Naming The Self, Named By The Other: Labelization And The Double Edge Of Racial Labels In African American Identity Construction
Auteurs : Gafour Zahra Ines . Chehri Youcef .
Résumé
This article examines the relationship between racial labeling practices and the construction of African American identity across historical and contemporary contexts. Drawing on critical discourse analysis and cultural identity theory, it investigates how racial and ethnic labels, from “Colored” and “Negro” to “Black” and “African American,” have functioned as sites of contestation, self-determination, and political mobilization within the African American diaspora. The paper employs the linguistic concept of labialization as a theoretical metaphor to illuminate the fluid, adaptive, and context-dependent nature of racial identity formation. Engaging with scholarship from Stuart Hall, Frantz Fanon, Teun A. van Dijk, and others, the analysis reveals that each terminological shift reflects specific historical struggles and power dynamics, while also acknowledging, through the perspectives of Orlando Patterson and Paul Gilroy, that labels can simultaneously constrain and reduce the complexity of individual identity. The paper contributes to ongoing debates in critical race studies and sociolinguistics by arguing that labeling is neither neutral nor merely symbolic: it is a constitutive act that shapes consciousness, solidarity, and political agency.
Mots clés
African American identity, Racial Labeling, Identity Reconstruction, Black Identity Politics, Diaspora
