The word "wog" in Australia
mike.j...@gmail.com
by (I think) mainly Australians in blogs, web forums, usenet groups,
etc. It seems to mean "person of southern European origin, eg Spanish,
Greek, Portuguese, etc", or "person with dark skin". I am not sure if
it is exactly synonymous with "spic". Some Australians proudly describe
themselves as "wogs". In the Uk, the word "wog" has the same
inflammatory effect as, say, "nigger" or "darkie", and would be avoided
by persons not wishing to appear racist.
Do Kiwis talk about "wogs"? is there an insulting word for Maori which
white New Zealanders use?
Are there Australians who would shy away from calling someone a
"boong", who would naturally and easily call someone else a "wog"
without racist intent? What happens when Poms hear the word? Do they
complain? Do black Poms ever go to live in Australia? What do they get
called?
TOF
mike.j...@gmail.com wrote:
> I am always taken aback when I see the word "wog" used, quite casually,
> by (I think) mainly Australians in blogs, web forums, usenet groups,
> etc. It seems to mean "person of southern European origin, eg Spanish,
> Greek, Portuguese, etc", or "person with dark skin". I am not sure if
> it is exactly synonymous with "spic". Some Australians proudly describe
> themselves as "wogs". In the Uk, the word "wog" has the same
> inflammatory effect as, say, "nigger" or "darkie", and would be avoided
> by persons not wishing to appear racist.
>
It has lost much of its force in Australia now, in part because the
word has been appropriated by southern Europeans in a manner that
resembles the use of "nigger" by blacks in the US. A popular comedy
show called "Wogs Out of Work" involves a self-deprecating line of
humour by Greeks.
In the 1970s of course, wog, spic, dago, reffo and greaseball were used
interchangeably to abuse those perceived to be of mediterranean
descent.
> Do Kiwis talk about "wogs"? is there an insulting word for Maori which
> white New Zealanders use?
>
> Are there Australians who would shy away from calling someone a
> "boong", who would naturally and easily call someone else a "wog"
> without racist intent?
These days, certainly. Nobody who used "boong" in Australia, or even
the term "Abo" can do so without being aware that it's deliberately
offensive.
> What happens when Poms hear the word? Do they
> complain? Do black Poms ever go to live in Australia? What do they get
> called?
Actually, this question was directly discussed when the new crowd
control rules on racial abuse for the coming Ashes (cricket) were being
discussed. It was agreed that the term "pom" (said to be an acronym for
"prisoner of Mother England" -- but I always thought it referred to the
vegetable Drake brought to Britain from the new world -- "pommes de
terre") was NOT a term of abuse, unless paired with an epithet such as
"bastard", "cunt" or similar.
TOF
mike.j...@gmail.com
TOF wrote:
> > What happens when Poms hear the word? Do they
> > complain? Do black Poms ever go to live in Australia? What do they get
> > called?
>
> Actually, this question was directly discussed when the new crowd
> control rules on racial abuse for the coming Ashes (cricket) were being
> discussed. It was agreed that the term "pom" (said to be an acronym for
> "prisoner of Mother England" -- but I always thought it referred to the
> vegetable Drake brought to Britain from the new world -- "pommes de
> terre") was NOT a term of abuse, unless paired with an epithet such as
> "bastard", "cunt" or similar.
>
I meant, what happens when Poms in Oz hear the word 'wog'? Are they
surprised? Are black Poms common in Australia? Is there a special name
for them?
Adrian Bailey
news:1159905610.6...@h48g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...
> I am always taken aback when I see the word "wog" used, quite casually,
> by (I think) mainly Australians in blogs, web forums, usenet groups,
> etc. It seems to mean "person of southern European origin, eg Spanish,
> Greek, Portuguese, etc",
I thought that was "wop"?
> or "person with dark skin". I am not sure if
> it is exactly synonymous with "spic". Some Australians proudly describe
> themselves as "wogs". In the Uk, the word "wog" has the same
> inflammatory effect as, say, "nigger" or "darkie", and would be avoided
> by persons not wishing to appear racist.
>
> Do Kiwis talk about "wogs"? is there an insulting word for Maori which
> white New Zealanders use?
>
> Are there Australians who would shy away from calling someone a
> "boong", who would naturally and easily call someone else a "wog"
> without racist intent? What happens when Poms hear the word? Do they
> complain? Do black Poms ever go to live in Australia? What do they get
> called?
I would never use the word. Even if I were a Scientologist.
Adrian
TOF
mike.j.har...@gmail.com wrote:
> TOF wrote:
>
> > > What happens when Poms hear the word? Do they
> > > complain? Do black Poms ever go to live in Australia? What do they get
> > > called?
> >
> > Actually, this question was directly discussed when the new crowd
> > control rules on racial abuse for the coming Ashes (cricket) were being
> > discussed. It was agreed that the term "pom" (said to be an acronym for
> > "prisoner of Mother England" -- but I always thought it referred to the
> > vegetable Drake brought to Britain from the new world -- "pommes de
> > terre") was NOT a term of abuse, unless paired with an epithet such as
> > "bastard", "cunt" or similar.
> >
>
> I meant, what happens when Poms in Oz hear the word 'wog'?
I have no insight to offer on that. Personally, I've never liked the
term 'wog' having grown up on the wrong end of it.
> Are they
> surprised? Are black Poms common in Australia?
I can't say I've ever met a non-white person from the UK in Australia.
> Is there a special name
> for them?
I doubt it. It wouldn't fit with contemporary cultural mores, and there
aren't enough persons fitting the description to cause the term to have
currency. If there is, I'm unaware of it.
TOF
ray o'hara
"Adrian Bailey" <da...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:kRAUg.69152$aP3....@fe3.news.blueyonder.co.uk...
> <mike.j...@gmail.com> wrote in message
> news:1159905610.6...@h48g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...
