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Sangdeboeuf (talk | contribs) Summary of Vox source, fixing MOS:EASTEREGG link, MOS:CLAIM, sentence order, other misc. |
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First used in the 1940s, the term has resurfaced in recent years as a concept that symbolizes perceived awareness of social issues and movement. By the late 2010s, ''woke'' had been adopted as a more generic slang term associated with [[left-wing politics]], progressive or socially liberal causes such as [[anti-racism]], [[LGBT rights]], [[feminism]] and [[environmentalism]]. It has also been the subject of [[meme]]s, ironic usage and criticism for its methods and consequences.<ref name=Fusion /><ref name="auto">{{cite web |url=https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/saturday/audio/2018726945/douglas-murray-the-groupthink-tyranny-of-woke |title=Douglas Murray: The groupthink tyranny of woke |date=14 December 2019 |website=rnz.co.nz |access-date=28 May 2020}}</ref> Its widespread use since 2014 is a result of the [[Black Lives Matter]] movement.{{r|Merriam-Webster|OED 2017}}
== History and usage ==
In some varieties of [[African-American English]], ''woke'' is used in place of ''woken'', the usual [[past participle]] form of ''wake''.{{r|OED 2017}} This usage can also take the place of the adjective ''awake''.{{r|Merriam-Webster|OED 2017}}
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=== 20th century ===
Black American folk singer-songwriter Huddie Ledbetter, a.k.a. [[Lead Belly]], uses the phrase near the end of the recording of his 1938 song "Scottsboro Boys", which tells the story of [[Scottsboro Boys|nine black teenagers accused of raping two white women]], saying: "I advise everybody, be a little careful when they go along through there{{emdash}}best stay woke, keep their eyes open".<ref name="Matheis">{{Cite news |url=http://digital.livingblues.com/publication/?i=515680&p=17#{%22page%22:12,%22issue_id%22:515680} |title=Outrage Channeled in Verse |last=Matheis |first=Frank |date=August 2018 |work=[[Living Blues]] |issue=4 |volume=49 |page=15}}</ref><ref name="Ledbetter">{{cite AV media |people=Lomax, Alan (recordist), and Lead Belly |date=1938 |title=Scottsboro Boys |medium=song |url=https://www.loc.gov/resource/afc9999005.8690.0 |access-date=August 31, 2018 |time=4:27 |location=New York}}</ref> Aja Romano writes in ''[[Vox (website) |Vox]]'' that this represents "Black Americans' need to be aware of racially motivated threats and the potential dangers of white America."{{r|Romano}} [[J. Saunders Redding]] recorded a comment from an African American [[United Mine Workers]] official in 1940, stating: "Let me tell you buddy. Waking up is a damn sight harder than going to sleep, but we'll stay woke up longer."<ref name="Redding">{{Cite news |title=A Negro Speaks for His People |last=Redding |first=J. Saunders |date=March 1943 |work=The Atlantic Monthly |volume=171 |page=59}}</ref>{{Primary source inline|date=February 2021
By the mid-20th century, ''woke'' had come to mean 'well-informed' or 'aware',<ref name="Krouse">{{cite book |last1=Krouse |first1=Tonya |last2=O'Callaghan |first2=Tamara F. |title=Introducing English Studies |date=2020 |publisher=Bloomsbury Academic |location=London |isbn=978-1-350-05542-1 |page=[https://books.google.com/books/about/Introducing_English_Studies.html?id=DQ-_DwAAQBAJ&q=%22stay+woke%22 135]}}</ref> especially in a political or cultural sense.{{r|OED 2017}} The [[Oxford English Dictionary]] traces the earliest such usage to a 1962 article titled "If You're Woke You Dig It" by African-American novelist [[William Melvin Kelley]], describing the appropriation of African American slang by white [[beatnik]]s.<ref name="OED 2017">{{Cite web |url=https://public.oed.com/blog/june-2017-update-new-words-notes/ |title=New words notes June 2017 |date=16 June 2017 |website=Oxford English Dictionary}}</ref>
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The 21st-century use of ''woke'' encompasses the earlier meaning of 'socially or politically conscious' with an added sense of being 'alert to social and/or [[racial discrimination]] and injustice'.{{r|OED 2017}} This usage was popularized by soul singer [[Erykah Badu]]'s 2008 song "[[Master Teacher (Erykah Badu song) |Master Teacher]]",<ref name="Merriam-Webster">{{Cite web |url=https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/woke-meaning-origin |title=Stay Woke: The new sense of 'woke' is gaining popularity |department=Words We're Watching |publisher=[[Merriam-Webster]] |access-date=26 December 2016}}</ref>{{r|Krouse}} Throughout the song, Badu sings the phrase: "I stay woke." ([[Merriam-Webster.com]] defines the expression "stay woke" in Badu's song as meaning, "[continue to be] self-aware, questioning the dominant paradigm and striving for something better"; and, although, within the context of the song it did not yet have a specific connection to justice issues, Merriam-Webster credits the phrase's use in the song with its later connection to these issues.<ref name="Merriam-Webster"/><ref name=Fusion>{{Cite news |url=https://splinternews.com/how-woke-went-from-black-activist-watchword-to-teen-int-1793853989 |title=How 'woke' went from black activist watchword to teen internet slang |last=Pulliam-Moore |first=Charles |date=8 January 2016 |newspaper=[[Splinter News]] |access-date=20 December 2019}}</ref>) Mainstream usage of ''woke'' in this expanded sense was also spurred on by its association with the [[Black Lives Matter]] movement,{{r|OED 2017}} with the meaning of "keeping watch for police brutality and unjust police tactics."{{r|Romano}}
