Origins: Run, Nigger, Run

Subject: RE: Lyr req: Run, Nigger; Run
From: X
Date: 13 Apr 02 - 12:59 PM

I see this thread all the time. I hope it's not because some of you like an excuse for writing the "N" word. Is it?

Subject: RE: Lyr req: Run, Nigger; Run
From: wysiwyg
Date: 13 Apr 02 - 09:26 PM

Banjoest, see the thread linked above as the continuation of this one.

~S~

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: GUEST,Retus
Date: 27 Apr 07 - 11:29 PM

This is the first and correct lyrics, whether you like them or not.
^^
RUN, NIGGER, RUN
from Gid Tanner & His Skillet Lickers
Run Nigger Run recorded in 1927 Atlanta, Georgia

Irish slave patrols (called patrollers, pattyrollers or paddyrollers by the slaves) were organized groups of three to six white men who enforced discipline upon black slaves during the antebellum U.S. southern states.

Oh run nigger run well the pattyroller will get you
Run nigger run well you better get away

Run nigger run well the pattyroller will get you
Run nigger run well you better get away

Nigger run nigger flew
Nigger tore his shirt in two

Run run the patty roller will get you
Run nigger run well you better get away

Nigger run, run so fast
Stoved his head in a hornets nest

Run nigger run well the pattyroller will get you
Run nigger run well you better get away

Nigger run through the field
Black slick coal and barley heel

Run nigger run the pattyroller will get you
Run nigger run well you better get away

Some folks say a nigger won't steal
I caught three in my corn field
One has a bushel
And one has a peck
One had a rope and it was hung around his neck

Run nigger run well the pattyroller will get you
Run nigger run well you better get away

Run nigger run well the pattyroller will get you
Run nigger run well you better get away

Oh nigger run and nigger flew
Why in the devil can't a white man chew
                                                        
Run nigger run well the pattyroller will get you
Run nigger run well you better get away


Hey Mr. Patty roller don't catch me
Catch that nigger behind that tree

Run nigger run well the pattyroller will get you
Run nigger run well you better get away

Nigger run, run so fast
Stoved his head in a hornets nest

Run nigger run well the pattyroller will get you
Run nigger run well you better get away

Nigger run, run so fast
Nigger, he got away at last

Run nigger run well the pattyroller will get you
Run nigger run well you better get away

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: mg
Date: 27 Apr 07 - 11:37 PM

I think we need some sort of official policy on the use of this word..perhaps in quotation marks or something to indicate it was a word that used to be used, never in polite society and hopefully never again....mg

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: GUEST,meself
Date: 28 Apr 07 - 12:01 AM

The only version of this I've heard is performed by an older black blues harp player - I can't remember who - but in his version, it's quite clear that N----- is the name of a dog; it's one of those harmonica hunting songs. For all I know, it could be a completely different song with that one phrase shared ("Run, N---, Run").

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: mg
Date: 28 Apr 07 - 12:20 AM

I think this is an unmentioned, perhaps, I am not a historian, additional tragedy of the potato famine...that decent young Irishmen took these positions..many more than I realized came in through the port of New Orleans...not all worked on the canals...mg

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: GUEST
Date: 28 Apr 07 - 02:33 AM

I find the language used on this thread racist in the highest extreme. Just because it was acceptable 50 years ago - IT'S NOT NOW.

Please delete.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: Joe Offer
Date: 28 Apr 07 - 02:54 AM

Well, it's history. I think it's best to present it as-is, without trying to sanitize it. Maybe the "good old days" weren't as good as we like to think, and maybe it's a mistake to portray them as a better time than the present. The thread titles are, first and foremost, an index. They are not primarily a statement, they're there to help people find things. This being a historically significant song, it's important that don't mess up the title and make it difficult for people to find it.

