I think it's actually pretty clear what the appropriation was. The fraternity was doing a badminton-based fundraiser and it called it "Bad(minton) and Boujee." There's a rap song "Bad and Boujee" and "boujee" is a distinctive spelling of the shortened form of "bourgeois" that's used as an insult and more commonly spelled — if anybody tries to write it — "bougie." The spelling "boujee" is actually good because it's phonetic and it keeps people from pronouncing it "boogie," which actually is a racial slur!
Here's the OED entry for the noun "boogie":
U.S. slang. offensive.Anyway, the spelling "boujee" is associated with black people, especially when used in connection with the rap song title. Here's the video of the song. Once you've watched that, you'll have to stoop to faux naivety to act like you don't know what the university was talking about. It's a separate question whether cultural appropriation is bad and whether it's something universities should patrol and how clearly they need to speak when they do.
A derogatory term for an African American.
1923 Confessions of Bank Burglar vii. 40 Three coons came into the barn..the three of them took a drink and then put the bottle in the hay... At noon the ‘boogies’ came in for another shot.
1925 Flynn's 1 Aug. 572/1 One of the cops..caught two boogies. We picked up the two hard-lookin' young negroes.
1925 Flynn's 1 Aug. 572/1 The boogie jus' got up and grinned.
1937 E. Hemingway To have & have Not iii. xiv. 205, I seen that big boogie there mopping it up.
Anyway, I'm just getting up to speed on the word "boujee," and I found a helpful blog post by Damon Young at Very Smart Brothas, "THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN BOUGIE, BOUJEE, AND BOURGIE/BOURGEOIS, EXPLAINED." Excerpt:
Bougie Black people are mostly urban, have completed some form of secondary education, and, most importantly, possess and are mindful of a certain urban/educated aesthetic. These are the people discussed and deconstructed in my Shit Bougie Black People Love series....I plan to read more Damon Young. Like his newest post: "HOW MAD SHOULD I BE WHEN WHITE PEOPLE GREET AND TALK TO MY DOG WHEN I’M WALKING HIM INSTEAD OF ME?"
Anyway, Boujee describes the type of nouveau/hood rich that would totally, definitely cook up some dope with an Uzi.* They may have even made more money last year than their Bougie and Bourgie/Bourgeois counterparts, but the IRS would never, ever, ever know.
_______________________
* That's a reference to the lyrics to the song "Bad and Boujee": "My bitch is bad and boujee/Cookin' up dope with an Uzi."
ADDED: The word pronounced boujee or bougie seems to have originated in speaking about black people. The first printed examples — according to the (unlinkable) OED — were spelled "bourgie" (showing the connection to the word "bourgeois" more clearly). The OED defines this word as "slang (chiefly U.S., orig. in African-American usage). Chiefly depreciative... A person, esp. an African-American, regarded as bourgeois or middle-class, or as exhibiting characteristics attributed to the middle class, such as conventionality, materialism, or pretentiousness." Example:
1968 Negro Digest Nov. 64/2 Instead of recognizing differences among members but valuing the common cause, individuals will begin to call some people ‘Uncle Toms’, ‘bourgeois’ or ‘bourgies’, conservatives, foot-shufflers, black Caucasians and a variety of other uncomplimentary names.It was also an adjective, again, "Originally used chiefly of and by African Americans." Example:
1968 Ramparts 26 Oct. 29/1 Silly-ass Kenneth Freeman..said some bull crap about ‘Huey P. Newton come from a bourgie family.’
Posts
99 comments:
Missing the "Althouse trolls her commenters" tag.
One more definition.
bou·gie1
ˈbo͞oZHē/
nounMEDICINE
a thin, flexible surgical instrument for exploring or dilating a passage of the body.
I've used them for 50 years. Didn't know about the other versions.
Bring back racial slurs.
Nazi is too limiting for a living language.
Appropriating German culture.
Bougie is French for Candle.
"a thin, flexible surgical instrument for exploring or dilating a passage of the body."
