Dropping That N-Bomb: OV Needs Your Help

It is one of the most painful, difficult, and quintessentially American words in our language.

It’s been used to dehumanize, to hurt feelings, to show love, and to sell records. When popular talk radio host Dr. Laura Schlessinger let fly with it on her national show last week, she stirred up a small hornet’s nest.

This Saturday, August 21, we’re having an OV family dialogue about the “N word.” Two of our correspondents – 64 and 21 years old – will have an inter-generational conversation about its meanings, uses, and controversies.

We will videotape and post the discussion.

Here’s where you come in. Please send us a ONE-sentence question or comment that you would like to be included in our conversation this Saturday.

Below, you can leave your thought as a comment. You can also comment on our Facebook page, or Tweet us using #OVNword. Be sure to give us your name (with pronunciation), and tell us where you’re writing from.

Have your comment or question in by Friday evening, Oakland time.

The debates about that word – about who can & can’t use it, when (not) to say it, whether or not its noxious history is a good enough reason not to use it today – aren’t new. They are all around us. Some complain about it with their friends. Others offend their elders with it. And of course there’s its confusing potency when it comes off the tongues of white people.

OV wants to bring some of those debates out into the open.