Hello people!
Me and a couple of fellas are adapting a subject from a short story written around 1890. Since one of its themes is racism in the Victorian era, there are a lot of racial slurs. So, my question is... what do you think would be the most historically accurate way to say the N-word in that era? We're talking 1883, to be as precise as possible. And the people using it are indeed racists, so they don't hold back nothing, except for one of them, who does not think he is racist, so we would also need suggestions for a lighter word to use for someone like him. I ask because english is not our mother tongue, but we do have to write the screenplay in english and this has been our biggest concern as of now, we don't want to come off with terms that are too exagerated or inaccurate.
The people speaking are part of high society, such as Lords or sons of Lords, except for a few servants. They are discussing about a black man just after dinner, in a Hotel set in Switzerland. They come from England, France, Austria, Switzerland, and America. As I said, except for one, who does not agree with the others, they all see black people as an inferior race and cannot see them as human, but rather as animals. Except for one who is young, in his 20s, they are all between 40 and 55 years old.
Of course I do not pretend to get to that 100% historical accuracy but it would be nice to have an idea of the slurs they could be saying, especially since during victorian age, people would rather not talk about this kind of stuff especially after eating and talk about something more mundane. But, if I did that, I wouldn't have a story! :)
I hope I got the point across.
Thank you very much for the interest! Have a nice day
Hi there - we're happy to approve your question related to your novel, and we are happy for people to answer. However, we should warn you that many flairs have become reluctant to answer questions for aspiring novelists, based on past experience: some aspiring novelists have a tendency to try to pump historians for trivia while ignoring the bigger points they were making, while others have a tendency to argue with historians when the historical reality does not line up with what's needed for a particular scene or characterization. Please respect the answers of people who have generously given you their time, even if it's not always what you want to hear.
Additionally, as amazing as our flair panel is, we should also point out that /r/AskHistorians is not a professional historical consultation service. If you're asking a question here because you need vital research for a future commercial product such as a historical novel, you may be better off engaging a historical consultant at a fair hourly rate to answer these questions for you. We don't know what the going rate for consultancy work would be in your locality, but it may be worth looking into that if you have in-depth or highly plot-reliant questions for this project. Some /r/AskHistorians flairs could be receptive to working as a consultant in this way. However, if you wish for a flair here to do this work for you, you will need to organize this with them yourselves.