I'd like information on various racial slurs, their etymology, a brief explanation of why they are offensive, and to whom. Take, for example, the word 'kike'. I know to whom it refers, but despite having asked around, no one could answer where it came from and why it was offensive. Anyone?
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Name : Andrew C., Gender : M, Race : White/Caucasian, Age : 30, City : Dallas-Ft. Worth, State : TX Country : United States, Occupation : Educator, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, Well... I suppose I can help out since I've learned a lot of this stuff in etemology and such classes. Kike as we all know refers to a jew. During the great immigration when everyone started migrating to our country... some people could not read or write. Therefore people could not put their signature on papers. So christians that couldnt write would put a cross, muslims put a sort of 'u' ( like the crescent moon symbol ) And Jews put a star of David. But as immigration officials got sloppy it became a sort of circle. So.. Kike comes from Keikle which mean circle. The circle from immigration papers... it was sort used by jews to make fun on the sloppy star of david.. which then turned around to make fun of jews. Now.. as for other racial slurs... such as nigger? Nigger came from the Latin term 'niger' which means black. And before it became the derogatory word it is today.. it used to simply mean 'Black American' I'm unclear on how it suddenly errupted to a racial word as it did. I guess 'spic' might be one you're also wondering about? Spic is obviously from Hispanic. But the reason it became such a huge thing to use to make fun of mexicans was because they'd come to the country saying 'I dont SPIC English'
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Name : Anna, Gender : F, Sexual Orientation : Straight, Race : White/Caucasian, Religion : Christian, Age : 17, City : Memphis, State : TN Country : United States, Occupation : student, Education level : Less than High School Diploma, Social class : Upper middle class, To my friend, Andrew C. from Dallas-Ft. Worth, TX: The origin of the slur 'kike' comes from late Middle Age and Renaissance Europe when more and more burghers and other lower class citizens of their respective countries were being required to 'sign' documents to denote their agreement to contracts stated therein. Much of the population of those societies were still illiterate and unable to write, however, their 'mark' was needed in order to render a document legal. Since Europe was mostly Catholic, as were all of the monarchies prior to the Reformation, the most common mark signifying solemn agreement was an 'X,' which is a corrupted, or vernacular, form of the sign of the cross. Since those Jews who were illiterate did not want to be making a symbol that was religiously foreign to them and the Star of David was too sacred, they opted to draw a 'keikel' - the Yiddish word for circle. Hence, 'keikel' drawing Jews over the years became disparagingly known as 'kikes.'
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Name : Richard-Popielarz30064, Gender : M, Sexual Orientation : Straight, Religion : Catholic, Age : 43, City : Philadelphia, State : PA Country : United States, Occupation : Social Worker, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, Well, this isn't exactly what you asked for, but its a start. Go to this website:http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com or just do a google on 'etymology of racial slurs.' Its really interesting
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Name : Wayne24381, Gender : M, Race : Black/African American, Age : 43, City : parsippany, State : NJ Country : United States, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, Kike - I can't tell you the origin of kike but it was assimilated by German Jews who looked down upon East European Jews and they referred to them as kikes. The term has become internationalized to refer to all Jews. Nigger - directly descends from the French 'negre' which is derived from the Latin 'niger,' meaning black. The first appearance of 'nigger' in its present form comes from a poem by Robert Burns written in 1786. For almost 200 years the term existed in various other forms such as: neegar, niger, niggor, etc. Throughout most of the words history, it was used openly sometimes with and sometimes without contempt. Redneck - believed to date back to 1830 to describe Presbyterians in Fayetteville, North Carolina. The term alludes to the sunburned backs of their necks while working in the fields. The equivalent Bahamian whites were referred to as 'redlegs.'
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Name : Ralph30216, Gender : M, Sexual Orientation : Straight, Race : White/Caucasian, Age : 39, City : Atlanta, State : GA Country : United States, Occupation : Attorney, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Upper middle class, Sometimes the meaning of the word itself is less important than the way that it is said and the actions taken by the person using the word. I have tried to look up the word 'nigger' (SORRY IF THIS IS OFFENSIVE TO ANYONE)and the only meaning i could find was 'offensive slang' When i asked my dad his thoughts he said that the word instilled fear in people because when that word was used it was likely to be followed up with violence, reminders that black people were thought of an inferior and that they werent able to protect themselves. When that word has been said to me i have feared for my safety, felt ridiculed and de-humanized and hurt that someone was obviously TRYING to say something to hurt me. Just one person's thoughts. This is probably something you could research yourself. I bet if you did a yahoo search of books + offensive racial slurs you could find some info. I am sure there are plenty of books about this. Leanne 100% Bi-racial!!!