I've been listening to "Uncle" Dave Macon CD's the last few days - many of his songs would be considered racist today, some disturbingly so. Interestingly, the Carter Family came from the same period, and their lyrics are mostly quite acceptable by today's standards.
-Joe-

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: kendall
Date: 28 Apr 07 - 07:17 AM

Historically accurate or not, I will never sing it.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: GUEST,wordy
Date: 28 Apr 07 - 07:29 AM

I agree kendall, but historically this is how it was. Once we start wiping the tapes of our history for whatever reason we remove the ability to learn from the past. Let's leave revisionism to the dictators of this world. If we wish to understand how people feel today we need to know how they were treated in the past.
Somehow this well meaning horror some people have for words can lead to a state of mind like holocaust denial and I'm sure none of us want to go there.
What was, is. Read, mark and learn.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: BanjoRay
Date: 28 Apr 07 - 08:02 AM

This thread was started (and titled) by Sule Greg Wilson - an African American musician interested in songs by and about African Americans. A regular contributer of useful stuff to the Black Banjo list, I assume he wanted to see some real history, not revisionist claptrap.
I hope we all want that - if you don't, this isn't the place to be.
Ray

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: Midchuck
Date: 28 Apr 07 - 08:15 AM

Ernest Hemingway said that American literature really began with one book, Huckleberry Finn. "That word" appears on more pages than not. So what do we do? Declare it a non-book?

Using language in such a way as not to give offense without just cause is one thing. Denying historical fact in the name of political correctness is another.

Peter

(who is old enough to remember when "nigger" was tasteless, but no big deal, but you'd be in real trouble if anyone heard you say "fuck" in public - and has lived to see the situation exactly reversed. Is this really progress?)

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: kendall
Date: 28 Apr 07 - 10:15 AM

I am NOT advocating re writing history. The past is by definition, past. I am simply saying I will never sing those words. Strictly a personal statement.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: Big Mick
Date: 28 Apr 07 - 10:31 AM

I am glad that this is back at the top. I have reread it, and my opinion has not changed. Songs like this, places like the Holocaust Memorial, all these things must never be sanitized. To do so is the first step to repeating the sin. I hate this word. It hurts to even hear it or read it. It attacks the sensibilities of any reasonable person. When my 15 year old daughter hears it, even today, she starts crying. That is how it should be. To make the past disappear, or become sanitized, means that one has nothing to compare to. People should always be made to realize the horror that otherwise decent people can inflict on one another for the most foolish reasons.

We should never lose our horror and disgust for these things.

Mick

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: Azizi
Date: 28 Apr 07 - 11:56 AM

I admit to flinching when I saw this thread title. Upon opening this thread, the first thing that I noted was the thread starter's name.

Fwiw, Sule Greg Wilson and I grew up in the same city. Though I don't believe that I have ever met him, in 2006 Sule contacted me through my website and we exchanged emails. In one of those emails, I invited him to visit & join Mudcat. It may mean nothing at all, but after that email, I never heard from Sule again.

It's possible that Sule still reads and posts to this forum. As a result of a private message that I received, I know there is at least one other African American besides myself who post on Mudcat. That person wrote me that he or she chooses not to identify himself or herself by race. Maybe that person is Sule. Maybe not. I find it interesting that when he started this thread, Sule didn't mention his race. Also, I consider it regrettable that Sule didn't continue to respond to subsequent posts in this thread that addressed concern about the thread's title.

I believe in "different strokes for different folks", but I very much wish that other African Americans, and other Black people, and any other people of color would post on Mudcat and would consider it appropriate & worhwhile to identify themselves by race/ethnicity on threads about race as the perspectives and opinions of African Americans, Black people, people of color may be of particular interest when discussions of race & ethnicity are held.

Though there is no need for me to do so for those who know me here, for those who don't, I'll reiterate my deep seated dislike of the referent "n****r", regardless of who writes and says it. I personally refuse to say it or to spell it out.

That said, I would have been much more disconcerted if this thread just contained variant examples of that song & historical source material data about that song-as interesting reading as I found them-if there had been no discussion of whether & how historical songs with language that are considered offensive by contemporary and/or historical standards. Without that discussion, how would people reading this thread know that some people here consider that term to be-as Big Mick described it-ugly and hateful?

It's my hope that other people of color wouldn't be so turned off by that highly offensive "n word" that they would refuse to read this entire thread. I hope that other African Americans, other Black people, other people of color would not only read this thread-and other Mudcat threads on race and non-racial topics- but that they would join the discussion and start new threads on racial topics and on non-racial topics which would expand the definition of what some folks here consider to be folk music.

