The word “woke” is broadly used to describe a state of being “aware of and actively attentive to important facts and issues especially of racial and social injustice” according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary. While it originated from African American Vernacular English (AAVE) in the early part of the 20th century, the term has become a common part of American slang.

What Are the Origins of the Term ‘Stay Woke’? | Snopes.com

But “woke” and the phrase “stay woke” had already been a part of Black communities for years, long before Black Lives Matter gained prominence. “While renewed (inter)national outcry over anti-Black police violence certainly fueled widespread and mainstream usage of the word in the present, it has a much longer history,” deandre miles-hercules, a doctoral linguistics researcher at the University of California Santa Barbara, told me.

The earliest known examples of wokeness as a concept revolve around the idea of Black consciousness “waking up” to a new reality or activist framework and dates back to the early 20th century. In 1923, a collection of aphorisms and ideas by the Jamaican philosopher and social activist Marcus Garvey included the summons “Wake up Ethiopia! Wake up Africa!” as a call to globalBlack citizens to become more socially and politically conscious. A few years later, the phrase “stay woke” turned up as part of a spoken afterword in the 1938 song “Scottsboro Boys,” a protest song by Blues musician Huddie Ledbetter, a.k.a. Lead Belly. The song describes the 1931 saga of a group of nine Black teenagers in Scottsboro, Arkansas, who were accused of raping two white women.

What is woke: How a Black movement watchword got co-opted in a culture war – Vox

Lead Belly says at the end of an archival recording of the song that he’d met with the Scottsboro defendants’ lawyer, who introduced him to the men themselves. “I made this little song about down there,” Lead Belly says. “So I advise everybody, be a little careful when they go along through there — best stay woke, keep their eyes open.”

What is woke: How a Black movement watchword got co-opted in a culture war – Vox

What was happening “down there” at the time Lead Belly was writing? The second wave of the Klan. White terrorism. White rage.

On August 8, 1925, more than 50,000 members of the Ku Klux Klan paraded through Washington, D.C. Some walked in lines as wide as 20 abreast, while others created formations of the letter K or a Christian cross. A few rode on horseback. Many held American flags. Men and women alike, the marchers carried banners emblazoned with the names of their home states or local chapters, and their procession lasted for more than three hours down Pennsylvania Avenue, lined with spectators. National leaders of the organization were resplendent in colorful satin robes and the rank and file wore white, their regalia adorned with a circular red patch containing a cross with a drop of blood at its center.

Nearly all of the marchers wore pointed hoods, but their faces were clearly visible. In part, that was because officials would sanction the parade only if participants agreed to walk unmasked. But a mask was not really necessary, as most members of the Klan saw little reason to hide their faces. After all, there were millions of them in the United States.

The Rise and Fall of the Second Ku Klux Klan – The Atlantic

“Kelley’s use of ‘woke’ is linked closely to contemporary definitions of the word as he is writing about Black people’s awareness of the racial dynamics at play in the process of linguistic appropriation,” miles-hercules said. “As a linguist and anthropologist, I highlight this piece specifically because it demonstrates both how language, culture, and power are always connected and, crucially, that this is not news to Black people. We been knew … we stay woke.”

What is woke: How a Black movement watchword got co-opted in a culture war – Vox

All marginalized people in the era of the fascist and bigoted “Project 2025” movement need to stay woke to the threats of Unreconstructed America. They’re coming for us.