I didn't mention it, but I saw that the OED too.
The "Here's" link to the rap song doesn't work. Comes up, "Not found. Error 404"
"Bougie" is French for candle, and the word came into English meaning candle. Under that entry, with candle as the first meaning, the medical instrument is the second meaning.
And that's actually the only entry for "bougie" in the OED.
The short form for "bourgeois" in the OED is spelled "bourgie." And, interestingly enough, the historical usages, beginning in the 1960s, are about black people.
I need to put this on the front page.
We have moved on from First World Problems to First World Problems of the .01%.
Here's the OED entry for the noun "boogie":
U.S. slang. offensive.
Yeah, right, like J.L. Hooker's "Boogie Chillen".
Is "dictionary" offensive slang for the OED, which is almost always incorrect about word origins?
Long John Baldry was unavailable for comment
There is only one appropriate response to meddling campus administrators who issue warnings to fraternities about 'cultural appropriation': "Go f*ck yourselves."
Of all the simple-minded memes to come from the left - and there are so many to choose from - the construct of "cultural appropriation" must take first prize.
So "boogie down" or "lets boogie" are racially offensive?
Can i still enjoy boogie woogie piano or is it goodbye to Fats Waller?
John Henry
The universities are enrolling too many students who do not have the intelligence, education or culture to succeed in university studies.
As a consequence, the university has to hire diversity administrators to develop sophisticated excuses for the inevitable academic failures.
Essentially the excuses are that these students are "marginalized" by mean people who do mean actions like "cultural appropriation". Thus the academic failures are blamed on White guys who host fraternity parties where some sombreros are worn.
If sombreros are worn at fraternity parties, then it's no wonder that most Affirmative Action students cannot read university-level textbooks and write university-level compositions.
Wearing sombreros was just the beginning.
Now, in addition, White guys are hosting fraternity parties where the word "boujee" is uttered.
Then there is "Booji Boy".
From Wiki:
"Booji Boy /ˈbʊɡi/ is a character created in the early 1970s by the American new wave band Devo... ...Booji Boy has traits of a simian child and typically wears an orange nuclear protection suit... ...The intent of the figure is to satirize infantile regression in Western culture, a quality Devo enjoyed elucidating..."
Can't get more White than Devo.
And they were Right about "infantile regression in Western culture."
I am Laslo.
And what is Greek Life, anyway? The phrase puts me in mind of lazlo and pony tail girl.
Not healthy thoughts to be having pn the sabbath
John Henry
Certain activities are only appropriate when carried out by people who belong to certain racial categories.
Okay. Noted.
Is eating fried chicken and watermelon included in this list of cultural activities?
So "boogie down" or "lets boogie" are racially offensive?
Not to mention the Boogie Man. And what about Boogers ?
You can't appropriate culture because it isn't owned by anyone. Logic, I know. Maybe some of the dipshits complaining about cultural appropriation should appropriate basic reasoning and critical thinking skills.
Charles Murray wrote a book titled Real Education: Four Simple Truths for Bringing America's Schools Back to Reality. One of the "simple truths" was that "too many people are going to college".
One very effective argument he made was to provide excerpts from 1) high-school textbooks and 2) university textbooks. The contrast was striking.
A large portion of the population cannot read at a university level and does not really want to try to do so. If they read anything at all, they read only light fiction.
A lot of high-school students never read any books except their school textbooks, because they are compelled to do so. They don't really read even those textbooks either -- they merely skim them.
Those non-reading high-school students should not go on to universities. Because they nevertheless are persuaded to enroll, they become maladjusted and resentful, and eventually they start parroting stupid excuses like "marginalization" and "mini-aggression" and "cultural appropriation" to justify their failures.
I have never in my life heard a black person referred to as "Boogie". If you'd asked me, I would have said it was recently invented. I can't even keep track of everything I'm supposed to be appalled by anymore.
"I have never in my life heard a black person referred to as "Boogie". If you'd asked me, I would have said it was recently invented."
Yeah, it's old. But I can remember it.