In my opinion, Mudcat could greatly benefit from that.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: Azizi
Date: 28 Apr 07 - 12:06 PM

I cut out a pertinent ending to a sentence in my previous comment. I'm posting it without attempting to make any changes to this admittedly convoluted sentence:

"That said, I would have been much more disconcerted if this thread just contained variant examples of that song & historical source material data about that song-as interesting reading as I found them-if there had been no discussion of whether & how historical songs with language that are considered offensive by contemporary and/or historical standards should be presented on Mudcat. "

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: GUEST,meself
Date: 28 Apr 07 - 12:22 PM

"but that they would join the discussion and start new threads"

I'm sure we all agree - "people of colour", with the exception of yourself, are conspicuously absent in the various discussions of racial issues that come up here from time to time, and it has often struck me as unfair that you should have to bear the standard here for all the world's "people of colour". (And I know that you often make it clear that your opinions are your opinions only).

Anyway - you handle it well!

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: Lonesome EJ
Date: 28 Apr 07 - 12:35 PM

Well said, Azizi. At heart, this Forum is a place of study and discussion on traditional music. As such, we should be able to discuss "Run, Nigger, Run" from a historical and musical standpoint without engaging in a full-fledged examination of slavery, repression, and race-relations, just as we can discuss "Knoxville Girl" without roundly criticizing homicide : Some things can be taken as understood. If we wish to discuss racism or murder, there are places below the BS line for that.
I do fine the thread title disturbing, as I hope we all do, and that is very healthy.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 28 Apr 07 - 01:32 PM

The Skillet Lickers' version posted by Retus is perhaps the best known, but, as noted in threads above, it appeared in Serenaders Song Book, White, 1851, was sung by slaves (who sang it first?) and appeared in Allen et al., "Slave Songs of the United States," 1867, and was found in several versions among Black populations. Scarborough (rich r 06 Jan 01) and others collected versions. The Patrollers also were used by blacks in much the same way as the 'boogerman' was used by whites to threaten their mis-behaving children.

The 'paterrollers' and the song about them illustrates an important although deplorable episode in American history; their actions were censured by many at the time, and contributed to the increasing demand for abolition. As such, the song is an important record of a time and an event.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: Big Mick
Date: 28 Apr 07 - 01:34 PM

Thanks for posting, Azizi. I too wish that there were more people of color here, and that they would post in a way that we knew we were getting their perspective as a person of color. Many peoples have been the subject of ugly persecution for ridiculous reasons, and it takes open discussion of these things to give me the tools I need to teach my child and other children how hateful speech can lead to horrendous actions. Just two weeks ago I took my daughter and her friend to see the Holocaust Museum in Washington DC. I wanted her to see that under certain circumstances, she could have been the little girl in the boxcar, for no other reason that what she was born. It is the same lesson I gave her when I showed her pictures of young Michael (a good kid, about her age) hanging from a tree. His crime? He was a black kid on a bike. But the more important lesson for her and her friend, the one that I made sure she got, was that by simply "getting along and going along" she could have been one of the people doing the acts. I think that is the important lesson in these songs, in these pictures, and in these places. I made sure that she "knew" these people.

I repeat. Never, ever, allow one's history to be whitewashed. If we do, then we are doomed to repeat these horrific events. The list is long, and every country has it.

Mick

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: Azizi
Date: 28 Apr 07 - 01:59 PM

Lonesome EJ & meself, thanks for the compliments.

**

meself, you wrote that "it has often struck me as unfair that you should have to bear the standard here for all the world's "people of colour" (And I know that you often make it clear that your opinions are your opinions only)."

You are correct that I have made it clear that I speak only for myself. I absolutely don't want to be considered a spokesperson for anyone but me.

Given that point, I certainly don't feel and hope that no one else feels that I "bear the standard here for all the world's "people of colour" or "color"

:o}

**

Lonesome EJ, I agree with your 1st, 2nd sentence, and last sentence. However, I don't agree with your 3rd and 4th sentence.

I certainly think that it's appropriate to have general or specific discussions about race/ethnicity and racism below the line in Mudcat's BS section. However, I also think it's important to have a discussion about how distasteful these referents are [and whether they are distasteful] within threads that contain these words in their title or in the lyrics of the featured song.