> > I am always taken aback when I see the word "wog" used, quite casually,
> > by (I think) mainly Australians in blogs, web forums, usenet groups,
> > etc. It seems to mean "person of southern European origin, eg Spanish,
> > Greek, Portuguese, etc",
>
> I thought that was "wop"?
>
Don Phillipson
news:1159905610.6...@h48g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...
> I am always taken aback when I see the word "wog" used, quite casually,
> by (I think) mainly Australians in blogs, web forums, usenet groups,
> etc. It seems to mean "person of southern European origin, eg Spanish,
> Greek, Portuguese, etc", or "person with dark skin". I am not sure if
The folk etymology (say 50 years ago) was Wily Oriental
Gentleman. Huge numbers of British soldiers served in
Egypt where the population was Wogs and Bints. (The
difference is that bint/binti is good Arabic for lady.)
--
Don Phillipson
Carlsbad Springs
(Ottawa, Canada)
Stephen Calder
> I am always taken aback when I see the word "wog" used, quite casually,
> by (I think) mainly Australians in blogs, web forums, usenet groups,
> etc. It seems to mean "person of southern European origin, eg Spanish,
> Greek, Portuguese, etc", or "person with dark skin". I am not sure if
> it is exactly synonymous with "spic". Some Australians proudly describe
> themselves as "wogs". In the Uk, the word "wog" has the same
> inflammatory effect as, say, "nigger" or "darkie", and would be avoided
> by persons not wishing to appear racist.
Your definition of "wog" as used in Australia is correct. It used to be
highly pejorative, but as you suggest it has had its teeth pulled to an
even greater extent than "nigger" in the US, to the point where we had a
musical play, film and soundtrack all called "The Wog Boy" (2000)
financed by the Government-assisted Australian Film Finance Corporation.
It may have raised the odd eyebrow, but wasn't really shocking.
It's still to be avoided in ordinary use unless you're familiar with the
people involved and are sure they won't take offence.
I think on a blog you would have to rely on context to to tell you the
attitude of the writer to the southern Europeans.
>
> Do Kiwis talk about "wogs"? is there an insulting word for Maori which
> white New Zealanders use?
I think so but I dunno.
>
> Are there Australians who would shy away from calling someone a
> "boong", who would naturally and easily call someone else a "wog"
> without racist intent?
I definitely would not use "boong". It's pejorative.
What happens when Poms hear the word? Do they
> complain? Do black Poms ever go to live in Australia? What do they get
> called?
>
They can't be "boongs", that word is for Aboriginals.
We don't get very many black Poms so a universal term has not arisen.
--
Stephen
Lennox Head, Australia
dontbother
>> > I am always taken aback when I see the word "wog" used, quite
>> > casually, by (I think) mainly Australians in blogs, web
>> > forums, usenet groups, etc. It seems to mean "person of
>> > southern European origin, eg Spanish, Greek, Portuguese,
>> > etc",
>>
>> I thought that was "wop"?
>>
> WOP is an American term for Italians. Its entymology is under
> dispute.
Must be because of buggy software.
--
Franke: EFL teacher & medical editor
Native speaker of American English; posting from Taiwan.
Unmunged email: /at/easypeasy.com
"Impatience is the mother of misery."
dontbother
> <mike.j...@gmail.com> wrote in message
>> I am always taken aback when I see the word "wog" used, quite
>> casually, by (I think) mainly Australians in blogs, web forums,
>> usenet groups, etc. It seems to mean "person of southern
>> European origin, eg Spanish, Greek, Portuguese, etc", or
>> "person with dark skin". I am not sure if
>
> The folk etymology (say 50 years ago) was Wily Oriental
> Gentleman. Huge numbers of British soldiers served in
> Egypt where the population was Wogs and Bints.
Seems to me that this is a proper place for "the population
{were/consisted of} Wogs and Bints".
> (The difference is that bint/binti is good Arabic for lady.)
--
Peter Duncanson
There is another meaning of "wog" in Australia, unless it has fallen
out of use:
http://www.askoxford.com/concise_oed/wog_2?view=uk
wog2
noun Austral. informal a minor illness or infection.
ORIGIN of unknown origin.
I first become aware of it when a cousin from Australia was in
England, a few decades ago, working at a hospital (she is a doctor).
We had been at a family gathering for Christmas at my parents'
house[1]. I drove her back to her hospital[2] where she went to her
rooms/flat/apartment to leave her luggage. We then went to a
doctors' lounge/rest room adjacent to the wards so that she could be
updated by her colleagues on the state of her patients. One patient
had started running a minor fever. After listening to the
description my cousin said "It's probably just a wog".
I was startled but realised that she was using the word with a
meaning that I'd not met before.
(She returned to Australia where she is now a consultant at a
hospital in WA.)
Notes for those who know the area:
[1] Wootton, Woodstock.
[2] Hatfield
--
Peter Duncanson, UK
(in alt.usage.english)
Robert Bannister
> mike.j...@gmail.com wrote:
>
>>I am always taken aback when I see the word "wog" used, quite casually,
>>by (I think) mainly Australians in blogs, web forums, usenet groups,
>>etc. It seems to mean "person of southern European origin, eg Spanish,
>>Greek, Portuguese, etc", or "person with dark skin". I am not sure if
>>it is exactly synonymous with "spic". Some Australians proudly describe
>>themselves as "wogs". In the Uk, the word "wog" has the same
>>inflammatory effect as, say, "nigger" or "darkie", and would be avoided
>>by persons not wishing to appear racist.
>>
>
>
> It has lost much of its force in Australia now, in part because the
> word has been appropriated by southern Europeans in a manner that
> resembles the use of "nigger" by blacks in the US. A popular comedy
> show called "Wogs Out of Work" involves a self-deprecating line of
> humour by Greeks.
Nevertheless, most of my southern European friends describe themselves
as "dings" rather than "wogs". We mainly use "wog" for BrE "bug" (germ).
