alifeallah

Comments by alifeallah

• alifeallah commented on the word tricknology

  "As with any rich language, there are words in Ebonics which convey powerful concepts that are lost in translation. “Tricknology” is one such word. “Tricknology” is a street corner word, an integral part of the inner city lexicon. It was coined by the Nation of Islam (NOI), and used in at least one public speech by Malcolm, but it was popularized by the Five Percenters, an NOI splinter group which appeals mainly to youth. The Five Percenters made the word an essential part of the black urban vocabulary. Switching gears momentarily from urban street corners to fairy tale wonderlands, “tricknology” is an example of a “portmanteau word” which signifies, as Humpty Dumpty explained to Alice in Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking Glass, that there are several meanings packed into one word. As the Five Percenters say, if you “break down” (analyze the etymological components of) the word “tricknology,” you will discover: the word “trick,” the word “knowledge,” and the suffix “-logy” which means “the science, doctrine or theory of.” Tricknology, then, is the “science of trick knowledge. Tricknology is not simply “plain ol’ trickery”; nor is it exemplified by your average street hustler’s con game. Tricknology denotes a much more subtle and sophisticated level of deception. The “science of trick knowledge” means the science of using respected fields of knowledge (or one’s official or expert capacity) in a cunning, devious or deceitful manner. The term “tricknology,” therefore, denotes the usage of any of the following techniques for purposes of fraud, deception, or the creation of ideological hegemony: sophistry, academic jargon, legalese, double-speak, psycho-babble, disinformation campaigns, lying with statistics, political chicanery, spin-doctoring, double-dealing, playing both sides against the middle, creating smoke-screens, subliminal advertising, media manipulation, the manufacture of consensus, etc. Of course, tricknology also includes any artifice used to divide and conquer people and any legally-sanctioned scheme employed by the wealthy to defraud poor people of their money or property (such as predatory lending practices). Most importantly, tricknology is almost exclusively the tool of the white man. (The Native American expression “the white man speaks with forked tongue” denotes that he lies; tricknology denotes the complex and elaborate machinations involved in his lying.) Hence, the word typically appears in these contexts: “the white man is using his tricknology on you” or—as when casting aspersions on a suspected ruse or ploy by whites to pull the wool over black people’s eyes—“that’s just the white man’s tricknology.” In short, tricknology is what the oppressor uses to keep black people deceived, misdirected, misinformed, baffled, duped, confused, torn between two poles, lulled into false security or false consciousness, distracted, diverted, un-alert or preoccupied, and powerless and impoverished."

  The Sambo Thesis Revisited: Slavery’s Impact upon the African American Personality. by Yusuf Nuruddin

  January 21, 2012