I also think it is both interesting and important within these kinds of threads to include some discussion about the efficacy of using such offensive referents in song performances, in titles, and in posts on this forum.

I don't think that it's "a given" that all or even most people nowadays consider "n****r to be racially coffensive. I believe that this thread needed to include an acknowledgement of the fact that some if not all folks here consider the "n word" to be offensive.

Also, it seems to me from a folkloric standpoint that persons who come across these threads now and in the future could be quite interested in reading out how various people in these times and in these places considered these kinds of subjects.

For these and other reasons, I would have been greatly disappointed if there had been no comments about the offensiveness of the "n word" within this thread.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: katlaughing
Date: 28 Apr 07 - 02:42 PM

I still find the title offensive and still am concerned about the so important first impressions of any newcomers who may see this at the top of the threads. I have no problem with the rest of it: the discussion, historical input, etc. just that title. My preference would be that it be modified with an "Historical Discussion" prefix or something similar. I would still hate for my son-in-law or grandsons to come here and see that first off. JMO.

kat

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: GUEST
Date: 26 Jan 11 - 08:00 PM

Post is from 'hellbilly'
There's a term you don't hear much anymore in the tune: roastin' ear. I remember havin' some durn good roastin' ears when I was a boy in Avery County.

I don't why anybody would get work up, since the song has happy ending:

"Nigger run, run so fast
Nigger, he got away at last"

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: GUEST,JC
Date: 11 May 11 - 11:53 PM

History should be remembered as it really was, not how we want to sugarcoat it today. These songs may not be politically correct by today's standards, but they tell of a real time, when slaves worked on plantations & the patrollers (Pattyrollers) checked them to be sure they had proper passes to be off the plantations, & if not, enforce the consequences. Old songs shouldn't be lost & everyone whether they are white, black, purple or green, should try to ensure they are not. Let's tell all our history - the good & the bad, the funny and the sad. Let's not rewrite what was, let's not glorify slavery but let's not pretend it didn't exist either. Just appreciate this for it's heritage & historical significance.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: Bill D
Date: 12 May 11 - 10:58 AM

Since this thread has been refreshed, I will say that it seems to me that almost everyone posting has made it clear that they do not approve of the use of the offensive word as an appellation for labeling a group of people. We recognize that the historical & cultural situations that led to ANY pejorative racial terms are sad and to be decried.
But...there in no way to erase the fact that it was once common, even among the groups being insulted, and is, sadly, still used today.
There is a huge difference between employing such terms in everyday discourse and referring to them in their historical context. The very sight of the word, while it make us wince, reminds us of what we strive to overcome, and as others have said in the 10 years of this thread, censorship using n***** is only a pretense that the word behind the ** is not 'there'.
As has been noted, the thread was started BY a black man doing research....and I have known black friends who used it among themselves to make certain points...and I'm sure, to emphasize that THEY still remember what it was all about, and to make clear that THEY intend to remind the world of past & ongoing discrimination.

We will never get everyone to agree on how to approach sensitive language on sex, race, religion..etc., but we DO know that Mudcat's policy is to delete offensive references directed AT anyone.
   I can't see any better way to cope with the issue.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: GUEST,hg
Date: 12 May 11 - 11:51 AM

Sule is alive and living in Tempe, Arizona. Find him on facebook for a consult...

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 02 Nov 11 - 08:56 PM

A single verse was published in Allen, W.F., C. P. Ware and L. M. Garrison, 1867, Slave Songs of the United States, A. Simpson, New York (book online; several reprints, including the Oak Pub. edition of 1965 by Irving Schlein, with new guitar and piano accompaniment, p. 144).

Run, Nigger, Run

O (G)some tell me that a (C)nigger (G) won't steal,
But (C)I've seen (G)a nigger in my cornfield;
(D7)O (G)run, nigger, run, for the (Am)patrol will catch you,
O run, nigger, (C)run, for 'tis (G)al- (D7)most (G)day.

It was first printed in White, 1852, The Serenader's Song Book.

"..... "Run, Nigger, Run," is a good example of the essentially non-racist of many such songs. In this case, the song's refrain voiced encouragement for escape. The folklorist Dorothy Scarborough found "Run, Nigger, Run," to be popular among Southern Black singers. In her 1925 book, On the Trail of Negro Folk-Songs, she claimed the song had its true origin among Black slaves in the antebellum South." (Her collected version is posted in this thread).

