The Case For Black With A Capital B

If we’ve traded Negro for Black, why was that first letter demoted back to lowercase, when the argument had already been won? Publications like Essence and Ebony push back, proudly capitalizing the B. But claiming the uppercase as a choice, rather than the rule, feels inadequate. Black should always be written with a capital B. We are indeed a people, a race, a tribe. It’s only correct. ~Lori L. Tharps is an assistant professor of journalism at Temple University.

In 1929, the editor for the Encyclopaedia Britannica informed Du Bois that Negro would be lowercased in an article he had submitted for publication, Du Bois quickly wrote a heated retort that called “the use of a small letter for the name of twelve million Americans and two hundred million human beings [In Africa and the Caribbean] a personal insult.”

The editor changed his mind and conceded to the capital N, as did many other mainstream publications including The Atlantic Monthly and, eventually, The New York Times.

Du Bois had won that argument.

The assertion that race is an artificial construction and that the capitalizing of the B in ‘Black’ only promotes a meme is patently false! Humans are part of the animal kingdom, like frogs, subject to the same laws of genetics as all others. Is ‘Human’ then an artificial construction? How about the ‘frog’?

The characteristics used to define race are genetics, akin to those defining breeds of dogs, if you can forgive the crass analogy – nothing is meant by it other than example. People of different races, in fact not only look different from one another, they are different from one another. Not better or worse, just different.

The difference between being “fat” and being “White” is that one can change fatness. One can even change a generation of “tall” people into tiny people if they can eradicate all dairy supplements from their diet. One cannot change one’s race. A “Black” person remains Black.

What is frightening is perhaps the pride inherent in ideas of race – mainly stemming from and influenced by White supremacist mentality – that all races that are not White are inferior. It makes as much sense as being proud of being short, having pale hair, or being ‘slow.’

The grammar attendant with race merely recognizes the importance of such basic qualities in human beings, and how they attach to large groups of people with shared traits. Like the personal pronoun “I,” should be capitalized. It seems to me that if breeds of dogs are capitalized, the least we can do is capitalize races of people. “Black” should be and must be capitalized.

People, all people, must own the right to manage how they are characterized by society. It is not another privilege of the privileged class to assign names to others. Assuming this right for the majority reinforces this group’s own sense of power. A power that has been wrongfully assumed, and built upon in just such ways, large and small.

For another example, consider the word “Jew.” Then compare how it strikes you with the terms “Arab,” or “Christian.” The sad truth is that the word “Jew” has been so often used as an epithet by bigoted white European Christians that it sounds harsh. We then will prefer to say “Jewish person,” or something else to avoid the simple, and correct term.

‘Jew’. The noun form has a weight the adjective, ‘Jewish,’ which is always capitalized as well, lacks. It seems loaded with a monosyllabic distaste, which was redoubled by the strange use of the upper case, JEW. All publications in the United States use capitalization for both. Still American writers keep the lowercase ‘black’ referring to a whole race of people for no logical reasoning.

The potential implications of something as seemingly simple as capitalizing ‘Black’, or not, which may be insignificant to White Americans (not necessarily because of evil, or even disinterested, perhaps unaware); can be incredibly important. Why? We like ‘Black’ so.

Since Dr. Tharps’ article was published in the New York Times, there has been a particular unease amongst many White commentators. They claim they would not like ‘White’ capitalized, implying that ‘Black’ should not be capitalized neither. Is that fair?

I’m happy to be white, but I don’t want to be White. My British and Irish ancestors tried to wipe each other out. To them, they were all different races. Gael, Saxon, Angle, Norman. They did not see themselves as part of one White race, and I’m not interested in pretending that they did. ~ Commentator.

What continues to be astounding about comments like this is that they feel it appropriate for those who are not Black or of African descent to determine how people who are Black or of African descent should be referred to in print. That is the issue that Dr. Tharps’ article addresses.

Not even one African American is proposing that the w in ‘white’ be capitalized. Why would we care?

But if Black people want to be referred to as Black, what right does someone who is not Black or of African descent have here? The article consistently referred to the media, NY Times, particularly, and others, not owned by “business people who are black,” that determines how Black people are referred to in print.

It seems as if telling a group how it should be referred to, or refer to itself in print, even when the group objects, is a form of domination that white America seems reluctant to shed.

Maybe the history of white entitlement, of telling Black people what to do, or how to talk or how to refer to themselves, is what a capitalized Black revolts against that “black” or “business man who is black” does not.

We can all, always, use some eye opening.