--
Rob Bannister
Western Australia
Robert Bannister
I don't think I've ever met one. "Black pommy bastard" sounds good.
--
Rob Bannister
Stephen Calder
The "prisoner of Mother England" derivation is now thought to be a
furphy (=unsubtantiated).
THe Australian National Dictionary puts it down as derived from
"pomegranate" presumably (poor) rhyming slang for "immigrant".
Stephen Calder
"Wog" in this sense (slight sickness) is still current, leading to some
humour along the lines of the double entendre in:
"Sorry I couldn't come last night. I was in bed with a wog."
TOF
Here's where I heard it:
||||
http://www.abc.net.au/am/content/2006/s1750828.htm
STEPHANIE KENNEDY: Any spectators found guilty of racial abuse will
face punishments ranging from ejection from a ground to a life ban.
The decision has made front-page news in Britain with the Daily
Telegraph questioning whether Australian cricket fans will be able to
stick to the new rules.
There's also been widespread debate on the source of the word "Pom".
Some suggest it dates back to convict times and is an acronym for
Prisoner of His Majesty.
Jonathan Coleman, a well-known Australian broadcaster working in London
has his own ideas.
JONATHAN COLEMAN: I went to Australia as a 10-pound Pom. You know, our
family emigrated from London to Australia, so we were 10-pound Poms.
And I was used to the thing... the term Pom, which means "Prisoner of
Mother England" or it means like a pomegranate, because in the First
World War the Australian troops said that British soldiers' faces in
the sun would get speckly, like a pomegranate.
So I think the Pom thing is a term of endearment.
||||
As you can see, it offers another theory for pomegranate.
TOF
Stephen Calder
The "prisoner" derivation theory is a well-known one, but it's
undocumented (speculative). The Australian National Dictionary (AND)
(Oxford Australia, 1988) doesn't even mention it; it carefully documents
the "pomegranate" origin.
It's older than WWI (first citation 1912), so Coleman's other theory is
wrong, too.
Peter Moylan
> <mike.j...@gmail.com> wrote in message
> news:1159905610.6...@h48g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...
>> I am always taken aback when I see the word "wog" used, quite
>> casually, by (I think) mainly Australians in blogs, web forums,
>> usenet groups, etc. It seems to mean "person of southern European
>> origin, eg Spanish, Greek, Portuguese, etc",
>
> I thought that was "wop"?
Australians never bothered much to distinguish between wogs and wops.
They were all foreigners. Now that I think of it, the most common insult
for Italian immigrants was "dago". I have since learnt that that term
would be more logically applied to the Spanish, but again we didn't
bother with accuracy. Anyway, we didn't get many immigrants from Spain.
By now "dago" and "wop" have both fallen out of use. "Wog" survives, but
it's a much milder term than it used to be. Anyone trying to use it as a
real insult would sound old-fashioned. In many contexts, it can be used
in a neutral or friendly way, although that does depend on your audience.
Now that I think of it, one-word epithets as racist insults have gone
out of fashion. The new way to sound racist is to propose that new
arrivals in Australia should be made to sign an oath of loyalty to
Australian values[1], or to insist that fluency in English is a
requirement for coming here. Or, for some people, it's a matter of using
a word like "Lebanese" with just that intonation that hints that you
think that all Lebanese are scumbags. For the most part, in any case, we
now discriminate on the basis of religion rather than country of origin.
[1] Nobody has yet managed to define these "Australian values". The
common conjecture is that they would include things like
poofter-bashing, burning down mosques, etc.
--
Peter Moylan http://www.pmoylan.org
Please note the changed e-mail and web addresses. The domain
eepjm.newcastle.edu.au no longer exists, and I can no longer
receive mail at my newcastle.edu.au addresses. The optusnet
address could disappear at any time.
Peter Moylan
> Actually, this question was directly discussed when the new crowd
> control rules on racial abuse for the coming Ashes (cricket) were
> being discussed. It was agreed that the term "pom" (said to be an
> acronym for "prisoner of Mother England" -- but I always thought it
> referred to the vegetable Drake brought to Britain from the new world
> -- "pommes de terre") was NOT a term of abuse, unless paired with an
> epithet such as "bastard", "cunt" or similar.
I've never heard the "pommes de terre" theory, and I'm fairly sure that
the "prisoner of Mother England" one has been debunked by now. The
most-accepted derivation of "pom" and "pommy", according to my reading,
is that it comes from rhyming slang
immigrant -> jimmy grant -> pomegranate
with the "pomegranate" idea reinforced by the fact that the new arrivals
were especially susceptible to sunburn and tended to have rosy cheeks.
This sounds far-fetched, I know, but apparently it's well supported by
evidence obtained from the newspapers of the day.
Matthew Huntbach
On Tue, 3 Oct 2006, mike.j...@gmail.com wrote:
> I am always taken aback when I see the word "wog" used, quite casually,
> by (I think) mainly Australians in blogs, web forums, usenet groups,
> etc. It seems to mean "person of southern European origin, eg Spanish,
> Greek, Portuguese, etc", or "person with dark skin". I am not sure if
> it is exactly synonymous with "spic". Some Australians proudly describe
> themselves as "wogs". In the Uk, the word "wog" has the same
> inflammatory effect as, say, "nigger" or "darkie", and would be avoided
> by persons not wishing to appear racist.
Yes, it would still be regarded as extremely offensive in Britain, though
in practice it's a dated term which I don't think gets used much even
by hardened racists. Only really heard in the phrase "Wogs begin at Calais",
which is meant to poke fun at people who dislike anything which is not
British. Perhaps there is something of this in its being taken up and
removed of its offensive meaning by southern Europeans in Australia.
The term, when it was used in Britain, tended to apply vaguely to the
middle east, perhaps to India, less so to sub-Saharan Africa.
> Do Kiwis talk about "wogs"? is there an insulting word for Maori which
> white New Zealanders use?