Quotation from Nick Tosches, Where Dead Voices Gather.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: Suffet
Date: 02 Nov 11 - 10:50 PM

On the other hand, here is Run, Children, Run, something I pieced together from a fragment of one version of RNR and the lyrics lifted from several other songs. It is not completely traditional, but neither is it completely an original composition. I prefer to use the term adapted.

--- Steve

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 03 Nov 11 - 03:20 PM

Mentioned by raredance, the version in Ozark Folksongs, coll. from Missouri, 1926.

Run, Nigger, Run

Run, nigger, run,
The calaboose'll git you,
Run, niggern run,
You better run fast:

This nigger run,
He run his best,
He stuch his head
In a hornet's nest.

Jump the fence,
Run through the pasture
White man run
But the nigger run faster.

Chicken in the bread tray
Scratchin' out the dough,
Granny will your dog bite?
No, child, no.

Randolph says some of the stanzas were used in a play-party song. The tune attracts floaters.

Have not seen the first printing, in White's Serenader's Song Book
Vance Randolph, 1980 reprint, Ozark Folksongs, vol. II, no. 264.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 03 Nov 11 - 03:29 PM

E. C. Perrow, Songs and Rhymes from the South, Jour. American Folklore, v. 28, 1915, printed two stanzas coll. from Negroes, Virginia, 1909.

Run, Nigger, Run !

Es I was runnin' through the fiel',
A black snake caught me by de heel.
Run, nigger, run, de paterrol ketch yuh !
Run, nigger, run ! It's almos' day !

Run, nigger, run ! I run my bes'
Run my head in a hornet's nes'.
Run, nigger, run !

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: GUEST
Date: 24 Dec 11 - 04:04 PM

I heard this for the first time today, great song.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: GUEST
Date: 22 May 12 - 04:14 PM

I found this page by doing an internet search on the lyrics after hearing it online from a compilation of the Virginia Mountain Boys. I was more than a little shocked and dismayed but wanted to know the history of it and I dare say if the title had been scrubbed, I may not have experienced this very high value discussion. I also would bet if the title was changed, the discussion would have been altered.

Anyway, 1 thing that strikes me is that no one has mentioned the variant lyrics by John Hartford in a song called "Up on the Hill where they Do the Boogie".

A-Some folks say that a hippie won't steal
But I caught three in my corn field
One had a flag and the other had a bomb
And the third ol' boy was a-gettin' on home

Peace

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 22 May 12 - 04:27 PM

I don't see why we can't put the word in italics or quotes or parenthesis ...I understand all the historical stuff but it is still vile. mg

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 22 May 12 - 05:42 PM

All this has been gone over before.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: PHJim
Date: 22 May 12 - 06:15 PM

I found the title of this thread offensive and read the thread out of curiosity. I was pleased to see that most of the posters (all that I read) kept a scholarly stance and not a bigoted one.
I do find the N word very offensive no matter who says it. There is something very ugly about that word that surpasses all other words.
I recall hearing it on the playground when I was a school teacher and trying to explain to the children who used it that, "I'd rather hear the F word than that one."
I have enjoyed Richard Pryor's acting, but couldn't listen to his stand-up routines because of his use of that word.

While I don't like hearing other people insulting their race, religion, sex or sexual orientation, somehow the N word has a particularly ugly, hateful feel that, to me, cannot be matched by any other.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: GUEST,Bb Coltman
Date: 23 May 12 - 07:24 AM

Hi All,

Perhaps it would be good if Mudcat were to try to foster a habit of using some circumlocution—for thread titles in particular—to avert the problem kat mentioned, especially to preserve good/responsible appearance on first impression.   Such as the following possibilities:

N—
N—r
N***
N***r

or something of the kind. I'm not happy with circumlocutions, and would personally prefer not to use them, but it is time we consider the feelings of everyone, and these are ways to do it.

I also think the dash is preferable because it somehow seems less brutal than the asterisks.

As to enforcing this, I suggest:

1. Use it only for titles in the forum message list, where it's most obvious and allows those offended to avoid the message if desired.