It's interesting how all this is about making success somehow shameful for blacks.
“Looks like someone got a degree and got all brand new”
At the link, "Shit Bougie Black People Love", Damon Young writes about bougie black people frequently throwing the slang word "trap" into their conversation in order to demonstrate their authentic blackness.
The Urban Dictionary says this:
trap
Not specifically a place where drugs are sold, rather, The ghetto, specifically the ghetto in Atlanta. Called the trap because people there are stuck in a cycle of selling drugs and hustling to survive, and are therefore "trapped" and unable to leave and make a better life for themselves.
But the existence of bougie blacks is evidence the trap can be escaped, that individual choices matter.
Lamar Gonna Set You Straight...
I got bigger things to worry about than "Cultural Appropriation", you feel me? I mean, it would nice and all if White People PAID for stealing the Black Man's shit, but we know that ain't ever going to happen: White People just take what they want, that's how they roll...
But here's the thing: us Black People can come up with New Shit faster than White Folks can steal it. Beyonce always gonna be one step ahead of you. Jay-Z always gonna be one step ahead. The Boys in the Hood will always be rockin' shit you White People never even thought of; that's how WE roll...
See, White People have the money, so they get lazy and just buy the latest shit. Brothers who are broke, we gotta make Shit ourselves. And we're GOOD at it. White People, at least they get this much: shit from the Ghetto is REAL.
Look at the 808: you White People came up with that, but couldn't do a damn thing with it, so you tossed it off in the trash like you always do. We Brothers find it in the trash, and we make it BOUNCE! Now all the White Hipsters be all about the 808, but only 'cause the Black Man showed them how to use it...
If all us Black People stopped using iPhones and rocked the flip-phone you know what would happen? Damn right: the next iPhone would be a motherfuckin' flip-phone...
So keep biting our shit, White People: you ain't never gonna catch up...
You think you got Problems? Fuck You.
I am Laslo.
Given their concern for avoiding cultural appropriation, I look forward to the day that American University (and UW-Madison) stops referring to the fraternities and sororities on campus by the term "Greek Life." My guess is that very few of the members these associations are in fact ethnic Greeks, have read Greek literature (classical or modern) of are familiar with the Greek language beyond the Greek letters they have misappropriated for their organizations. ;)
Perhaps it's more slang than slur. The Boogie Woogie Trumpet Player has not been banned. Not all short hand terms are derogatory.
It's good to see you guys worrying about the important stuff.
Racial slurs of the early 20th century are like homosexual labels of the late 20th century. Trying to co-opt as many words as possible for their causes, and making it so all sorts of perfectly fine words get marred with suspicion, even if the great amount of people don't have any idea those words are used this way.
If I heard the word boogie, I think of three meanings:
Boogie man: potentially racist, and it'd be interesting to see the history of that use. Did it predate the racial uses? It's usually meant to mean an actual monster.
Boogie: dance. Let's boogie! Positive term for having fun dancing.
Boogie Board: coming from a SoCal family, growing up in the 70s-80s, this was the much more common usage. It's a way of surfing that you lie down on, rather than stand up. Is there a racial background to this? I would guess it's more related to the dancing meaning if anything.
But, I come from the proletariat so I defer to the cultured sophisticates to understand our cause better and provide a guide for language usage.
It's good to see you guys worrying about the important stuff.
We didn't start this shit...you guys did.
Boogie-woogie choo-choo train?
Those blacks Damon Young described as always using the word trap are also wanting to show that they haven't forgotten where they came from, that they aren't smug and superior and that they respect the struggle of people who are trapped in the ghetto.
Conversely, whites who have escaped the poor areas of rural America and are doing very well in the cities have a different attitude. They openly despise and heap derision on their fellows who are still struggling with poverty and drugs in the south or in the rust belt.
We didn't start this shit...you guys did.
We start lots of stuff: Social security, Medicare, landing a guy on the moon, expanding the insurance pools by tens of millions, winning World War II, defeating Hitler and Tojo, the regulations that staved off a depression for nearly 80 years.
