A01=Elizabeth Stordeur Pryor
Author_Elizabeth Stordeur Pryor
blackness
Boston
can I say the n word
Category=DNBM1
Category=JBFA1
Category=JBSL1
Celebrity
Comedian
Comedy
daughters
Elizabeth Stordeur Pryor
eq_bestseller
eq_biography-true-stories
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eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
eq_society-politics
Fame
family
fathers
forthcoming
history of the n word
Los Angeles
memoir
mixed-race
n word
nigga
Parthenia
race
Richard Pryor
richard pryor's daughter
richard pryor's family
the n-word
what is the n word
whiteness
who can say the n word
Product details
- ISBN 9781982154509
- Weight: 445g
- Dimensions: 152 x 229mm
- Publication Date: 02 Jul 2026
- Publisher: Simon & Schuster
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Hardback
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Part memoir by the daughter of the iconic comedian Richard Pryor, part exploration of the historical and contemporary use of the N-word, this hybrid book peels back the curtain on the life of Pryor and interrogates the most perplexing word in the American lexicon, a word he helped popularize.
The N-word is one of the most perplexing, controversial and misunderstood words in the American lexicon. It’s a word that Elizabeth Pryor has not only contemplated, it’s one that she has taught and observed up close.
When a white student quoted her father and blurted out the N-word in the middle of a class she was teaching, Professor Pryor’s worlds collided. In that moment, she was forced to confront the history of the notorious slur in the United States, and her complicated relationship with her father Richard Pryor, who made the word a trademark of his comedy in the 1970s.
As she dives into her research, her own memories of the N-word come flooding back in unprocessed memories that she hadn’t thought about for decades. In reckoning with those memories, Elizabeth goes on a more public journey of discovery of the messy and sometimes surprising legacies of racism in the United States.
A braided narrative that seamlessly integrates the history of the N-word with Elizabeth’s own story of growing up the Black Jewish daughter of Richard Pryor, Something We Said follows Elizabeth as she becomes a leading scholar and teacher of the very word her father put on the pop culture map.
The N-word is one of the most perplexing, controversial and misunderstood words in the American lexicon. It’s a word that Elizabeth Pryor has not only contemplated, it’s one that she has taught and observed up close.
When a white student quoted her father and blurted out the N-word in the middle of a class she was teaching, Professor Pryor’s worlds collided. In that moment, she was forced to confront the history of the notorious slur in the United States, and her complicated relationship with her father Richard Pryor, who made the word a trademark of his comedy in the 1970s.
As she dives into her research, her own memories of the N-word come flooding back in unprocessed memories that she hadn’t thought about for decades. In reckoning with those memories, Elizabeth goes on a more public journey of discovery of the messy and sometimes surprising legacies of racism in the United States.
A braided narrative that seamlessly integrates the history of the N-word with Elizabeth’s own story of growing up the Black Jewish daughter of Richard Pryor, Something We Said follows Elizabeth as she becomes a leading scholar and teacher of the very word her father put on the pop culture map.
Elizabeth Stordeur Pryor is a professor of history at Smith College where she teaches courses on race, slavery, and her father, comedic legend Richard Pryor. She is the award-winning author of the article “The Etymology of [N-Word]: Resistance, Language, and the Politics of Freedom in the Antebellum North” and the 2016 book Colored Travelers: Mobility and the Fight for Citizenship Before the Civil War. Her viral TED talk on why it’s hard to talk about the n-word has been viewed more than two million times.