2. The body of messages could continue to use the word (sparingly if possible!) for scholarly accuracy and also because message contents would be too much to have to police.

3. How to do it: when the N word appears in a message title, the moderator changes it ASAP to the chosen circumlocution.

That would mean such message titles might appear for a brief time. However, they would presumably be caught and changed within a few hours to a day at most.

Does this seem doable? Does it answer the objections to the term?

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: PHJim
Date: 23 May 12 - 09:26 AM

Doc Watson and Clarence Ashley recorded this song on their Original Folkways Recordings.They called it Run, Jimmie, Run.

Jimmie run, Jimmie flew,
Jimmie tore his garter shoe,
Run Jimmie run, the paterollers'll catch you,
Run Jimmie run, You'd better get away.

Jimmie run, he run his best,
Stove his head in a hornet's nest.
Run Jimmie...

Jimmie run through my cornfield,
A black snake bit him on the heel.
Run Jimmie...

Jimmie run, Jimmie flew,
Jimmie tore his shirt in two.
Run Jimmie...

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 23 May 12 - 01:45 PM

In 2007, I wrote, "The 'paterrollers' and the song about them illustrates an important although deplorable episode in American history; their actions were censured my many at the time, and contributed to the increasing demand for abolition. As such, the song is an important record of a time and an event.

I find attempts to lily-gild American history more deplorable than the song itself.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 23 May 12 - 06:40 PM

"I do find the N word very offensive no matter who says it. There is something very ugly about that word that surpasses all other words. "
Having been, at various times, a "Hebe", a "Yid", a "Mockie", or a
"Christ killer" in good standing, I'm not quite sure I agree. Neither, I feel, would the various "Wops", "Guineas", "Spics", "DAgos", "Nips", "Harps", "Poms" and "Chinks" who might happen to congregate at the Mudcat Cafe.
They're certainly not nice words, but their offence, I feel, lies in the malice or lackof same of th people that use them.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: Seamus Kennedy
Date: 23 May 12 - 06:44 PM

Dick - you forgot "Kike". But I agree with your sentiments.

Seamus the Mick, Paddy, Harp, Donkey, Spud-Eater et al.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: Stewie
Date: 23 May 12 - 08:18 PM

Apparently, introducing and playing Uncle Dave Macon's version of this song on KFVD (Los Angeles) on 20 October 1937 marked the beginning of Woody Guthries' epiphany from a casual racist to a committed anti-racist. Will Kaufman, his most recent biographer, gives the story: 'He received from one Howell Terence a letter so politely incandescent - and he was so shaken by it - that he read it out over the airwaves the next day: "You were going along quite well in your program this evening until you announced your Nigger Blues. I am a Negro, a young Negro in college, and I certainly resented your remark. No person or persons of any intelligence uses that word over the radio today". Guthrie apologised profusely, dramatically ripped the offending song sheet to shreds before the microphone, and swore he'd never use that word again. He later made the point of repeatedly apologising to the African American community for all the racist 'frothings' that he had uttered'. [Will Kaufman 'Woodie Guthrie: American Radical' pp 149-150, Uni of Illinois Press 2011]

Joe Klein, a previous biographer, commented that he also 'ripped all the "nigger" songs out of his (song)book'. [Joe Klein 'Woody Guthrie A Life' p 97, Delta 1980]

I agree with Q above, that sanitising the historical song is bowdlerism, and there is no place for it - either reject it entirely or explain its historical context.

--Stewie.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Run, Nigger, Run
From: GUEST,josepp
Date: 23 May 12 - 09:42 PM

What are we--children? "Nigger" hurts our little feelings? By placing this taboo and stigma around it even for discussion purposes, we give it the power to hurt. Words can't hurt you unless you let them. Time to grow a pair, people, and deal with it like adults.

Casual racism in songs should definitely be discouraged. There's no place for it in this society. But discussion of racist words should NEVER be discouraged and by bowdlerizing, redacting, censoring and the like those words to be discussed we ARE discouraging the discussion. Censoring of the words is a censoring of the discussion. The inability to discuss the words for fear that we might hurt another's feelings is intellectual cowardice. It is lower than the words themselves and even more worthy of contempt.

If we can't be adult about such things, just what exactly CAN we be adult about?