That REALLY, REALLY Bad Word for African Americans. And My Struggle With It. Artwork

StocktonAfterClass

Ron Stockton was a professor of political science at the University of Michigan-Dearborn for 48 years. His specialty was non-western politics and political change. He taught classes on the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, Religion and Politics, the Politics of Revolution, Non-Western politics, and American politics. He also taught in the Honors Program, focusing upon foundational readings from the 18th and 19th centuries. He has an interest in religion and politics and in the role of religio-ethnic groups in the political system. The listener can anticipate talks on Arab-Americans, Jews, African-Americans, the Scots-Irish, and Evangelicals. He has lectured and written on American politics, public opinion, and voting behavior and on the role of religious organizations and ideologies in the political system. There will be occasional discussions of books and films that address serious issues. And he has lectured and published and even taught a class on gravestones, especially those of different ethnic and religious groups such as Muslims, African-Americans, Jews, and Native Americans. The goal of the podcast series is to provide analysis and commentary by a political scientist to explain and make accessible political, historical, and cultural developments in the United States and around the world, and to give the listener analytical tools to understand those developments. It is also to entertain the listener.

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StocktonAfterClass

That REALLY, REALLY Bad Word for African Americans. And My Struggle With It.

July 01, 2025 • Ronald Stockton

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I sometimes tell people that I am a recovering racist. It is not really my fault. I grew up in a culture (the 1950s in the border South) when that was just the way things were. The outward and visible sign of our moral failure was that word. You know the one I mean. We used that word without even thinking of it. It was just the word we used. But as I went to college and had two Black room mates, and then lived in Kenya for two years, where all of my students were Black and I was often the only white person around, my way of thinking began to change.

This is a personal story, but it is really a story of how America changed. And after I wrote up my thoughts, I posted on Facebook the story of my struggles and asked my friends and former students to share their experiences and reactions. Their contributions are part of the podcast. I think you will find this podcast of some interest.

And perhaps it will help those of you who are overseas to understand a bit about how we Americans, with our terrible history of racial injustice, struggle with our past.