To "stay woke" in this sense expresses the [[African-American Vernacular English#Grammar |intensified continuative and habitual grammatical aspect]] of African American English: in essence, to always be awake, or to be ever vigilant.<ref name="Adams">{{Cite book |last=Adams |first=Michael |chapter=Language |title=Encyclopedia of African American History, 1896 to the Present: From the Age of Segregation to the Twenty-first Century Five-volume Set |editor-last=Finkelman |editor-first=Paul |date=2009 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-516779-5 |pages=[https://books.google.com/books?id=6gbQHxb_P0QC&q=woke 130–135]}}</ref>{{Failed verification |date=January 2021}}
== In popular culture ==▼
Implicit in the concept of being woke is the idea that such awareness must be earned. Rapper [[Earl Sweatshirt]] recalls singing "I stay woke" along to the song and his mother turning down the song and responding: "No, you're not."<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.npr.org/sections/microphonecheck/2015/03/24/394987116/earl-sweatshirt-im-grown|title=Earl Sweatshirt: 'I'm Grown'|last=Kelley|first=Frannie|publisher=[[National Public Radio]] |date=March 24, 2015| access-date=2016-12-26}}</ref>▼
Romano says ''woke'' reached mainstream American awareness as a term with political meaning following the [[death of Michael Brown]] in 2014 when ''stay woke'' became a phrase used by Black Lives Matter activists admonishing people to keep watch for police brutality. Since then, she argues, ''woke'' has evolved into a "single-word summation of leftist political ideology, centered on social justice politics and critical race theory.{{r|Romano}}
In 2012, users on [[Twitter]], including Badu, began using ''woke'' and ''stay woke'' in connection to social and racial justice issues and #StayWoke emerged as a widely used [[hashtag]].<ref name=Fusion/> Badu incited this with the first politically charged use of the phrase on Twitter; she tweeted out in support of the Russian feminist performance group [[Pussy Riot]]: "Truth requires no belief. / Stay woke. Watch closely. / #FreePussyRiot."<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://twitter.com/fatbellybella/status/233215131876724736|title=fatbellybella on Twitter|author=Badu, Erykah|author-link=Badu, Erykah|date=2012-08-08|publisher=[[Twitter]]}}</ref>▼
By the late 2010s, ''woke'' had
From social media and activist circles, the word spread to widespread mainstream usage. For example, in 2016, the headline of a ''[[Bloomberg Businessweek]]'' article asked "Is [[Wikipedia]] Woke?", in reference to the largely white contributor base of the online encyclopedia.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2016-12-22/how-woke-is-wikipedia-s-editorial-pool|title=Is Wikipedia Woke?|last1=Kessenides|first1=Dimitra|date=2016-12-22 |last2=Chafkin|first2=Max |newspaper=Bloomberg Businessweek|access-date=2016-12-26}}</ref>▼
▲=== In popular culture ===
The 2020 TV series ''[[Woke (TV series)|Woke]]'' features fictional [[San Francisco]] black cartoonist Keef Knight, played by [[Lamorne Morris]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/tv/story/2020-09-09/hulu-woke-lamorne-morris-review|title=In 'Woke,' a Black cartoonist gets political. But don't expect a sermon|date=9 September 2020|website=Los Angeles Times}}</ref>▼
▲Implicit in the concept of being woke is the idea that such awareness must be earned. Rapper [[Earl Sweatshirt]] recalls singing "I stay woke" along to the song and his mother turning down the song and responding: "No, you're not."<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.npr.org/sections/microphonecheck/2015/03/24/394987116/earl-sweatshirt-im-grown|title=Earl Sweatshirt: 'I'm Grown'|last=Kelley|first=Frannie|publisher=[[National Public Radio]] |date=March 24, 2015| access-date=2016-12-26}}</ref>