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Name : Leanne, Gender : F, Race : I'm a mutt!!, Religion : Christian, Age : 22, City : pleasant hill, State : CA Country : United States, Occupation : artist, Education level : 2 Years of College, Social class : Lower middle class, Check out this webside for a whole list of the origins of racial/derogatory slurs: http://www.angelfire.com/geek/APRACE/glossary.html
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Name : k26944, City : Washington, State : DC Country : United States, my understanding is it is a derrivation from a foreign word for circle( i think greek)and that on ellis island when jews were asked to sign or make their mark, they wouldnt do it with an X because that is a cross, so the signed with a circle
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Name : Dave25978, Religion : Jewish, City : Miami, State : FL Country : United States, I saw a documentary on TV once about Ellis Island. It said that there were many short-hand abbreviations used on immigrants' papers in order to keep track efficiently. To identify religion, catholics had a cross written at the top corner of their documents, while Jews had a circle. In Yiddish, the language spoken by most immigrant Jews at the time, the word for circle is 'kikel.' The term eventually evolved to kike, as a short-hand way of denoting a Jew's documents, and then later as a derogatory epithet. In addition, the documentary explained the slur for an Italian person, Wop. Apparently, a boatload of Italian immigrants arrived, but none had any documentation. Entrance documents were issued to them, with the notation at the top of WOP, or without papers. Hence, they were referred to as Wops. As to why these terms are offensive, I feel it is simply because of the way that they are used. Firstly, they are never used in anything but a negative context (you never hear 'oh my friend Esther, she's such a nice kike'). Secondly,when you use a racial epithet, no matter its origins, it places the person apart from yourself, making them inferior to you. I would be equally offended if someone yelled out 'Hey Jew' as I would 'Hey, kike.' I hope that helps...
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Name : Jaymie, Gender : F, Race : White/Caucasian, Religion : Jewish, Age : 23, City : Suffern, State : NY Country : United States, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, The word kike originated on Ellis Island in the late 19th century, when Jewish immigrants who were illiterate (or could not use Roman-English letters), when asked to sign the entry-forms with the customary 'X,' refused -- and instead made a circle. The Yiddish word for 'circle' is kikel (pronounced KY - kel). Before long, immigration inspectors were calling anyone who signed with an 'O' instead of an 'X' a kikel or kikeleh or kikee or, finally and succinctly, kike. They refused to sign with an 'X' because for some Jews it was considered to be an evil sign.
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Name : Marc22342, Gender : M, Age : 30, City : Seattle, State : WA Country : United States, Occupation : Writer, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, What I've heard about ' kike ' is this: it started in the USA and spread to the rest of the world. It started during the late 1800's. Large numbers of immigrants entered the US via Ellis Island in NY. Many of the immigrants were illiterate...national origin had nothing to do with it. When documents had to be signed, if an immigrant couldn't spell their name, they were required to make an ' x ' on the document. To Jews, that would symbolize a cross. As they were not Christians, they were allowed to sing with an ' o ' instead. In Yiddish, which many of the Jews spoke, an ' o ' or circle, is ' kikel '. People then started calling them ' kikes '. That's what heard...Idon't know if it's true or not. The word ' nigger ' has a well known origin. It comes from various European languages for ' black '. ' Neggar ' = Dutch, ' Negro ' = Spanish etc. During the early days of slavery, the European words for Africans were applied to them and eventually, a bastardization of the words eventually produced the word ' nigger '. I can only assume ' paki ' originated during the late 1940's when the nation of Pakistan was created...but I may be wrong. ' Chink ' probably came from a bastardization of ' Chinese '. ' Spic ' came from a bastardization of ' hispanic '. ' Wetbacks ' originated in Texas where many Mexicans who wanted to enter the US illigally had to cross rivers and thus they got wet and thus ' wetbacks '.
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Name : Tom24106, City : Calumet City, State : CA Country : United States, It's offensive because it's generally used in an offensive manner. End of story. I don't know the origin of it, nor is that important.
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Name : Jeremy30936, Gender : M, Race : White/Caucasian, Religion : Jewish, Age : 27, City : Seattle, State : WA Country : United States, Occupation : Political Technology, Education level : 4 Years of College, Well, obviously the N word means ignorant, which I find to be offensive and I am white! BUT, I don't understand where black people get Honky from--Honky refers ,badly I might add, to Hungarians, not white people in general. I was called a Honky once by some black people in Philly, and I decided to let them know just how 'ignorant' (if ya catch my drift) their use of that terminology was, beings I was Irish. Okay, I was ALOT younger back then,... so I slipped!
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Name : NorthernDisclosures, Gender : F, Race : White/Caucasian, Age : 40, City : Out in the Hills, State : MI Country : United States, Occupation : Getting There, Education level : 2 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, Have you tried Google? I'm gettin 238,000 hits.
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Name : George, Gender : M, Sexual Orientation : Straight, Race : White/Caucasian, Religion : Buddhist, Age : 54, City : Toronto, Ontario, State : NA Country : Canada, Occupation : Evaluation researcher, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, In Christian Europe, until the time when the literacy rate began to rise rapidly, people would 'make their mark' - a cross, or an 'X' - on legal documents in lieu of a signature which they could not provide due to their inability to even sign their own name. This, of course, had to be witnessed by a literate person who had a writing job such as a scribe, or notary. When Jews were asked to make their marks, they refused to make anything resembling the sign of the cross because they were, at the time, labeled by the Church as Christ killers. Therefore, they opted to make a 'keikel' - Yiddish for 'circle.' The same was true at Ellis Island during the great Jewish immigration from Central & Eastern Europe to the United States. When the illiterate among them insisted on making their mark with a 'keikel,' they were labeled with the epithet of 'kike.'
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Name : Richard, Gender : M, Sexual Orientation : Straight, Race : White/Caucasian, Religion : Catholic, Age : 44, City : Philadelphia, State : PA Country : United States, Occupation : Social Worker, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, 
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