Can I use a "bad word" in art?
My last article was about my answer to a friend’s recent question. She had asked, basically, “How do I explain to someone that it’s not ok for him to use the ‘n-word,’ even if he’s just quoting someone else?”
In my response, I suggested that for people who aren’t in-group, it’s just not ok to use the word in its full form, and you should always use the taboo avoidance term, which in American English is ‘the n-word.’
And a reader wrote with an interesting follow-up question. What about historical (and I would add, present-day) films that cover race relations? Isn’t it necessary to depict the problematic language accurately? Including saying ‘the n-word’ in full? (And “with a hard r,” which is how many people point out that it isn’t the reclaimed, positive use of the word, which is usually spelled ending with an ‘a’.)
So, can we use a “bad word” in art?
The answer is – sure, as long as it’s done carefully and in ways that let people interpret the stance of the artist(s).
I’ll illustrate with a look at a movie I love that is sometimes considered controversial – Blazing Saddles.
A still from Blazing Saddles of actor Cleavon Little as Sheriff Bart surrounded by baddies Warner Bros Pictures
I happened to rewatch Blazing Saddles a few weeks ago (just for fun, not for work) and was struck by how well-done the satire and racial commentary was. I see quotes out there about how Blazing Saddles just offends everybody, or that it’s a racist movie. But a careful look at context – and who is saying bad things – lets us see that the film actually takes a strong anti-racist stance.
In-group contributions
I used to think that Blazing Saddles was written only by Jewish screenwriters. But it turns out that not only was a Black man the inspiration for the script, but a Black man also co-wrote it.
Andrew Bergman, an academic turned screenwriter, was inspired by voting rights activist and Black Panther H. Rap Brown, and wrote a film called Tex X, about a “hip, [B]lack, modern sheriff dropped into the old West.” Originally cast with James Earl Jones as the sheriff, the production fell apart, and the script ended up in the hands of Mel Brooks, who put together a team to rewrite it.
Brooks wanted to bring on Black satirist and comedian Dick Gregory, but Gregory wasn’t interested. So instead he reached out to Richard Pryor, who was at the time a small stand-up comic working in clubs. Brooks tried to cast Pryor in the lead role of the Black sheriff, but studio concerns about his drug use led to Cleavon Little getting the role instead.
But Pryor was an integral part of the writer’s room. It wasn’t just outsiders writing sympathetically about the Black experience – it was an insider as well.
And I think it’s a great example of diverse teams, where people bring their expertise and lived experience, creating higher-quality and more broadly appealing products.
Who is using “bad language”?
In my last newsletter, I talked about how useful it can be to analyze speech using Erving Goffman’s framework of speaker roles: author, animator, and principal. The author comes up with the words, the animator produces them, and the principal is the person aligned with the stance or opinion expressed by those words.
When it comes to art like novels and films, people often don’t make a distinction between what the author has written for a character and what the author believes.
In other words, people will often assume that because an author wrote some words, that they are automatically the principal as well – that they agree with those words.
But authors write characters who have stances that are not their own. Who believe things they don’t believe. Who act in ways they find unpleasant and do not condone. Who are on the page or screen as a depiction of someone problematic, not someone to be endorsed.
The author comes up with the words, and the actor (or character on the page) animates them – but just because they wrote the words, the author is not necessarily the principal. Or, to put it more plainly, you can write a racist character who says racist things as part of an anti-racist work of art.
Blazing Saddles is filled with the use of ‘the n-word.’ But it is very careful about who says it. In the film, it is only ignorant, bigoted, narrow-minded people who use this word. Their use of the word is part of the depiction of their racist behavior. A problematic word is an integral part of their problematic behavior.
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It can be dangerous to write material that has a stance different from your own. I see misinterpretations again and again for both satire and sarcasm. On the internet, people will frequently write /s after a sarcastic statement so it will be interpreted correctly. Sarcasm requires you to know enough about a person and their beliefs that you are able to understand they are saying exactly the opposite of what they believe.
And satire is often seen as not satirical but a straight forward endorsement. For example, The Colbert Report was a satirical, faux Fox news show in which Stephen Colbert played a character who was a right-wing news host. But for many people, that satirical framing was lost, and the show read as a straightforward news show, where Colbert was in alignment with the stances of his character.
This even shows up in art like songs, where a singer sings a song as a character, but people lose the distinction. Like Every Breath You Take, by the Police, where Sting sings from the perspective of a stalker. But people who aren’t listening carefully see it as a straightforward love song, which is why it is played at weddings.
The lack of distinction between what a character is saying and what an actor believes can also cause problems. Saturday Night Live played with this in a 2014 sketch called 12 Years a Slave Auditions. In the sketch, white actors are being asked to audition for roles like “hostile slave owner” and to read the lines while looking at a Black staff member. “Don’t…want to say…those words…” one of them says with a look of horror on his face. He knows how easy it is to assume that the animator of words believes them.
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Can you use “bad words” in art? Sure. In fact, it’s probably necessary if you want to accurately depict problematic behavior, since problematic language is an integral part of it.
But you can’t always trust that people will be careful in their interpretations. The human tendency to assume that a person is author, animator, and principal all at once means that people will often miss sarcasm, satire, or anti-racist messages that are delivered in more subtle ways.
The more careful we are with our interpretations, the better job we will do separating out depictions of problematic behavior from actually problematic behavior.
Industry-leading inclusive language expert Suzanne Wertheim facilitates in-person and virtual inclusive language trainings, as well as offering empowering and educational inclusive language keynotes.
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