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In the poll I owned up to using the word ghettoblaster because it's the term I grew up with but it's not a word I'd use casually and I'd probably recommend something like "boombox" instead.

I was pretty sure that there would be people who find the term offensive but I had a little Google for citations. I think I'll make more of an effort to avoid the term now, anything that begins with 'ghetto-' is pretty likely to be stereotyping, which is practically step one of racism.

Guidelines for Bias-Free Writing (Indiana University Press), by Marilyn Schwartz and the Task Force on Bias-Free Language of the Association of American University Presses lists "ghettoblaster" as "pffensive as a stereotype of African American culture". I also found this publication from an offshoot of the University of Wisconsin which listed the term as "offensive because it is culture specific and stereotypical". Urban dictionary's 5th definition for the term indicates it is heavily racialised in usage: "A large, portable, electronic noise-making device carried on the shoulders of spade cats, coons, stove lids, jigaboos, and (as the liberals call them) guys of color". Stuff White People Do concurs that the term is racialised and stereotyped.

Damn you for getting me started on this search, it's too fascinating! I'm delicious tagging what I find though so if I seek out anything else helpful I'll add it there.

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Hmm. I wrote a long response to "offensive because it is culture specific and stereotypical", but then realised I was writing myself into a corner.

Does a "stereotype" necessarily have to be offensive ? Obviously stereotypes can be used in an offensive way, but is any sort of "template for particular group" bound to be a problem ? Is it OK if we just call it an archetype instead ?

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Stereotypes pave the way for offensive speech and thoughts. In fact, leave out 'offensive', stereotypes pave the way for racist, classist and sexist behaviour. People rarely ascribe to sterotypes about their own culture, it's generally about someone or some group that is Other. And the sterotype creates sloppy ignorant thinking.

Look at the sterotype of "working-class single-mothers" and all the baggage that goes along with that, the assumptions about teenage girls deliberately getting knocked up to qualify for council accomodation. (I get to hear a lot of this in my office.) Or how about the stereotyped "fat person", the lazy glutton who never exercises. How about those "thieving Arab/Gypsies"?

Once you think of groups of people as ascribing to a common "template" you stop thinking of people as individuals. You internalise the ludicrous notions that all black people have natural rhythmn, all women can't read maps and feminists are all hairy-legged lesbian man-haters.

I think that all sterotyping is dangerous but it's especially dangerous when applies to a particular ethnic or class group to which you do not yourself belong. So while there are sterotypes of behaviour that I do not (at present) consider offensive such as "all English people drink buckets and buckets of tea", it's wise to treat these reductions with great caution. And to remember that people of colour (for example) come up against stereotypes all the time.

I don't think an archetype is quite the same thing as a stereotype but if you view the words as analogous then I'd say that changing the word doesn't help, it's the thought pattern that's the problem.

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addedentry.livejournal.com

People rarely ascribe to sterotypes about their own culture

While I agree with the rest of your comment, even the Torygraph would be happy to claim that the English like to talk about the weather while standing in queues, not grumbling. And drinking buckets and buckets of tea.

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Yeah, that's why I went for rarely rather than never. I think the English (not so much the British) may be particularly given to sterotyping themselves. Both the Paxman and Fox books about Englishness were positivity enthusiastic about certain stereotypes of their own culture.

Me, I don't drink tea. ;)

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My thinking was that if you need to refer to "the typical Frenchman" (say) then there are probably things that "the typical Frenchman" does. They probably aren't riding a bike while wearing the stripey jumper and the onions, but they possibly are "stereotypical" French things.

Of course, there aren't really very many situations where you can justify needing to refer to "the typical Frenchman", which may be the point - once you start doing it, you may rapidly descend into the sort of sloppy thinking you're talking about.

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Resorting to the dictionary, there are differences between "typical" and "stereotypical". "Stereotype" is often used specifically to indicate that the abstraction is over-simplified, prejudiced, or offensive. In which case the answer would be that if it's not offensive, it's probably not stereotyping, but rather a careful, informed, and accurate survey of notable traits of a particular group or culture.

Of course that does leave the statement "this is offensive because it's stereotyping" perilously close to circular. But it's probably reasonable to assume that over-simplification and prejudice regarding a racial or social group is at least liable to cause offence.

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I'd say the problem here is the reversal of an archetype. One's mental conception of a "ghetto" (assuming we believe in the psychological theory of category definition through archetypes) might include groups of people in the streets playing recorded music. This probably only offends if it's wilfully ignorant, and the existence of such groups in "the ghetto" is a part of hip hop tradition / mythology as well being as an outsiders' fancy.

To then refer to any device used to play music in the streets as a "ghetto blaster" stigmatises that activity, by flipping the archetype around to say that when one thinks of street music, one thinks of ghettoes, as opposed to saying that when one thinks of ghettoes one thinks of street music. I think this is probably more likely to be offensive to anyone who does it, regardless of whether the area they live can reasonably be described by the speaker as a "ghetto". Especially so if they feel their love of public music is cultural, and that you are therefore consigning their culture to the ghetto.

The issue is further strained in the US, because there discussion of "ghettoes" is a live political issue associated with race. I've always understood that "ghetto blasters" are not named after the Warsaw ghetto of 1940-1943, but after poor, predominantly black neighbourhoods in US cities.

I say this in full knowledge that I certainly used to call the things ghetto blasters myself. Not sure whether I still would - it actually took me a while to remember the term, so long is it since I had occasion to talk about such portable stereos. The obvious fix is for Apple to change the language by manufacturing an iBlaster, which people with very strong arms will take jogging.

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I believe there are also Jewish people who find the casual use of the term "ghetto" offensive but I haven't been able to find adequate citation of this.

Also, check out this thread for casual use of the word "ghetto", racial stereotyping, minimisation and racism. Oh and for bonus points a reference to "PC gone mad" on page 2.

And this and more minimising, more PC-gone-mad and more blatant racism.

Edited Date: 2009-02-06 03:02 pm (UTC)

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Which reminds me, I heard a joke I rather liked the other day:

Did you know that Suggs is headlining Rock Against Racism ?
It's just Madness gone politically correct.

I started to read the threads you linked to, but I think it would be bad for my blood pressure :( Although that's more a feature of the-way-discussions-happen-on-the-web (in general) than the racism in particular.

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Similarly, "mental illness: it's madness gone politically correct".

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undyingking.livejournal.com

That joke would be more charming if Suggs was not a former enthusiastic National Front activist.

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Good grief, was he really ? I didn't know that.

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undyingking.livejournal.com

He claims to have seen the error of racism and left the NF before Madness became famous, and I'll do him the credit of believing that. (The same is true of Mike Barson of the band.)

But I believe Suggs kept up his friendship with Ian Stuart (they used to be flatmates) right up till the latter's death.

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