But you guys are so horrible at building on those more important legacies that you focus on the petty stuff instead. Just like a Republican should!
PC is just a response to the Republican culture war to return us to the 1950s. It will go away when you actually start doing something useful with your time in the government-graft complex. Which will of course be: Never.
Just get out of office already. You're soooooo bad at it! And you hate it anyway!
Never hire someone who declares his goal to be to wreck the company.
Blogger Jason said...There is only one appropriate response to meddling campus administrators who issue warnings to fraternities about 'cultural appropriation': "Go f*ck yourselves."
Maybe futile and stupid gestures would work.
The people who created the term "cultural appropriation" landed us on the moon? And won WWII?
Just when you thought it couldn't get any sillier.
The people who created the term "cultural appropriation" landed us on the moon? And won WWII?
Well, it wasn't the isolationists like you who hated FDR and sided/sympathized with Hitler and Mussolini.
I'll give you credit where it's due!
"and sided/sympathized with Hitler and Mussolini. "
You mean like Stalin ?
Isn't this curltural reclamation? Bougie implies whiteness, bourgeoisie is white middle class.
I didn't know you spoke for Stalin, Cuck Kennedy.
I thought Von Braun, of the Reform Nazi Temple, was useful in designing the rockets that got us to the moon. It's said that the Russians had some formidable German scientists, but our Nazis, working under a free market system, were the best.
I know your side loves itself some revisionism, William. Hell, it HAS to! Hard to love reality when you're engaged in such a brutal war to the finish against it.
But this idea that Von Braun and other patriated Nazis would have accomplished the moon shot without NASA or Kennedy's leadership - just because private enterprise and the market saw a huge profit motive in spending billions dangerously firing off humans into space and a dusty gray rock orbiting the earth with nothing financially valuable on it, is just about the funniest thing I've heard a single Trumpist/slave/clone/cock utter all year long. And I've heard some doozies.
Do tell us more. Maybe we will next hear about the profit to be gained by offsetting the trajectory of the earth and orbiting it into a path that crashes it into the sun.
Those Republicans! They're certainly a creative bunch! Suicidal and homicidal sadistic maniacs, to be sure. But creative!
"Cultural appropriation" is what whiny bitches whine and bitch about when they've run out of everything else.
At the Daffodil Cafe, Laslo posted another classic. Shrink to Unhappy Blog Commenter:
"We're near the end of our session. So, to recap: you are Unhappy, and you spend your time reading a Writer you don't respect and then communicating with others that you don't respect. And you want all of them to change while you stay the same. Is that a fair assessment?"
Yes, that's a fair assessment.
"HOW MAD SHOULD I BE WHEN WHITE PEOPLE GREET AND TALK TO MY DOG WHEN I’M WALKING HIM INSTEAD OF ME?"
Congratulations, Damon. You're accepted by white people. That's how white people greet white strangers with dogs. You must dress like a grownup and own a non-threatening dog.
I think it's actually pretty clear what the appropriation was. The fraternity was doing a badminton-based fundraiser and it called it "Bad(minton) and Boujee."
How dare they appropriate badminton from India.
They were also appropriating Greek culture. Horrors!
Cultural appropriation of the sort that raises complaints is when you adopt something from another culture and then do it better than they did.
There was a great one from Stanford from a couple of years ago that didn't make the papers. (I know some of the kids involved.)
A black kid from Oakland was tired of the music usually played at his fraternity's parties, so he proposed to the house that the next party should feature hip-hop music. The house agreed and told him he could organize the party.
So he goes all out and announces a big "Streets of Oakland Hip-Hop" party for the house.
The administration sees this and tells the largely white fraternity that this theme is unacceptable cultural appropriation and forces them to cancel the party.
Of course, this leaves the kid dumbfounded and wondering why he's not permitted to have "his" music at a party.
Cultural appropriation is how Tory Republican cucks make the progressive ideas and ideals of the founders seem less threatening and alien to them.
"They were also appropriating Greek culture." And beer culture.
