What happened to the word 'woke'?

What does woke mean?

You might know it as the past tense of wake, like in the sentence, “I woke up early this morning.” (wake – woke – woken). But woke has also been used in a different way, and its meaning has changed a lot over time. Let’s take a look!

A bit of history

In the 1940s, Black people in America started using woke to mean ‘awake’ in a different sense - not just waking up from sleep, but being aware of unfairness in the world. It was a way to say that someone understood racism and the struggles of Black communities, especially in the fight for civil rights. For a long time, woke was a positive word. It meant caring about fairness and wanting to make things better.

In the 2010s, more people started using it, especially when the Black Lives Matter movement grew. The meaning of woke expanded, and it wasn’t just about race anymore. People used it to talk about unfairness in other areas, like gender, the environment, and human rights.

How has the word woke changed?

In the late 2010s, some people started to think that woke had become too vague or overused. Others felt that some people were just pretending to care about these issues to look good, rather than actually doing anything to help. They felt these people were self-righteous. Some people started using woke to describe those who seemed too sure they were right about social issues.

• Self-righteous (adj) - believing you are always right and better than others, especially about moral issues.

Many people felt frustrated with how much social rules were changing. For example, older generations, who grew up in a time when certain jokes or opinions were normal, often feel like they have to be extra careful about what they say now. They worry they might accidentally offend someone or be told off for using words that were once acceptable but are now considered offensive. Those who were raised with traditional gender roles, might feel that conversations about sexism or privilege are unfairly blaming them for things they didn’t personally do. In a similar way, some working-class people, who struggle financially, feel frustrated when they are told they have ‘privilege’ just because they are white.

Many of these people feel that it's 'political correctness gone mad.’ They think people get offended too easily, that woke ideas can be 'over the top' and make it harder to speak freely. They see news stories about comedians being criticised, people losing jobs over social media posts, or books being rewritten to remove ‘offensive’ words. To them, it feels like you can’t say anything anymore without being attacked.

What’s interesting is that there aren’t many words to criticise people who are too self-righteous about fairness and being easily offended. Because of this, woke may have changed to fill that gap. When people don’t have a word to describe something, they often take an existing one and give it a new meaning. In some ways, it's not surprising that the word woke started being used in a negative way.

Why can't you say whatever you want?

The truth is, you can say whatever you want. There’s no law stopping you. But words have consequences. If you say something offensive, people might disagree with you, criticise you, or stop listening to you. Some believe this is unfair, calling it ‘cancel culture’. Others argue that this isn’t a new idea at all. Society has always judged people based on what they say - just in different ways.

• Cancel culture - the idea that if you say something wrong, society will punish you by shaming you or shutting you out.

Nowadays, you're more likely to hear woke being used in a negative way than a positive one. Newspapers, social commentators, and certain political groups have taken to using the word woke as a way to criticise people who are very vocal about social issues. It's used to label them as 'overly sensitive'. The word has been weaponized.

• to weaponise (v) - to adapt something and use it as a weapon; to exploit something for the purpose of attack.

I can't help thinking that it's a bit of a shame that the meaning has changed in this way. It seems sad somehow that something that originally stood for something so positive has been distorted. However, this shift in meaning is, of course, a natural part of language which is inherently changeable. It evolves as we evolve. Ultimately, understanding these changes can help us engage more thoughtfully in conversations about social issues, even if the language we use to describe them has become more complex.