>
> Are there Australians who would shy away from calling someone a
> "boong", who would naturally and easily call someone else a "wog"
> without racist intent? What happens when Poms hear the word? Do they
> complain? Do black Poms ever go to live in Australia? What do they get
> called?
It's not unusual for non-white people to move from Britain to Australia
or Canada, but then wouldn't they be seen as from the country they or
their parents originated from and hence not "poms"? Putting it the other
way round, could someone from Australia who was not white and moved to
Britain be an "Ozzie"? I've known Italian Ozzies, but I think a Chinese
from Australia would have to work really hard at keeping up the Ozzie
stereotypes to be seen as an Ozzie rather than just Chinese with an
Australian accent.
Matthew Huntbach
Nick Spalding
on Tue, 3 Oct 2006 17:57:54 -0400:
Not particularly American, it was the usual derogatory term in England
for Italians during WWII long before the US joined in. Mussolini was
Top Wop.
--
Nick Spalding
Leo
TOF wrote:
>
> JONATHAN COLEMAN: I went to Australia as a 10-pound Pom. You know, our
> family emigrated from London to Australia, so we were 10-pound Poms.
>
> And I was used to the thing... the term Pom, which means "Prisoner of
> Mother England" or it means like a pomegranate, because in the First
> World War the Australian troops said that British soldiers' faces in
> the sun would get speckly, like a pomegranate.
>
> So I think the Pom thing is a term of endearment.
>
> As you can see, it offers another theory for pomegranate.
>
>
There are no terms of endearment for poms during the Ashes. "Pomme de
terre" means "scum of the earth" until just after the last ball of the
last Test.
TOF
On Oct 4, 11:48 pm, "Leo" <lazaus...@gmail.com> wrote:
> TOF wrote:
>
> > JONATHAN COLEMAN: I went to Australia as a 10-pound Pom. You know, our
> > family emigrated from London to Australia, so we were 10-pound Poms.
>
> > And I was used to the thing... the term Pom, which means "Prisoner of
> > Mother England" or it means like a pomegranate, because in the First
> > World War the Australian troops said that British soldiers' faces in
> > the sun would get speckly, like a pomegranate.
>
> > So I think the Pom thing is a term of endearment.
>
> > As you can see, it offers another theory for pomegranate.There are no terms of endearment for poms during the Ashes. "Pomme de
> terre" means "scum of the earth" until just after the last ball of the
> last Test.
Hmmm ... I just like watching good cricket, whoever wins. All that
"leave our flies alone" stuff is just silly rabble-rousing, and ought
to have been left on the other side of WW2.
TOF
Mike Lyle
> > WOP is an American term for Italians. Its entymology is under
> > dispute.
>
> Must be because of buggy software.
They could have learned it at a spelling bee.
--
Mike.
Mike Lyle
Robert Bannister wrote:
[...]
> Nevertheless, most of my southern European friends describe themselves
> as "dings" rather than "wogs". We mainly use "wog" for BrE "bug" (germ).
I had one of those squirm moments at lunch with the Australian
ambassador in Sudan. I was travelling around with a Pakistani girl, and
he casually remarked that he'd recovered from an infection he reckoned
he'd got because "a wog had got into the water-tank".
--
Mike.
Leo
Sure, at the end of the series it's only proper to be gracious and to
end it all with a
"Jolly well played, sir". I see the sporting field as the only place
where jejune
jingoism is acceptable, and it would be boorish and highly offensive to
continue
it after the game.
Leo
Peter Moylan wrote:
> Adrian Bailey wrote:
> > <mike.j...@gmail.com> wrote in message
> > news:1159905610.6...@h48g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...
> >> I am always taken aback when I see the word "wog" used, quite
> >> casually, by (I think) mainly Australians in blogs, web forums,
> >> usenet groups, etc. It seems to mean "person of southern European
> >> origin, eg Spanish, Greek, Portuguese, etc",
> >
> > I thought that was "wop"?
>
> Australians never bothered much to distinguish between wogs and wops.
> They were all foreigners. Now that I think of it, the most common insult
> for Italian immigrants was "dago". I have since learnt that that term
> would be more logically applied to the Spanish, but again we didn't
> bother with accuracy. Anyway, we didn't get many immigrants from Spain.
>
Lithuanians were derided as "Balts" for a very short period after WW2.
I only heard it once when I was about seven or eight. It made me feel
like a wog in my own country and I felt pretty good about that for some
reason. I recall thinking at the time that it was about the most
piss-weak term of abuse I had ever heard and that calling the Russian
kid across the road "Sputnik" was much funnier.
snip
> Now that I think of it, one-word epithets as racist insults have gone
> out of fashion. The new way to sound racist is to propose that new
> arrivals in Australia should be made to sign an oath of loyalty to
> Australian values[1], or to insist that fluency in English is a
> requirement for coming here.
Has anyone proposed a Scottish Gaelic test again?
Peter Moylan
> Peter Moylan wrote:
>> Now that I think of it, one-word epithets as racist insults have
>> gone out of fashion. The new way to sound racist is to propose that
>> new arrivals in Australia should be made to sign an oath of loyalty
>> to Australian values[1], or to insist that fluency in English is a
>> requirement for coming here.
>
> Has anyone proposed a Scottish Gaelic test again?
The Prime Minister has been at pains to emphasise that this is nothing
to do with the infamous Dictation Test. Since he's not in the habit of
telling the truth about anything, it'll probably be in something like
Aztec this time.
Just recently I heard an interesting comment about Pauline Hanson, the
founder of the first Australian political party to be openly and
explicitly racist. The reporter said that, although she has now
disappeared from politics, and her former party is close to extinction,
she can still be judged to have been a success, in that her policies
have now been adopted by the major parties.
