Pejorative

"Name slur" redirects here. For other uses of slur, seeSlur (disambiguation).

Apejorative word, phrase,slur, orderogatory term is aword or grammatical form expressing a negative or disrespectful connotation, a low opinion, or a lack ofrespect toward someone or something.^[1] It is also used to expresscriticism,hostility, or disregard. Sometimes, a term is regarded as pejorative in some social or ethnic groups but not in others or may be originally pejorative but later adopt a non-pejorative sense (orvice versa) in some or all contexts.

Etymology

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The wordpejorative is derived from aLate Latin past participle stem ofpeiorare, meaning "to make worse", frompeior "worse".^[2]

Pejoration and melioration

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Further information:Semantic drift

Inhistorical linguistics, the process of an inoffensive word becoming pejorative is a form ofsemantic drift known aspejoration. An example of pejoration is the shift in meaning of the wordsilly from meaning that a person was happy and fortunate to meaning that they are foolish and unsophisticated.^[3] The process of pejoration can repeat itself around a single concept, leaping from word to word in a phenomenon known as theeuphemism treadmill, for example as in the successive pejoration of the termsbog-house,privy-house,latrine,water closet,toilet,bathroom, andrestroom (US English).^[4]^[5]

When a term begins as pejorative and eventually is adopted in a non-pejorative sense, this is calledmelioration oramelioration. One example is the shift in meaning of the wordnice from meaning a person was foolish to meaning that a person is pleasant.^[6] When performed deliberately, it is described asreclamation orreappropriation.^[7] Examples of a word that has been reclaimed by portions of the community that it targets isqueer,faggot anddyke which began being re-appropriated as a positive descriptor in the early 1990s by activist groups.^[8] However, due to its history and – in some regions – continued use as a pejorative, there remain LGBT individuals who are uncomfortable with having this term applied to them.^[9] The use of theracial slurnigger (specifically the-a variant) byAfrican Americans is often viewed as another act of reclamation, though much like the latter in the LGBT movement, there exists a vocal subset of people with Sub-Saharan African descent that object to the use of the word under any circumstances.^[10]

References

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^"Pejorative". Dictionary.com.Archived from the original on Mar 21, 2016. Retrieved2012-04-25.
^"Pejorative (adj.)".Online Etymology Dictionary. RetrievedOctober 16, 2016.
^Horobin, Simon (March 31, 2021)."Five words that don't mean what you think they do".The Conversation.Archived from the original on April 5, 2021. Retrieved2021-04-05.
^Stollznow, Karen (2020-08-11)."Ableist Language and the Euphemism Treadmill". Cambridge University Press. Retrieved2021-04-06.
^Bell, Vicars Walker (1953).On Learning the English Tongue. Faber & Faber. p. 19.The Honest Jakes or Privy has graduated via Offices to the final horror of Toilet.
^Nordquist, Richard (3 October 2019)."Amelioration (word meanings)".ThoughtCo.Archived from the original on Jan 18, 2021. Retrieved2021-04-06.
^Brontsema, Robin (2004-06-01). "A Queer Revolution: Reconceptualizing the Debate Over Linguistic Reclamation".Colorado Research in Linguistics.17 (1).doi:10.25810/dky3-zq57.ISSN 1937-7029.Linguistic reclamation, also known as linguistic resignification or reappropriation, refers to the appropriation of a pejorative epithet by its target(s).
^Perlman, Merrill (2019-01-22)."How the word 'queer' was adopted by the LGBTQ community".Columbia Journalism Review. Retrieved2021-07-12.
^Druhan, Colin (2019-03-06)."Our complicated relationship with the term queer".IN Magazine. Retrieved2021-07-12.
^Higson, Rachel (2017-09-28)."Considering the N-Word: To Reject or Reclaim?".Prindle Institute. Retrieved2023-03-12.