Nigger (word)

In the present-day English language, the word nigger is an ethnic slur, usually directed at black people. The word originated as a neutral term referring to people with black skin, as a variation of the Spanish and Portuguese noun negro, a descendant of the Latin adjective (meaning the color "black"). It was often used derogatorily, and by the mid-twentieth century, particularly in the United States, its usage became unambiguously a pejorative, racist insult. Accordingly, it began to disappear from popular culture, and its continued inclusion in classic works of literature has sparked controversy. Because the term is considered extremely offensive, published written media often replace it with the euphemism "the N-word".

The variant "nigga" has to some extent been reclaimed by African Americans.

The variants neger and negar derive from the Spanish and Portuguese word negro (black), and from the now-pejorative French nègre. Etymologically, negro, noir, nègre, and nigger ultimately derive from nigrum, the stem of the Latin niger (black) (pronounced [ˈniɡer] which, in every other grammatical case, grammatical gender, and grammatical number besides nominative masculine singular, is nigr-, the r is trilled).

The Oxford English Dictionary traces the first English use to 1577, "the Nigers of Aethiop", translated from the Spanish los negros in Ethiopia. Other early spellings attested include "nigor" and "Nigre"; the first spelling of "nigger" is in 1608. The OED offers as its first definition "Used by people who are not black as a relatively neutral (or occasionally positive) term, with no specifically hostile intent" and notes that early citations "expressing patronizing views, reflect underlying attitudes rather than a hostile use of the word itself". The second meaning, of "a hostile term of abuse or contempt" from whites to blacks is first attested in print in 1775. Its use by black people both "as a neutral or favourable term" and "as a depreciatory term" go back to 1831 and 1834 respectively.

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