Mizter T
>
> It's not unusual for non-white people to move from Britain to Australia
> or Canada, but then wouldn't they be seen as from the country they or
> their parents originated from and hence not "poms"? Putting it the other
> way round, could someone from Australia who was not white and moved to
> Britain be an "Ozzie"? I've known Italian Ozzies, but I think a Chinese
> from Australia would have to work really hard at keeping up the Ozzie
> stereotypes to be seen as an Ozzie rather than just Chinese with an
> Australian accent.
>
As a Brit I don't see any issue with calling someone an Ozzie
regardless of their extraction. I guess it really depends on how they
define themselves, and that might have more to do with whether they're
first or second (or more) generation immigrant. Someone's who's grown
up all their life in Australia - even if their parents were of Chinese
extracton - would be an Australian in my books, and I'd call them an
Ozzie should I know them here in the UK, as well as calling them by a
plethora of insults during the Ashes.
Should they come and live here then maybe they might start to feel
English/British after a while, yet retain their affection for down
under... but now we're moving into esoteric debates about immigration
and identity.
If someone comes from Australia, talks like an Australian and has
behaves like one, then they're an Ozzie. They share the same Ozzie
values right... unless those Ozzie values reject people of Chinese
descent in which case they may well not wish to share them and thus
will distance themselves from portraying an Australian identity.
Yusuf B Gursey
for "girl" (or daughter) binti: is "my daughter / girl"
Leo
Matthew Huntbach wrote:
> On Tue, 3 Oct 2006, mike.j...@gmail.com wrote:
>
> > Are there Australians who would shy away from calling someone a
> > "boong", who would naturally and easily call someone else a "wog"
> > without racist intent?
I think that anyone using the word "boong" in public in Australia would
probably be asking for trouble. I have heard some Aboriginal people use
the term to describe other Aboriginals in a derogatory way, but they
reserve the term for extremely offensive homeless alcoholics much as
some whites will use "dero" or similar terms.
For me, the general rule is that you can call someone a wog if they
have invited you to do so in some way, and if you don't use it as a
term of abuse. Think of the way that some black people use the word
"nigger" to address each other. However, I also think that it's very
open to misinterpretation so I'd leave it well alone.
Matthew Huntbach
> Matthew Huntbach wrote:
> > It's not unusual for non-white people to move from Britain to Australia
> > or Canada, but then wouldn't they be seen as from the country they or
> > their parents originated from and hence not "poms"? Putting it the other
> > way round, could someone from Australia who was not white and moved to
> > Britain be an "Ozzie"? I've known Italian Ozzies, but I think a Chinese
> > from Australia would have to work really hard at keeping up the Ozzie
> > stereotypes to be seen as an Ozzie rather than just Chinese with an
> > Australian accent.
> As a Brit I don't see any issue with calling someone an Ozzie
> regardless of their extraction. I guess it really depends on how they
> define themselves, and that might have more to do with whether they're
> first or second (or more) generation immigrant. Someone's who's grown
> up all their life in Australia - even if their parents were of Chinese
> extracton - would be an Australian in my books, and I'd call them an
> Ozzie should I know them here in the UK, as well as calling them by a
> plethora of insults during the Ashes.
Sure, but there's the point - if the person behaved in a typically
"Ozzie" way, such as caring very much over who won the cricket, the
initial barrier to considering them as an "Ozzie" of atypical skin
colour, would be surmounted. Thus my point about "black Pom" - the idea
of a black person from Engalnd behaving in such a stereotypically
English way that he gets considered a "Pom" in Australia strikes me as
not impossible, but still unusual. Whereas a white person from England
would be considered a "Pom" even if he didn't behave in a
stereotypically English way.
Matthew Huntbach
Peter Moylan
> If someone comes from Australia, talks like an Australian and has
> behaves like one, then they're an Ozzie. They share the same Ozzie
> values right... unless those Ozzie values reject people of Chinese
> descent in which case they may well not wish to share them and thus
> will distance themselves from portraying an Australian identity.
Just to keep your scorecard up to date, the Chinese are by now fairly
well accepted in Australia. The current targets of racist bad feeling
are the Lebanese and Vietnamese. (Ask again in five years, and it will
be some different group(s).) In theory all Muslims are disliked, but in
practice that means only those Muslims who wear distinctive clothing.
I myself am fourth-generation Australia, of Irish descent, and I'd have
to say that I don't share many of what are called stereotypically
Australian values. For example, I don't really care who wins the cricket.
It is true that the "black Pom" is rarely seen in Australia. (Most of
our dark-skinned people, at least in my region, came here directly from
Africa.) What strikes me when seeing them on TV, though, is their very
noticeable English accents. Based on that, we'd almost certainly
classify them as English, regardless of whether they showed other signs
of identifying themselves as English.
Richard Bollard
wrote:
[...]
>
>The "prisoner" derivation theory is a well-known one, but it's
>undocumented (speculative). The Australian National Dictionary (AND)
>(Oxford Australia, 1988) doesn't even mention it; it carefully documents
>the "pomegranate" origin.
The acronym theory is instantly rejected because acronyms are held to
be very much a modern phenomenon. Despite this, I still give it a
chance of accuracy because I have seen an old picture of convicts
wearing clothing with POHM written on it. Of course the picture may be
inaccurate in it s depiction of convict clothing, I saw it years ago
so I can't check, but the "folk etymplogy" occurred to me immediately
on seeing it. I thought I was being original at the time (callow
youth).
>
>It's older than WWI (first citation 1912), so Coleman's other theory is
>wrong, too.
--
Richard Bollard
Canberra Australia
To email, I'm at AMT not spAMT.
Mizter T
> Mizter T wrote:
> >
> > (snip)
> >
> > As a Brit I don't see any issue with calling someone an Ozzie
> > regardless of their extraction. I guess it really depends on how they
> > define themselves, and that might have more to do with whether they're
> > first or second (or more) generation immigrant. Someone's who's grown
> > up all their life in Australia - even if their parents were of Chinese
> > extracton - would be an Australian in my books, and I'd call them an
> > Ozzie should I know them here in the UK, as well as calling them by a
> > plethora of insults during the Ashes.
