Except, y’know, not.
I should point out that this post was inspired by a specific incident. However, given that I was at best a spectator to this incident and a number of the people who were actually involved have expressed a wish that fuel not be added to the fire, that’s not what I’ll be talking about. So if there appears to be an obvious gap in my examples, that might be why.
Anyway, to get to the point. There is an argumentative strategy that I have noticed tends to crop up when the topic turns to language use. This strategy is to turn to the dictionary as the ultimate arbiter of what is acceptable. Pretty much every argument on language I’ve seen lately has someone doing this. Two examples, both of which I’ve seen recently.
1. Arguing that disability is Always Bad. Always. Yes, Even Then. When someone makes this argument, it’s often not long before they turn to the dictionary, pointing out that the OED defines “disability” at least in part as “inability, incapacity; weakness”. SO OBVIOUSLY IT’S TERRIBLE.
2. A bit more specific. On the door of our office at the school (I’m a volunteer with the campus queer group, for those just tuning in), there is a sign. This sign says “Gay Pizza”. We use it at those of our events where–surprise–we serve pizza. I am aware it is not without its problems (where is the bi pizza? Or the pizza for other folk who don’t take the label ‘gay’), but. You get the idea. Anyway, the other day we found a hand-scrawled addendum attached to this sign, which read “what makes it so carefree and happy?”. This particular dictionary troll, you see, had decided to be a wit and in the process erase the validity of ‘gay’ as a descriptive term that a community has chosen for itself. And you can bet that had we found out who they were and called them on it, the response would have been along the lines of “well that’s what it means in the dictionary!”
So, here’s the thing. I understand this impulse. Really, I do. You’re arguing about what words mean, aren’t you? So it seems only natural to turn to the Ultimate Cultural Arbiter of what words mean, the dictionary. Totally rational train of thought.
But it’s still a terrible idea. Sure, it works fine when you are writing in most circumstances, but when you’re dealing with issues of oppression, when you’re talking about marginalized populations, it doesn’t. And the reason is a simple one.
Dictionaries did not spring fully-formed from the ether. They are written by people. And people, believe it or not, are bound by their cultural context and, furthermore, are people. They’re human! They get things wrong! So sometimes when you look at the dictionary, the definition you see there is not going to reflect the reality of how people use the term. As sickening a cliche as this is, language is alive. It evolves. Dictionaries often do not reflect this, and they are going to enshrine definitions that do not apply–I mean, for gods’ sakes, the first five definitions for “faggot” in the OED relate to “bundles”. That’s not how people are using the word now, and if someone tried to cite it in an argument, I would hope (though not trust) that that would be seen as ridiculous.
When you’re talking about people, when you’re referring to the concepts and the language that a marginalized group have made their own, there’s only one way to get it right: ask them. Even then, you may run into disagreement between members of a group. You might need to, y’know, actually think about who you sympathize with more. But while you’re doing that, I ask you to keep two things in mind.
1) Don’t fight with someone’s self-identification. Someone may self-identify with a word you find distasteful, but it is not your place to tell them they are wrong. By all means avoid using that word to refer to other people. But don’t take away someone’s right to self-determinatino.
and
2) For gods’ sakes, don’t turn to the fucking dictionary to make your decision for you.
A lot of times, dictionary trolls (dictionarians?) would be well-served by looking up “connotation”. :-)
Also, language shifts. Words take on different meanings over time. Man, it boggles the mind that some people do not grasp this.