How Do You Say “Ghostwriter” in Spanish? The Answer is Racist.

How do you say ghostwriter in Spanish? It’s a good question. And as someone who now makes her living as a ghostwriter, while living in Spain, this is a word I needed to learn. Turns out, the word here in Spain is negro. Like the color black, you ask? Not really.  It’s negro, as in, referring to a Black person. Now, I know the Spanish language is considered sexist by some, and there are some inherently racist turns of phrases imbedded in the language, but why is the word for ghostwriter, “Black person?” Of course I felt compelled to investigate.

Is Calling a Ghostwriter “A Black” Racist?

Does being a ghostwriter mean being a slave?

I am not a linguistics expert, but when I heard that “Black person” is the word for ghostwriter, I just felt that there had to be some sort of racist explanation for the term. However, there are muchos justifications that are “not racist” as to explain why a ghostwriter in Spain is referred to as a negro literario. The simple explanation as to why Spaniards use this term is because…they borrowed it from the French. The word used in France until recently for ghostwriter was negre, which technically means Black person, but it’s more commonly thought of as a racist slur, much like ni**er is used in the United States. And that’s not racist, right?

There was a really good episode on the NPR podcast, Rough Translation that explained the French usage of the word negre for ghostwriter. From the show:

“Negre was the word used to describe black people during slavery. …France is really proud of the fact that slavery was illegal in France, but if you cross the Atlantic and landed in the New World, places like Haiti or Guadalupe …or Louisiana, that’s where France enslaved Black people, in its colonies. They were the negre. So negre came to mean ghostwriter because a negre is the person who’s doing all this work and not receiving any of the benefits of that labor. The most famous example that’s kind of been carried down through history to us is with Alexandre Dumas.”

So, that explanations sounds like confirmation for the fact that calling a ghostwriter “Black” is pretty darn racist!

Maybe it’s not Racist. Maybe it’s Just Inappropriate

Thanks to the hard work of French journalist and literary agent, Nelly Buffon, who decided as a Black woman, she couldn’t stand being in the business of providing “ni**er services,” the official term for ghostwriter was changed in France in 2017 from negre to pret-plume, translation: ready pen. It wasn’t easy to get the Delegation General a la Langue Francaise, the esteemed body that protects the French language, to make the change, but after a successful public petition launched, it was declared that negre was “inappropriate for the times.” Not racist, inappropriate. *shrugs shoulders.*

Why is the Word for Ghostwriter in Spain Still ‘Negro?’

So, if the reason Spaniards use the term negro is because of the French, and the French changed their ways back in 2017, is a ghostwriter in Spain still a negro? Sadly, yes. According to the Spanish newspaper El Pais:

“In Spain, there is no movement neither in Culture nor in the RAE to change the use of this term. What’s more, if you do a Google search, you’ll find multiple articles about how much does a literary Negro cost, or what is a literary Negro? Even literary agencies use the term.”

That article in El Pais was written in January 2018. Later that same year however, the Spanish anti-racism group, Afroféminas launched their own petition asking the Royal Academy of Spanish to indeed strike the use of negro to mean ghostwriter. “Ghostwriters are not slaves,” is how they titled the petition. But it doesn’t appear that the RAE made any official changes to the language, but there are other terms people are using nowadays including escritor fantasma to refer to ghostwriters. But negro literario is also still very much in use.

Should I Change My Title to “Literary Negro?”

Thankfully, I haven’t actually heard anyone use this term in my presence. But now I think I know why Spanish people have suddenly become tongue-tied when I asked them what the word for ghostwriter is here. They probably didn’t want to call the Black lady a negro. So, what am I to do?

It’s kind of funny because I am technically a literary negro in more ways than one. I could even say I’m a Black Negro or an Afro-Negro. Or as my son suggested, Negro Squared?  I’m thinking about putting Literary Negro on my business cards and reclaiming a pejorative term. Or maybe I’ll start a petition, just like I did to capitalize the letter B when referring to Black people. Because at the end of the day, calling a ghostwriter a slave is most definitely racist.

Apparently a Literary Negro’s work is never done. Stay tuned!