Antilocution is a form of prejudice in which negative verbal remarks against a person, group, or community, are made in a public or private setting and not addressed directly to the target. American psychologist Gordon Allport first used this term in his 1954 book, The Nature of Prejudice, to label the first of the five degrees of antipathy that measure manifestation of prejudice in a society as antilocution (see also: "Allport's Scale"). Antilocution is similar to the rather common form of betrayal in which a person "talks behind someone's back.", but antilocution involves an in-group ostracizing an out-group on a biased basis.