>
> Sure, but there's the point - if the person behaved in a typically
> "Ozzie" way, such as caring very much over who won the cricket, the
> initial barrier to considering them as an "Ozzie" of atypical skin
> colour, would be surmounted. Thus my point about "black Pom" - the idea
> of a black person from Engalnd behaving in such a stereotypically
> English way that he gets considered a "Pom" in Australia strikes me as
> not impossible, but still unusual. Whereas a white person from England
> would be considered a "Pom" even if he didn't behave in a
> stereotypically English way.
>
I think you'd be surprised - a black Briton can be very English/British
(whatever - and the same applies for a black Scotsman etc) - and, a
slightly seperate issue here, to an extent the concept that Englishness
is in some way racial is on it's way out - describing someone as a
black Englishman isn't a contradiction in terms.
However it would seem that many "black Poms" as you put it don't go
down under. To an extent this is true about black Brits holidaying in
Europe, and indeed in more rural Britain. There appears to be a bit of
an attitude that the foreign country / the British countryside isn't
welcoming for black people, but these prejudices and assumptions are
increasingly challenged. Also of note is the fact that a lot of urban
dwellers (white, black or whatever) in big cities don't get out to the
countryside that much (despite it being relatively easy) - which IMO is
a shame but there you go. Perhaps that's in part because they aren't
wealthy, in part just out of habit (the city is where things happen),
in part just a lack of imagination and get-u-and-go. But I digress!
Another factor when it comes to holidaying is that black Brits may well
choose to go to their 'homeland' (though many would regard the UK as
their homeland too) to see family or in the case of second or more
generation immigrants to see their 'roots'. The classic case of this is
to go to Jamaica, but there are lots of black Brits of African
extraction now as well.
Much the same applies to those of asian origin (in the UK we largely
use 'asian' as meaning those from south asian/the Indian subcontinent -
India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh - unlike the yanks for who
'asian' means an east asian - Chinese, Japanese, Korean etc) who may
well visit their homeland. By and large the older way of lumping asians
together with black people and describing them all as black is history
- would a British asian be described as a "black Pom"? Would an Indian
be described as black at all in Australia?
I guess another factor that might put black Brits off Australia is the
image of it as a white country, demonstrated by the hstoric racial
issues vis-a-vis the Aborigines along with the more recent issues.
Mizter T
> Mizter T wrote:
>
> > If someone comes from Australia, talks like an Australian and has
> > behaves like one, then they're an Ozzie. They share the same Ozzie
> > values right... unless those Ozzie values reject people of Chinese
> > descent in which case they may well not wish to share them and thus
> > will distance themselves from portraying an Australian identity.
>
> Just to keep your scorecard up to date, the Chinese are by now fairly
> well accepted in Australia. The current targets of racist bad feeling
> are the Lebanese and Vietnamese. (Ask again in five years, and it will
> be some different group(s).) In theory all Muslims are disliked, but in
> practice that means only those Muslims who wear distinctive clothing.
Thanks for the info re the Chinese in Australia - by the by I'm amused
to see that you use the expression scorecard despite you're disinterest
in the cricket! (of course it is just an expression).
>
> I myself am fourth-generation Australia, of Irish descent, and I'd have
> to say that I don't share many of what are called stereotypically
> Australian values. For example, I don't really care who wins the cricket.
Out of interest do you feel you have/hold any Irish values at all?
>
> It is true that the "black Pom" is rarely seen in Australia. (Most of
> our dark-skinned people, at least in my region, came here directly from
> Africa.) What strikes me when seeing them on TV, though, is their very
> noticeable English accents. Based on that, we'd almost certainly
> classify them as English, regardless of whether they showed other signs
> of identifying themselves as English.
I think you're on the ball there (to use a football expression - proper
football that is!). Though I'd suspect that any "black Poms" that do go
to Australia would speak fairly well and be qite well to do (and fairly
affluent) - I'm not sure the classic Jamaican patois-speaker would
holiday in Australia. That said there are many who can switch
patois-speaking mode on and off like a switch. Indeed a lot of urban
kids (white/black whatever) lace their speach with a fusion of patois
and other street slang - and again for many of them it's just a way of
speaking to friends, they can 'speak propah' when they need to.
Amethyst Deceiver
> Much the same applies to those of asian origin (in the UK we largely
> use 'asian' as meaning those from south asian/the Indian subcontinent
> - India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh - unlike the yanks for who
> 'asian' means an east asian - Chinese, Japanese, Korean etc) who may
> well visit their homeland. By and large the older way of lumping
> asians together with black people and describing them all as black is
> history - would a British asian be described as a "black Pom"? Would
> an Indian be described as black at all in Australia?
We tend to write Asian, mind you. Not asian.
--
Linz
Wet Yorks via Cambridge, York, London and Watford
My accent may vary
Mizter T
> Mizter T wrote:
>
> > Much the same applies to those of asian origin (in the UK we largely
> > use 'asian' as meaning those from south asian/the Indian subcontinent
> > - India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh - unlike the yanks for who
> > 'asian' means an east asian - Chinese, Japanese, Korean etc) who may
> > well visit their homeland. By and large the older way of lumping
> > asians together with black people and describing them all as black is
> > history - would a British asian be described as a "black Pom"? Would
> > an Indian be described as black at all in Australia?
>
> We tend to write Asian, mind you. Not asian.
>
I did originally write my post using capital 'A's then decided it
looked a bit odd and went back and changed them all to lowercase,
working on what I now realise is the bizarre theory that whilst America
is a country (hence Americans) asia is not (hence asians).
Which is of course plane stupid now that I think about it - Asia is a
proper noun like any other.
(The truth is I was supposed to be doing something else, hence I was
probably somewhat hasty in pressing 'post message'!)