▲In 2012, users on [[Twitter]], including Badu, began using ''woke'' and ''stay woke'' in connection to social and racial justice issues and #StayWoke emerged as a widely used [[hashtag]].<ref name=Fusion/> Badu incited this with the first politically charged use of the phrase on Twitter; she tweeted out in support of the Russian feminist performance group [[Pussy Riot]]: "Truth requires no belief. / Stay woke. Watch closely. / #FreePussyRiot."<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://twitter.com/fatbellybella/status/233215131876724736|title=fatbellybella on Twitter|author=Badu, Erykah|author-link=Badu, Erykah|date=2012-08-08|publisher=[[Twitter]]}}</ref>{{Primary source inline|date=February 2021}}
▲By the late 2010s, ''woke'' had taken to indicate "healthy paranoia, especially about issues of racial and political justice" and has been adopted as a more generic [[slang]] term and has been the subject of [[Internet meme|memes]].<ref name=Fusion /> For example, [[MTV News]] identified it as a key teen slang word for 2016.<ref>{{Cite news|url=http://www.mtv.com/news/2720889/teen-slang-2016/|title=Say Goodbye To 'On Fleek,' 'Basic' And 'Squad' In 2016 And Learn These 10 Words Instead|last=Trudon|first=Taylor|date=5 January 2016|newspaper=MTV News|access-date=26 December 2016}}</ref>
▲From social media and activist circles, the word spread to
▲Romano says ''woke'' reached mainstream American awareness as a term with political meaning following the [[death of Michael Brown]] in 2014 when ''stay woke'' became a phrase used by Black Lives Matter activists admonishing people to keep watch for police brutality. Since then, she argues, ''woke'' has evolved into a "single-word summation of leftist political ideology, centered on social justice politics and critical race theory.{{r|Romano}} Writer [[Amanda Hess]] has argued that the word has been [[Cultural appropriation|culturally appropriated]], writing, "The conundrum is built in. When white people aspire to get points for consciousness, they walk right into the crosshairs between allyship and appropriation."<ref name=NewYorkTimes/>
▲The 2020 TV series ''[[Woke (TV series)|Woke]]'' features fictional [[San Francisco]] black cartoonist Keef Knight, played by [[Lamorne Morris]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/tv/story/2020-09-09/hulu-woke-lamorne-morris-review|title=In 'Woke,' a Black cartoonist gets political. But don't expect a sermon|date=9 September 2020|website=Los Angeles Times}}</ref>
=== In business and marketing ===
In an article for ''[[Time (magazine)|Time]]'', journalist [[Alana Semuels]] detailed the phenomenon of "woke capitalism" in which brands have attempted to include socially aware messages in advertising campaigns. In the article she cited the example of [[Colin Kaepernick]] fronting a campaign for [[Nike, Inc.|Nike]] with the slogan “believe in something, even if it means sacrificing everything,” after Kaepernick caused controversy by refusing to stand for the US national anthem as a protest against racism.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://time.com/5735415/woke-culture-political-companies/|title=Why Corporations Can No Longer Avoid Politics|last=Semuels|first=Alana|date= 21 November 2019|work=Time|access-date=6 June 2020}}</ref> The term "corporate wokeness" has also been used by conservative writer [[Ross Douthat]].<ref>{{Cite news |last=Douthat |first=Ross |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/28/opinion/corporate-america-activism.html |url-access=limited |title=The Rise of Woke Capital |date=28 February 2018 |access-date=6 June 2020}}</ref> Feminist writer [[Helen Lewis (journalist)|Helen Lewis]] wrote a long article for ''The Atlantic'' criticizing the minimal efforts some companies make to feign progressivism while maintaining existing power structures.<ref>Lewis, Helen. [https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2020/07/cancel-culture-and-problem-woke-capitalism/614086/ "Cancel Culture and the Problem ..."] ''The Atlantic''. 14 July 2020. 14 July 2020</ref> Bonny Brooks accused large corporations such as [[Pepsi]] (who in 2017 released an advertisement campaigned titled "[[Live for Now (Pepsi)|Live for Now]]" inspired by the Black Lives Matter protests) of hypocrisy for including ''woke'' messages in adverts and social campaigns while exploiting workers or using child labor in global supply chains.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://arcdigital.media/how-woke-is-wokonomics-b78ab3621202|title=How Woke is Wokonomics?|first=Bonny|last=Brooks|date=7 February 2019|website=Medium}}</ref> Similarly, conservative commentator [[Rita Panahi]] has accused corporations such as Nike of promoting ''woke'' campaigns in the Western world while choosing to ignore cases of modern slavery and human rights abuses against ethnic minorities in China so as not to upset business interests.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.goldcoastbulletin.com.au/news/national/hypocrisy-rife-inside-woke-corporations-turning-a-blind-eye-to-china/video/5ecc0bd7a31ff1d3130ae1b133167f9d|title=Hypocrisy rife inside ‘woke’ corporations turning a blind eye to China | Gold Coast Bulletin}}</ref>
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