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Obama in Los Angeles for Barbara Boxer and Tim Kaine (iPhone)

A Bilingual Discussion on Semantics

With one exam, one paper, and a few graduate school application aggravations remaining until I can leave California, I would like to take a break from Italianistica to address a personal problem with Garzanti Linguistica:

On 27 November 2006, I wrote in this journal about the entry negro that I found in the famous Garzanti online dictionary (whose praises I have often been known to sing). They defined the word by describing a race of people, whether we want to say black, African, or a “human group comprised of several subgroups”, with distinct physical traits: wide, smashed nose, woolen hair, etc.

I, Kristina Farah Bigdeli, an Italian-Iranian-American from “the South” who was exposed to racism and discrimination, moved to Los Angeles and subsequently became hypersensitive to racism. Then, I moved to a conservative European town that has a façade of intellectualism to become hyperaware of European shortcomings in the realm of race, gender, and ethnic equality. I, who am exactly that person with that history, reacted too quickly.

And now I think I may have made it worse.

According to word reference now and Garzanti before I asked them to change it. . .

the principal translation of negro IS DEFINITELY the N word;

and according to my friend Michele Longhini, “99.99% of the time, when the word is used in Italian, it is pejorative.”

Garzanti customer service allowed me my little victory when they replaced the “wide, smashed nose” with the “human group and subgroups”, but in the process, they took away the true meaning of the word. Yes, I will admit, the etymology listing still has the little three-letter abbreviation for pejorative (spr), but the principal definition is now the polite, anthropological adjective.

I feel like the next time little Giuseppino Junior or Alfonsina want to talk to the shy sixteen-year-old African immigrant in their second grade class (who happens to speak English better than Italian and is there to matriculate into professional soccer -Remember, I volunteered at an Italian middle school) they are going to check Garzanti. And Garzanti will tell them that it is okay to use the word.

I am confused, I think that I am still over-reacting, and I feel somewhat guilty. I am going to wait and ponder before I react too quickly like I did last time.

Also, I think I am prone to writing complex run-on sentences, so I am going to edit this again.

Garzanti's Response

A: Kristina Bigdeli
Sogg: R:Definizione poco politically correct

Gentile Kristina,

il problema è dovuto al fatto che la definizione in questione, come del
resto l'intero dizionario di italiano che il nostro sito mette a
disposizione per la consultazione gratuita, risale all'edizione, ormai
piuttosto datata, del 2003. Nel corso di questi anni, le varie
definizioni sono state rivedute e corrette, in taluni casi persino
radicalmente, per cui abbiamo provveduto a sostituire nella versione on
line del dizionario la vecchia definizione con quella, più recente e
decisamente più "politically correct", tratta dalla nuova edizione 2007
del Grande Dizionario Garzanti di Italiano, attualmente in commercio.

Ringraziandola per l'attenzione e la sensibilità dimostrate nei
confronti dei nostri Dizionari, le porgiamo cordiali saluti.
Servizio Clienti
Garzanti Linguistica

To: Kristina Bigdeli
Subj: RE: Definition hardly politically correct
Dear Kristina,

The problem is due to the fact that the definition in question, like the rest of the whole dictionary of Italian that our site makes available for free consultation, is from the edition, by now rather dated, of 2003. In the course of these years, various definitions have been reviewed and corrected, in a few cases very radically; so we substituted for the old definition in the online version of the dictionay the one, more recent and decisively more “politically correct”, taken from the new 2007 Edition of the Great Garzanti Dictionary of Italian, presently on the market.

Thanking you for the attention and sensibilty demonstrated in the considering of our Dictionaries, we offer you cordial salutations.
Customer Service
Garzanti Linguistica

I immediately went online and typed in the word negro again. Here is what it says now:

"che appartiene a un gruppo umano, comprendente diversi sottogruppi, originario del continente africano, caratterizzato da pelle di colore più scuro e capelli scuri dai ricci più fitti rispetto alla media dei popoli europei; nero"

"belonging to a human group, including several subgroups, originally of the African continent, characterized by darker skin and dark hair with tighter curls in comparison with the average of European populations; black"