Which raises the question: what would an appropriation-free life look like?
Of course, the very idea of cultural appropriation is appropriated from a DWEM. I think. But don't get me started. Who will disappropriate the disappropriators?
How dare American Indians appropriate the name "Indians" from the, um, Indians!
Althouse is overplaying her etymology of "Boogie" and falsely linking it so tightly to the black race. There is an alternative etymology for the term which wholly avoids US race politics.
Lewis Wetzel said...
How dare American Indians appropriate the name "Indians" from the, um, Indians!
Not to mention the English taking Dutch from the Deutch!
Going to jail is cultural appropriation.
A central tenet of my tribe's culture (the one which built western civilization) dictates that (i) cult approp (CA) is not only fine, it's obvious common sense/should be encouraged, (ii) anyone who thinks that CA is problematic is full of shit, (iii) if you don't like CA, too bad; deal with your own weaknesses and insecurities, but do not assume they are of slightest interest to us, and (iv) the topic's not worthy of further discussion. Everyone is, of course, free and encouraged to adopt any cultural aspects of my tribe that they find attractive.
I plan to read more Damon Young. Like his newest post: "HOW MAD SHOULD I BE WHEN WHITE PEOPLE GREET AND TALK TO MY DOG WHEN I’M WALKING HIM INSTEAD OF ME?"
That is the stupidest thing I've ever heard. I talk to dogs all the time.
Now do I bend down and pet the dog without acknowledging the owner at all? No. But I'll walk past and say "Hi" Or "Hi precious" or whatever to a dog without really talking to the owner.
And people would do that with me when I was walking my dog.
Don't assume something is happening to you because of your race. Look around and see if it is happening to other people, too!!
The problem here begins with the fact that white (and Asian) kids consume rap music, and provide that industry with the larger part of its revenues. That is the greatest and most despicable act of cultural appropriation ongoing today. Where do all these privileged people get the gall to listen to black peoples music?
There ought to be a campaign, to press home the point that rap and hiphop are for blacks only. That would also solve a great many other problems I think, the least being the risk of secondary appropriation of black-dialect words typical of rap.
When non-Western countries take up Marxism, isn't that cultural appropriation? Stop reading "Das Kapital," people of color. What do the ideas of a 19th century self-hating German Jew have to do with you?
Here's an article about the name boogie board. Which doesn't mention anything about racist slurs.
@exile,
When non-Western countries take up Marxism, isn't that cultural appropriation?
Oh, yes, & it was meant to be exactly that. It was seen by the non-European countries involved as a part & parcel of the modernization & Westernization of the country. That's why the Chinese communists were so brutal towards traditional Chinese culture, destroying everything they could of it (I include the invasion of Tibet as part of this cultural war).
Even the rise of Bolshevism in Russia can be seen as yet another stage in the long struggle between the Westernizers & the Slavophiles. The Westernizer Bolsheviks are now gone, replaced by a Slavophile Putin regime.
So when black people use a French word most commonly associated with the acolytes of a German philosopher and activist, that's okay, but now it's theirs, and no one else can use it? Prof. Althouse lives in a world constrained by very artificial rules, and the sad part is, the artificiality isn't like garden parties or white tie dinners, because it isn't even fun.
There ought to be a campaign, to press home the point that rap and hiphop are for blacks only.
I might even donate a little money to that cause.
Not kidding, this is scary because I could have accidentally used this and thereby put my job in jeopardy. My twenty-something kids use a word, pronounced "boo-jzhee," to mean a person who exhibits upper-class pretensions. Apparently if I had ever tried to use it myself, it could be easily taken for some kind of gross anti-black stereotype. It's also crazy that miniscule variations of this slang term apparently mean very different things, some of which are OK and other of which are thermo-nuclear social bombs.
I wonder if the use of the terms built around "boogie" as a racial slur aren't really contractions of the much more common term "jigaboo". Growing up in northern Alabama in the 60s & 70s, I heard more racist terms than you can shake a stick at, but never once did I hear "boogie" as a racist term. I heard it in the usage of "Get down & boogie!". Maybe it was a regionalism, & was used in other parts of the country.
