As the country debates issues of race, power and identity, many publications have changed their style to capitalize Black when referring to race.
After writing recently about the death of George Floyd and student charges of racism at the FSU/Asolo Conservatory for Actor Training, I received some mail objecting to my use of a capital “B” for Black when referring to racial identity, but a small “w” when referring to whites.
“If you want to capitalize race it should be equal,” wrote a reader, suggesting I use “Caucasian” and “Negro” instead. “I find [your usage] prejudicial and inconsistent and expect more from a newspaper columnist.”
Well, I’ve got news for you; it’s not up to this columnist — or any other journalist who isn’t self-employed — to choose what punctuation (or word) to use in reference to race; we follow the directives of the news organizations for which we work. In the case of the Herald-Tribune, that’s the USA Today network owned by Gannett, which follows the the venerable arbiter of journalism style policy, the Associated Press. (Even if, as one reader testily replied, “I don’t really care what newspaper and journalists have decided.”)
Referred to as “the Bible” in copy editing circles, the AP Stylebook was revised this month to include the capital “B” for Black. Since then, dozens of mainstream news organizations have belatedly followed the suit of publications like Essence and Ebony, which have capitalized Black for years. (As of this writing, the New York Times and Washington Post have yet to join the bandwagon.)