This article shows how students confront offensive language head-on by researching its history and reconsidering its use in contemporary conversation. It describes an assignment in which students study the histories and social reception of words (in some cases considered obscenities) used to insult people of various social categories. Students come to recognize the powerful, sometimes damaging effects of language, enabling them to fight those effects intellectually. Many derogatory terms are cited as examples in this article. (Contains 1 note.)