Regionalisms get really, really strange. I remember being weirded out when I heard the word "jaw" used as a noun for the female genitalia, in other words, "pussy". Needless to say, the clown who was using the term was not exactly strong on etymologies, so I still remain baffled as to its origin.
sean said
"So when black people use a French word most commonly associated with the acolytes of a German philosopher and activist, that's okay, but now it's theirs, and no one else can use it?"
Good point. Why are blacks using "bourgeois" to begin with? Not only the word, but the entire concept of a middle class comes from the people of pallor.
Cultural appropriation flatters the appropriated culture. It's a good thing. Like naming your sports team Redskins. It's a frickin' compliment.
Some university needs an endowed chair in Stupid Shit to Get Upset About.
Rules are arbitrary and capricious when it's really about asserting power.
If the rap is in Englsh, then who is appropriating whom?
Boogie Boards had a TV ad in the 1980s with a jingle that included the verse "put your body on a Boogie." That caused my dad to laugh; he had grown up in Detroit and apparently that word as slur was current then.
Let's say for a moment that cultural appropriation os worthy f being taken seriosly. What are its boundries? Which is to say, what is my culture? What is your culture? What am I alloeed to do?what are you allowed to do?
It's hard to imagine anyone being allowed to do anything.
Typos courtesy of iPad and no edit feature on blogger.
I'm with Paco Wove, 9:23-- troll level: expert.
Well I'm assuming that the all knowing all wise all puffed up university administrator could figure out that these "Greek" boys were not appropriating the culture of Lesbos.
But then it's possible that he or she (the administrator) might be that dumb.
Black people naturally speak languages that sound like Ughah Bugah Bugah Boo (I know this from watching Johnny Weissmuller movies as a child. I also know that Oomgahwah! is what German-Americans say to elephants, evil white hunters, cannibal chiefs, and half-naked English girls on all occasions for the same reason.) Consequently, any black person using bougie, boujee, or any utterance derived from bourgeoisie are guilty of cultural appropriation from the French. I foresee demands for reparations from the rap industry issuing from the Elysée Palace quite soon.
I'm past fed up with the "cultural appropriation" shtick. Taken to its logical conclusion Tiger Woods should not have been allowed to play golf because the game was invented in Scotland so only people with Scots ancestry should be allowed to play it? F*ck that.
But then it's possible that he or she (the administrator) might be that dumb.
It's she, trust me on this one.
Somewhere the shade of Herbert Asquith is grinning ruefully.
RigelDog,
No, relax, you're in no danger of being pilloried for an accidental mis-step in this minefield created for precisely the reasons. Unless of course you're a conservative, a person who once held a view held (at least for public consumption) by the Left which is no longer operative , if you're a man and otherwise completely on board with the PC agenda but the usual suspects need to destroy someone as an example to others, if you're a anti-racist who tries to make a lame joke about perceived white attitudes towards AIDS before getting on a long intercontinental flight without first having expressly established 1)one's bona fides and 2) that it is a joke on white people, a white liberal public official who uses a word that is mildly cognate with a racial slur even though its etymology is from a Scandinavian language and predates any meaningful contact with Africa, ....
Okay, on the other hand, worry a little. Or, tell them to sod off. Your choice.
I propose making a list of all cultural appropriations by African-Americans; in fact, Quaestor will get the ball rolling as it were:
List of Cultural Appropriations Committed by Black People
1) Shoes that enclose the toes.
There are many racial/ethnic slurs that are acceptable words used in other contexts. Google to find a list of slurs and you will see.
Here
Alphabetical order.
Funnily enough, my first name is on the list!
List of Cultural Appropriations Committed by Black People
2) Lyrics to Old Man River. Except for "Mississippi" and "potatoes", it's Anglo-Saxon throughout. All Paul Robeson recording must be overdubbed in Mandé immediately.