Matthew Huntbach
> Matthew Huntbach wrote:
>> Sure, but there's the point - if the person behaved in a typically
>> "Ozzie" way, such as caring very much over who won the cricket, the
>> initial barrier to considering them as an "Ozzie" of atypical skin
>> colour, would be surmounted. Thus my point about "black Pom" - the idea
>> of a black person from Engalnd behaving in such a stereotypically
>> English way that he gets considered a "Pom" in Australia strikes me as
>> not impossible, but still unusual.
> However it would seem that many "black Poms" as you put it don't go
> down under. To an extent this is true about black Brits holidaying in
> Europe, and indeed in more rural Britain. There appears to be a bit of
> an attitude that the foreign country / the British countryside isn't
> welcoming for black people, but these prejudices and assumptions are
> increasingly challenged.
It wasn't me who introduced the term. I was just wondering whether an
Australian who would have a better concept of what "Pom" means than me
would be able to grasp the concept of "black Pom", or does "Pom"
automatically imply white. I was thinking more in terms of people
emigrating to Australian from Britain than holidaying. I know it isnn't
uncommon for Asian in Britain to emigrate to Australia, whether West
Indians would as well, I know less. But once there, wouldn't they just
be seen as West Indians?
> Much the same applies to those of asian origin (in the UK we largely
> use 'asian' as meaning those from south asian/the Indian subcontinent -
> India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh - unlike the yanks for who
> 'asian' means an east asian - Chinese, Japanese, Korean etc) who may
> well visit their homeland. By and large the older way of lumping asians
> together with black people and describing them all as black is history
> - would a British asian be described as a "black Pom"? Would an Indian
> be described as black at all in Australia?
It was once considered the height of political correctness in Britain
to use the term "black" to mean anyone non-white, so Asian as well
as African descent. But this usage never really got beyond a certain
sort of political person - who often inflicted it on local government -
and it managed to piss off the ordinary non-political person of both
African (who wanted the term "black" to be restricted to themselves)
and Asian descent (who didn't at all like being called "black",
particularly as the term has a use in Asian cricles to mean
"Asians with darker skin than me", and is meant pejoratively).
This usage has now almost disappeared, but you may still find it in
obscure corners of local government where they haven't updated the
paperwork.
Matthew Huntbach
Matthew Huntbach
> Indeed a lot of urban
> kids (white/black whatever) lace their speach with a fusion of patois
> and other street slang
Yes, to the point where Estuary is beginning to sound quaint and
old-fashioned. "Da yoot" do not call the mselves "ve yoof" any more.
Matthew Huntbach
Mizter T
> On Fri, 6 Oct 2006, Mizter T wrote:
> > Matthew Huntbach wrote:
>
> >> Sure, but there's the point - if the person behaved in a typically
> >> "Ozzie" way, such as caring very much over who won the cricket, the
> >> initial barrier to considering them as an "Ozzie" of atypical skin
> >> colour, would be surmounted. Thus my point about "black Pom" - the idea
> >> of a black person from Engalnd behaving in such a stereotypically
> >> English way that he gets considered a "Pom" in Australia strikes me as
> >> not impossible, but still unusual.
>
> > However it would seem that many "black Poms" as you put it don't go
> > down under. To an extent this is true about black Brits holidaying in
> > Europe, and indeed in more rural Britain. There appears to be a bit of
> > an attitude that the foreign country / the British countryside isn't
> > welcoming for black people, but these prejudices and assumptions are
> > increasingly challenged.
>
> It wasn't me who introduced the term. I was just wondering whether an
> Australian who would have a better concept of what "Pom" means than me
> would be able to grasp the concept of "black Pom", or does "Pom"
> automatically imply white. I was thinking more in terms of people
> emigrating to Australian from Britain than holidaying. I know it isnn't
> uncommon for Asian in Britain to emigrate to Australia, whether West
> Indians would as well, I know less. But once there, wouldn't they just
> be seen as West Indians?
Apols - when I said <"black Poms" as you put it> I didn't mean that in
an accusatory manner - to be honest I was amused more than anything at
the idea of Australians going round talking of "black Poms". Also a
confession - for reasons unknown I presumed you were an Ozzie, but I
see from your email address that ain't the case.
In terms of black Brits emigrating down under, I'm not sure. Perhaps
they might be considered West Indian at first, but if they were second
or more generation descendents of immigrants to Britain then they may
well be very British themselves - so once people knew them they might
redefine their ideas. In part it must depend on how each peson (and
family) defines themselves and subsequently display to the world at
large, which is perhaps a notion that familiar to all immigrants. Given
that it doesn't appear to happen that much then it would seem to remain
a largely hypothetical question, albeit certainly an interesting one.
> > Much the same applies to those of asian origin (in the UK we largely
> > use 'asian' as meaning those from south asian/the Indian subcontinent -
> > India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh - unlike the yanks for who
> > 'asian' means an east asian - Chinese, Japanese, Korean etc) who may
> > well visit their homeland. By and large the older way of lumping asians
> > together with black people and describing them all as black is history
> > - would a British asian be described as a "black Pom"? Would an Indian
> > be described as black at all in Australia?
>
> It was once considered the height of political correctness in Britain
> to use the term "black" to mean anyone non-white, so Asian as well
> as African descent. But this usage never really got beyond a certain
> sort of political person - who often inflicted it on local government -
> and it managed to piss off the ordinary non-political person of both
> African (who wanted the term "black" to be restricted to themselves)
> and Asian descent (who didn't at all like being called "black",
> particularly as the term has a use in Asian cricles to mean
> "Asians with darker skin than me", and is meant pejoratively).
> This usage has now almost disappeared, but you may still find it in
> obscure corners of local government where they haven't updated the
> paperwork.
>
Thanks for that background, I was never very clear about who used the
term black as an all encompassing one. I certainly saw it used fairly
recently in Newcastle upon Tyne, as part of the name for a charity
project (The Black West End Housing Initiative or something along those
lines), but I don't recall seeing it used in London recently.
