  It affects both how conservatives who misuse the word and how progressives attempting to combat misinformation utilize the misused word to combat its effects.  In a real world setting, agency doesn't mean exerting dominance but that's how it is framed typically by conservatives that see themselves as a minority defending an established position.  That's to say the context is manipulated in ways that can corrupt the word and subvert its actual definition.

Part of it is that we often think of this as deliberate act, in part because look at the evolution of fascism as a metric.  Mussolini understood the power the fasces itself represented, not simply because it's a unified collection of shaft and reeds but also because its so tightly bound that neither shaft nor reed can move without the others.  However, he was also corrupting the symbol by reimagining what bound those reeds together as his own deeply-flawed ideals.  Similarly, DeSantis and politicians like him have deeply flawed understanding how society is held together when they see "wokeism" as way of subverting the status quoa.

[Lemming]

I think as a poly independent term it is loosely ported to the abject string of consciousness paired in the left side’s semi fragmented cloud of prefatory effervescent clauses.

[tsar4]

It's an "us vs them" term.  Not unlike the phrase "born again" became.  (I'm sure non-Christians were snickering at that one.)  It can mean something specific initially, but eventually such meanings are used as a cudgel.  "You aren't______?".  "You better get _____!" - people on the receiving end of such attacks will start to use the term with a negative connotation.

[scoobdog]

17 hours ago, tsar4 said:

It's an "us vs them" term.  Not unlike the phrase "born again" became.  (I'm sure non-Christians were snickering at that one.)  It can mean something specific initially, but eventually such meanings are used as a cudgel.  "You aren't______?".  "You better get _____!" - people on the receiving end of such attacks will start to use the term with a negative connotation.

But it really isn't, or, rather, no word is.  The imagery of the cudgel is a very interesting, though, and its a perfect compliment to the discussion.

First off, when you say "it can mean..." you're pointing to the word context.  If you've ever had the opportunity to look at a full Oxford English Dictionary, you know just what goes into creating even the most common of words - far more than just the basic etymology you get in a home dictionary.  It's effectively a historical record, and when you use this as a framework for appraising the word as communication it corrects a lot of the misconceptions that surround words.  As a rule, "woke" has never been used in the context of someone else being made aware; it is always used in terms of an individual becoming self aware.  If you extend its history to include its source (awake or awaken), you'll see that the word comes from similar predecessor words that mean things like "to enliven."  In general, all of the source material for the word in any iteration is entirely antithetical to the idea of it being used in the manner you describe because it's based on the idea that being "woke" is a specific understanding rather than a state of mind.

Here we can use the doll house analogy to illustrate the point.  Calling them doll houses is, of course, a modern term that describes what they've become rather than what they originally were intended.  You don't build a scale model of your own home to show it off, you go to the store and buy a plastic facsimile of an ideal house that your child can use to store his or her toys.  Yet, it's still a representation of an idealized existence now as it was then.  When you use a word like "woke", it is in part an idealized representation of what it means:  to be "woke" means to be enlightened, and regardless of what that enlightenment is, there are certain emotional components that are shared among all who experience it.  At the same time, a doll house from the Elizabethan era isn't necessarily going to represent the oppression that would have been integral to the manor house it represented:  the home might be product of its era but it can't possibly incorporate all of the indirect elements that contributed to its creation.  For instance:  the tudor house of a middle class merchant would have furniture ornamentation in it that would be unthinkable a century prior and might be commercial work from a craftsman as opposed to underpaid commission work by a nobleman, so its not necessarily appropriate to use a Elizabethan doll house generally as an emblem of class suppression.  Similarly, just because "woke" is a product of a society that has perpetuated racism in both overt and subversive ways, doesn't mean being "woke" automatically calls up guilt for one's part in that system.

Therein lies the problem.  The "wokeness" you describe is tinged with guilt that is neither implied nor intended by the word.  DeSantis standing behind a lectern, decrying wokeness, isn't speaking to black (or Jewish, or Latino, or LGBTQ+) people... he's speaking white people who perhaps understand they are guilty of oppression in some form but either can't or simply do not want to deal with it.  Guilt is a powerful motivator, and it rarely results in actionable results because people who feel guilty are trying to rid themselves of a problem rather than encouraging a problem solving approach that make you a part of the solution they create.  As such, the people you describe are claiming to recount an individual they may have seen or heard but is actually an unseen archetypical entity that is an amalgemation of many different and loosely associated protests.  Like a dollhouse, the word "woke" can be haunted by the space in which it was created and it can cause people who are terrified of it see more than what is actually there.

[Heshi]

I find it rather annoying meow, but I'm a trans woman who voted for Trump twice

Trying to balance moderate right political views while being in the LGBTQ+ group is frakin awkward meow X_X

Wait whaaaaa boobs iz besser wort IDKMYBFFJILL 

[André Toulon]

Ok, I really didn't want to be involved in this thread....Mostly because my only response was going to isolate both sides pof this debate, but since recent events at home sparked the conversation again, and I'm still engulfed in the flames I just want to say the evolution of the word "woke" is pretty unsettling to me and I'll explain why despite my knowing this is EXACTLY why i didn't want to start this.

Woke is a term that has been in the black lexicon for decades...I would say the start of it being used in common, everyday interactions was after the release of Spike Lee's School Daze and the famous "wake up" scene.  Since then and perhaps even before it (I can't say for sure since even I was a child back then)

 

"Wokeness" was a common theme in Spike's films and you could buy stay woke and wake up merch at any Asian hair store.....This dates back before the 90s, and long before the mainstream internet.  Well, the internet comes along and the word takes a massive online slumber until BLM hits the scene and uses it as part of their campaign.  Welp, like many things that other people find cool because we do it, woke became synonymous with any and all targeted groups of people and their crusade to be heard.  But that's not what it is.....And since it got latched onto every tiny thing that bunches conservative undies, it's no longer applied the way it's intended.  

It's almost ironic (shut up scoob) that at it's core, the very term used to help us identify and rally against such things as cultural appropriation was culturally appropriated....Who did it first is up for grabs but the point is black folks can't have shit.

Also, this is a great film and everyone should see it....And yes...That's Gustavo Fring.

Edited April 23, 2023 by André Toulon