List of Cultural Appropriations Committed by Black People
3) Use of any weapon that isn't "chucked". All copies of Django Unchained must be recalled immediately pending re-edit. Django may skewer his foes with a spear or cudgel them with a stick, but he must not shoot them. As it stands Django Unchained is culable of cultural appropriation against the Chinese (gunpowder) and the Europeans (firearms) and the Mexicans (Django's hat). Once the necessary edits are accomplished there won't be much of Django Unchained left, I fear.
stay away from gender, culture, or sexuality
nice rule for university life!
a.k.a. "just give us your money"
(typo alert) "culable" should read culpable.
Aren't bros one of the largest consumer segments for rap and hip hop?
And do they put "bros" on the in house consumer segmentation breakdown or something friendlier?
List of Cultural Appropriations Committed by Black People
4) Quot homines tot sententiæ. As the aphorism is from Publius Terentius Afer all Black People must be of one mind on any and all questions. (Hillary Clinton should be chagrined this rule came too late for her to win Michigan, Ohio, and Pennsylvania)
NB Anyone who points out that Terence himself was of African origin is guilty of being more pedantic than Quaestor. This is forbidden on the Althouse blog — just ask her.
Re: cultural appropriation
OMG! Did you see what the Romans did to the Greeks? And how about the Japanese and the Chinese? Talk about derivative! And what about Bhuddism in China? They ripped off the Indians.
Cultural appropriation is another name for human progress.
From the list Althouse linked to:
Ali Baba
(US) an Iraqi suspected of criminal activity.[7]
Really? Has anybody ever heard Iraqis being referred to as "Ali Babas?"
But then I'm just a Bohunk so what do I know?
I do like the term "plastic Paddys" for fake Irishmen.
My local paper once carried a letter to the editor written by a Filipino gentleman. He complained that the native Hawaiians insisted on calling him "flip" or "buk-buk."
"Flip" is on the list that Althouse linked to, but not buk-buk.
In the 1980s we used the phrase "bougie white trash" in reference to white people with ostentatious buying habits. Mostly the children of hillbillies or urban blue collar workers. The digital economy killed off the bougie buying habits. Some of them are still driving Mercury Cougars.
Culture in its function as a human adaptation is constructed to be appropriated. The process of appropriation is one of the key ways that innovations and ideas move through human societies. For a university to take a stand against cultural appropriation is oxymoronic--a key purpose of a university is the very process of cultural appropriation itself. It is intended to spread knowledge, not to constrain and segregate it. How stupid these people are!
I wonder if people on the left know just what thin ice they are on intellectually when they go around accusing people of cultural appropriation. My junior high school geometry class was full of Greek symbols for angles. Do they want our kids to dispense with angles in geometry? And what about iPhones? Will the people complaining about cultural appropriation turn in their iPhones because two while guys like Steve Jobs and Stephen Wozniak started Apple which turned around years later and began selling iPhones?
This is what happens when you have some half-educated college functionary trying to make pronouncements about matters he doesn't have the first clue about intellectually but where he knows what the politically correct answer is likely to be.
And the rappers who used the term "boujee" are guilty of culturally appropriating a term and concept made prominent by a nineteenth century German philosopher. So they ought to stop using the word and apologize.
As BDNYC said. When I meet a dog-walker I do not know, I almost always "greet" the dog first. I dangle the back of my hand a couple feet from the dog's head, mumble something like "nice puppy" (regardless of the puppy-status or size of the critter), and make eye contact. If the dog approves of me, I move on to the human.
Doing it in the other order would offend the dog, if the dog is in "protection" mode, which they often are.
I expect dog owners to understand this.
Blogger Ann Althouse said...Here Alphabetical order. Funnily enough, my first name is on the list!
The author(s) of this list have no idea what a cheesehead is!
Once you've watched that, you'll have to stoop to faux naivety to act like you don't know what the university was talking about.
Or it's a subtle method of pointing out black culture appropriated this from others and thus cultural appropriation is normal and nothing to be bothered with avoiding.
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