Woke
 | This articleneeds moresourcesforreliability. |
Woke(/ˈwoʊk/WOHK) is a word which originally referred to awareness aboutracismanddiscrimination.It later came to include an awareness of other issues ofsocial inequality,for example regardinggenderandsexual orientation.Since the late 2010s it has also been used as a general word forleft-wing politicalmovements and viewpoints which emphasise theidentity politicsofpeople of color(those who are notwhite),LGBT people,andwomen.
The phrase "stay woke"began within the everyday language of someAfrican Americansin the 1930s, because inAfrican-American Vernacular English(AAVE)wokeis instead ofwoken,the usualpast participleform ofwake.[1]
After theshooting of Michael BrowninFerguson, Missouriin 2014, the word was used byBlack Lives Matter(BLM) activists who wanted to raise awareness about police shootings of African Americans in the US.[2]It became an Internetmemeand was increasingly utilised by individuals who were not African American to show that they supported BLM. Popular amongmillennials,the word spread worldwide and was added to theOxford English Dictionaryin 2017.
The word ended up being used as a catch-all term to describeleft-wing ideologies,often centred on theidentity politicsof minority groups and informed by academic movements like critical race theory, which identified themselves as being devoted tosocial justice.This included BLM, anti-racism, and campaigns on women's and LGBT issues. By 2020, parts of thepolitical rightin some Western countries wereironicallyusing the word "woke" to describe left-wing movements and ideologies they disagreed with. In turn, some left-wing activists came to consider it an offensive term used tobelittlethose campaigning againstdiscrimination.[3]
Related pages
[change|change source]References
[change|change source]- ↑"woke adjectiveearlier than 2008".Oxford English Dictionary.25 June 2017. Archived fromthe originalon 16 July 2021.Retrieved16 July2021.
- ↑Richardson, Elaine; Ragland, Alice (Spring 2018)."#StayWoke: The Language and Literacies of the #BlackLivesMatter Movement".Community Literacy Journal.12(2).
- ↑Bacon Jr, Perry (March 17, 2021)."Why Attacking 'Cancel Culture' And 'Woke' People Is Becoming The GOP's New Political Strategy".FiveThirtyEight.RetrievedJuly 5,2021.