I honestly hope that no one will be offended by this reading. Has anyone else ever had to narrate something that they felt was wrong?LibriVox and "Sensitive" Topics
Every work included in the LibriVox collection is potentially a sensitive and sacred text...depending on the reader or listener. We approach every work with respect, but we will not exclude a work because of it being potentially offensive or disrespectful. The nature of our collection is historical due to it being primarily pre-1923, and we will be running into works that will raise questions, concerns, or conflicts (i.e. religion, slavery, woman's status in society, treatment of indigenous peoples, etc.)
We acknowledge that some of the information and perspectives presented may be offensive, or even just plain incorrect, but we're preserving history as presented by people of a specific time period without making judgements or statements about these perspectives.
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May I change the text?
Occasionally people ask if they can change the published text, for instance by omitting or substituting offensive words or ideas.
The answer is: No. We present the text as it is written: no additions, omissions, or substitutions. If the text contains a word you just cannot say, consider choosing something else to record. (There is so much available to record! No need to cause yourself discomfort.) If you wish to make an "editorial comment" about the content of the text, you may do so in the written catalog summary, but you may not add it to the recording.
In the nineteenth century, the N word was not an insult or bad word. So, in reality, it is only a nasty word when brought into our twentieth or twenty-first century context. According to Wikipedia: "The word originated as a term used in a neutral context to refer to black people, as a variation of the Spanish/Portuguese noun negro, a descendant of the Latin adjective niger, meaning the colour "black"... Nineteenth-century English (language) literature features usages of nigger without racist connotation, e.g. the Joseph Conrad novella The Nigger of the 'Narcissus' (1897). Moreover, Charles Dickens and Mark Twain created characters who uttered the word as contemporary usage. Twain, in the autobiographic book Life on the Mississippi (1883), used the term within quotes, indicating reported usage, but used the term "negro" when speaking in his own narrative persona."jedopi wrote:I suppose that I will have to say it to stay true to the author's writings but it does make me feel very uncomfortable.
Apparently you don't live in the Deep South, kid.Jonathan Awesome wrote:I couldn't imagine anyone being upset with you for reading something accurately.
How interesting.Nicholas19 wrote:In the nineteenth century, the N word was not an insult or bad word. So, in reality, it is only a nasty word when brought into our twentieth or twenty-first century context. [...]
Yes. Even something as benign as Cylon could become something bad!!!!Great Plains wrote: Kinda makes you wonder which benign modern words will have their meanings shift over time into something nasty.
I do intend to read the book anyway. I just wanted to let any "sensitive" readers out there know that I don't approve of the word, but that's the way it was back then and I can't change that.