John Mitchell

Parayno
Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain, an American classic, is constantly the center
of controversy for its use in the public school education because of the use of the
offensive nature of the n-word found in the book.
The n-word is a powerful word that causes old wounds to burn and said by
some a word that grates on people souls (Hayasaki). But does that justify the
censorship of that word from literature? Do we have the right to alter the language
used by authors if the language disagrees with our present morals? There is no
place for censorship in book and we should respect the words authors choose to
include.
Michiko Kakutani argues that changing the n-word to slave in Huck Finn
effectively labels him as property. Changing the words caused the meaning to
shift and is ironic because slavery is what Jim is running away from in the book.
Changing words does nothing but causes the original meaning to change. It doesnt
and cant hide the hatred of white southerners in the past. That hatred will remain
visible in the rest of the text.
Kathleen Parker and Kakutani both called the works of authors sacrosanct.
The word sacrosanct means holy or sacred. They strongly believed that the words
used by authors should not be altered or defiled by the hands of editors or others in
the attempt to make the books match the moral standards of the day. To censor
Huck Finn in the name of making a less offensive book, no one would find this more
offensive than Twain (Parker). Mark Twain would be the most offended because
others are willing to change the words he painstakingly worked to get the perfect
combinations of vowels and consonants (Parker). The content of what the book

should have is up to the editor to urge and, in a righteous world, the writer to
decide (Parker). The book is written by the author, so it is only natural that the
author gets the final say in what words are used in the book.
Jimmy Swindler states that he can use Huck Finn to teach if its the version
with the n-word removed. He argues that it is better to have an edition with the
word removed that not being able to use the book in class at all. Preventing the
book from being used in class is ultimately worse than removing a word. An outright
ban deprives of exposure to classic works of literature (Kakutani). However this
way of thinking is flawed because in both cases you are preventing people from
seeing the depiction of race relations in the South back then. You should not accept
this argument because getting an edition of the book with words edited out is a
passive acceptation of censorship.
The word is hated and represents hatred against blacks with connections to
slavery in the past. It is described as a racial slur that never seems to lose its
vitriol (Kakutani). Even today the word continues to cause grievance among the
black community. However the hatred of the word has been transferred into
something positive. It is used by rappers like 50 cent in their rap songs and use by
the current generation to say thats my homeboy (Hayasaki). This doesnt remove
all the hatred off the word but it is a good direction to go to heal the wounds of the
past.
Censorship only servers to hide and whitewash the disgusting truths we do
not want to acknowledge. It does no service to the young minds to see a distorted
version of what has happened in the past. They must see the hard, cold facts if they
truly want to understand what happened and to decide what they should do in the

future. To this extent we should praise Mark Twain for his use of language to depict
the South during his time.