"What’s up nigga?"

“What did I tell you about saying that word?” the African American assistant manager for a large department store sternly intercedes, her voice dripping with disdain.

“Sorry, I’m so sorry, I promise I won't say it again,” professed the tin-grinned, baby-faced 19-year old Filipino American employee.

“You keep apologizing, but you continue to say it. Stop using the word!”

“I know it’s just a habit. Some of my friends are black so, you know?”

The situation of nigga this nigga that is an ongoing conflict that fails to cease. And to try and tell this guy or many like him not to say it is like telling them to change the way they tie their shoes.

In class, on the bus or maybe walking down the street, you've had to hear nigga at least once.

To be as politically correct as possible, the “N word”--oh forget it, nigger--comes from the slave trade. It is derived from the term neger, which stems from negro. In Spanish it means black and was used to describe people of African descent, according to Randall Kennedy’s article, “Who Can Say ‘Nigger?’ And Other Considerations,” in the Journal of Blacks in Higher Education. Overtime, slave owners and people who participated in demeaning the character of blacks exclusively used nigger. Centuries later, “Nigger” eventually transcended to a form of kinship or a greeting among other blacks by dropping the “e-r” and adding an “a” or “ah.” It has been tweaked by the very people who were controlled by it to gain ownership and to undo some of the pain that is intertwined with the word, according to scholarly reports and articles.

A man of many years with a young soul, Dr. Ernest Brown, a lecturer in the Africana Studies department and Academic Advisor at San Francisco State University says, "I don’t use the word because of the fact that many people have died to take the word out of the language without success."

With his dark-tinted Stevie Wonder shades and consternation etched on his face, his booming voice resonates off the walls in the small office like a woodpecker thumping a hollow tree stump.

"It’s always been around in the African American community and they seem to want to make it commonplace. It’s a demeaning and degrading word usually directed towards African Americans," says Brown. Many African American educators share this point of view.

Lets take it to the streets and see what the younger generation thinks of the word.

In the world of perfectly manicured lawns and two-parent households we find 19-year old suburbanite Neil Castellan aka Curly Fries. The urban swagger and street vernacular from the curly haired white boy seemingly exemplifies his existence with urban culture. “It’s a habit. I say it without even knowing it now,” said Castellan. “When I’m in Richmond or around parents, I really pay attention to what’s coming out my mouth though,” explained “Curly Fries” while leaning in his chair nonchalantly as though he has been interrogated on the nigga topic before. “It was just a way of life, hearing it all the time at Pinole Middle School.”

“It came out of my mouth a few times and nobody really reacted, so I thought it was alright to say it,” said the Caucasian Castellan.

Keith Fukamae, a 21-year old small-statured Asian American, who shares the same neighborhood with Castellan vaguely remembers the first time he used nigga, but to his recollection he replies, “Probably around the eighth or ninth grade I said the word. People I hung around were saying it, so I kind of just start saying it.”

Does this make using the term okay? Is this word a product of a person’s environment, and if so, why does the individual continue using it after they understand the implications of such a word?

On the predominantly all black campus of North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, much attention has swirled around the word nigga because faculty and students live with the word on an everyday basis and "its the debate" according to 41-year old Dr. Myra Shird, Associate Professor and Director of Speech at NCAT during a phone interview. She has been speaking about the issue for a while, and educating others of her shared opinion has been a step in answering an increasingly controversial issue. Shird and others have held a panel about nigga at the NCAT campus each semester for some time now. “People are engaged with the topic. Every time I have done it, it has been a standing room only.”

Shird explicitly unpacked nigga like a bunch of sweaty Sear's movers during a phone interview. The explanations tumbled from the receiver in a continuous flow, addressing each question with efficiency and passion.

"There are clans (Klu Klux Klan) groups that don’t use the word anymore because it has become commonplace, if you will, in the market place," said Shird. "'Yankee Doodle,' if we look at the history of that, has the same slander and history as 'nigga.' So we see that the evolution of language has taken place in our society before, but we just take a lot of note on nigga." The word Yankee has also evolved from a Colonial description negatively describing Northerners in the 1800's, while now it takes on a more friendly, joking tone.

“Virtually all gangsta rap wraps itself around nigga,” stated Bill Maxwell in“Nigger: Slur of Slurs” from the Journal of Blacks in Higher Education. The term is sometimes used as an endearment toward another person. Hip-Hop’s 20-year plus history has sculpted the way some think and approach the word nigga. And overtime time "nigga" has been adopted by not only blacks as a form of camaraderie, but by Latinos, Asians, and Caucasians. Many young adults that are not black explained they start using nigga after some sort of learned or repetitive usage among their peers or listening to music.

“I haven’t really thought on why I use it, it was something that I caught on to by living and going to school in Richmond and listening to Tupac,” said Castellan.

In a quote pulled from the NCAT school newspaper, Shird replied to one of her colleagues who expressed that blacks own the word. Her reply was, “We don’t want to put our dirty laundry in the street, but we do it through entertainment. It’s just music imitating life. Once it becomes commercial, it’s not exclusive anymore," stated Shird at the one time semester panel and debate about "nigga."

"The experience of the word is different, it’s not connected with pain… it’s connected with money," adds Shird passionately during the phone interview.

Whether or not Hip Hop culture does influence how the word is used, it’s still evident that nigga or nigger still sparks anger and controversy for blacks and makes others uncomfortable. Ironically, some black people that use the word don’t want others to use it towards them or at all, because they feel it’s degrading and perpetuating racist relationships.

In response to the idea that black people can use the word, but no one else can, Shird responds with vigilance in her tone

"They are hypocrites," said Shird. "Now the shoe is on the other foot with this particular language thing and for black folk to say 'oh we can use the word, but white people can't' or 'ohhh I heard them say it’ No! You can’t do that. Either 'nigga' is okay or 'nigga' is not okay."

“I really don’t like saying it around black folks because a lot of them take it offensively,” said Castellan, when asked about his feelings about the exclusiveness of the word.

Is there a solution or remedy for the loosely used epithet of nigger or does our future graciously bestow everyone as a nigga?

“Perhaps if parents taught their children at a young age of how nasty the word is, probably then we might see a change,” Brown added as a possible solution to the growing popularity of the word.

Revolution or evolution is usually sparked by a catalyst and Shird thinks, “If we want this to stop, we are the first people to stop it because I guarantee you that you know more black people that call each other nigga than you know white folks that would walk up to you on the street and say, "yo, what’s up my nigga?' We are the catalyst of change."

The word "nigga" doesn’t seem to be dwindling from the vocabulary of many, but at least some are gaining the awareness that in some way or another it’s negative. Just take Mr. “Curly Fries” for instance, “I’m actually trying to stop using that word because of what happened to my cousin at In-N-Out. She said that word and some lady just went off on her. It’s just not worth it.”

It won’t be too long until San Francisco State University tackles the well overdue debate of nigga and will be discussing among students and faculty on November 13, The Misunderstanding and Brainwash of the word "Nigga" and "Nigger" in Richard Oakes Multicultural Center at SF State.