Robert Bannister
> In terms of black Brits emigrating down under, I'm not sure. Perhaps
> they might be considered West Indian at first, but if they were second
> or more generation descendents of immigrants to Britain then they may
> well be very British themselves - so once people knew them they might
> redefine their ideas. In part it must depend on how each peson (and
> family) defines themselves and subsequently display to the world at
> large, which is perhaps a notion that familiar to all immigrants.
My Kenyan cleaning lady brought 2 of her children round yesterday. She
has a lovely, lilting accent, so I was surprised that her 6 year old son
has a very, almost posh, English accent, despite the fact that he goes
to school here.
--
Rob Bannister
W Australia
Robert Bannister
> I think you're on the ball there (to use a football expression - proper
> football that is!).
While being on the ball in proper, ie Australian football, can mean to
be temporarily chasing the ball around instead of remaining in a more or
less in a fixed position, I would have thought "you're on the ball"
could apply to any of the half dozen codes of football or even to
snooker. In fact, without doing a search, I have grave doubts whether
"on the ball" has anything to do with the prima donna, mainly scoreless
game.
--
Rob Bannister
Mizter T
The beautiful game I think you mean!
"On the ball" is certainly a very widely used expression in association
football here in Britain - basically when a player has the ball (in
possesion of it) they're "on the ball".
I don't know the roots of the phrase, which as you say could apply to
all sorts of sport, but these two guys seem to think it comes from
baseball...
http://www.phrases.org.uk/bulletin_board/13/messages/1424.html
http://www.phrases.org.uk/bulletin_board/13/messages/1423.html
... so maybe it does.
Peter Moylan
> - would a British asian be described as a "black Pom"? Would an
> Indian be described as black at all in Australia?
I've known quite a few Indians, of many different skin tones, and only a
very small minority of them would qualify as "black" in my mind.
Despite having heard the English usage many times, I still have trouble
thinking of an Indian as "Asian". To me, India is way over there near
Europe.
Peter Moylan
>> I myself am fourth-generation Australia, of Irish descent, and I'd
>> have to say that I don't share many of what are called
>> stereotypically Australian values. For example, I don't really care
>> who wins the cricket.
>
> Out of interest do you feel you have/hold any Irish values at all?
Some years ago, in Italy of all places, I happened to bump into an
Irishman who shared my surname, so we had a beer or three together.
After swapping a lot of stories, we concluded that Australian values and
Irish values have a lot in common. This showed up most vividly in a
shared sense of humour and sense of the ridiculous. (When I mentioned that
Australia's greatest cultural heroes were a bushranger and a racehorse,
he felt that that was a very Irish attitude.)
This is hardly surprising, because I would say that Australia's cultural
identity was largely formed in the 1800s and the early 1900s, and in
that period a very high proportion of the population was of Irish descent.
One consequence of this is that I can't really answer your question. I
seem to hold some values in common with the Irish as a whole, but I
can't really say whether these are Irish values or Australian values.
(And now I see that I've just contradicted an earlier statement. In fact
I do hold many Australian values; just not the most obvious ones.)
Peter Duncanson
<pe...@ozebelgDieSpammers.org> wrote:
>Mizter T wrote:
>
>> - would a British asian be described as a "black Pom"? Would an
>> Indian be described as black at all in Australia?
>
>I've known quite a few Indians, of many different skin tones, and only a
>very small minority of them would qualify as "black" in my mind.
>
>Despite having heard the English usage many times, I still have trouble
>thinking of an Indian as "Asian". To me, India is way over there near
>Europe.
But that's where Asia is. The people to the north of you in the
eastern part of Mainland Earth are Orientals.
<retires rapidly to a place of safety>
--
Peter Duncanson, UK
(in alt.usage.english)
Robert Bannister
> I don't know the roots of the phrase, which as you say could apply to
> all sorts of sport, but these two guys seem to think it comes from
> baseball...
>
> http://www.phrases.org.uk/bulletin_board/13/messages/1424.html
> http://www.phrases.org.uk/bulletin_board/13/messages/1423.html
>
> ... so maybe it does.
>
Interesting. Thanks. I had intended to look in a dictionary and (for
once) didn't think of googling for it.
--
Rob Bannister
R H Draney
>
>On Sat, 07 Oct 2006 23:54:37 +1000, Peter Moylan
><pe...@ozebelgDieSpammers.org> wrote:
>>
>>Despite having heard the English usage many times, I still have trouble
>>thinking of an Indian as "Asian". To me, India is way over there near
>>Europe.
>
>But that's where Asia is. The people to the north of you in the
>eastern part of Mainland Earth are Orientals.
ObSynchronicity: a category on this week's "Jeopardy!" Kids' Week concerned
"Asian bodies of water", and included clues dealing with the Sea of Japan, the
Yangtze and Ganges rivers, the Persian Gulf and the Dead Sea....r
--
"Keep your eye on the Bishop. I want to know when
he makes his move", said the Inspector, obliquely.
Peter Moylan
> On Sat, 07 Oct 2006 23:54:37 +1000, Peter Moylan
> <pe...@ozebelgDieSpammers.org> wrote:
>> Despite having heard the English usage many times, I still have
>> trouble thinking of an Indian as "Asian". To me, India is way over
>> there near Europe.
>
> But that's where Asia is. The people to the north of you in the
> eastern part of Mainland Earth are Orientals.
But they're the ones we call Asian. Perhaps we could start referring to
Indians as Occidentals.
Peter Duncanson
<pe...@ozebelgDieSpammers.org> wrote:
>Peter Duncanson wrote:
>> On Sat, 07 Oct 2006 23:54:37 +1000, Peter Moylan
>> <pe...@ozebelgDieSpammers.org> wrote:
>
>>> Despite having heard the English usage many times, I still have
>>> trouble thinking of an Indian as "Asian". To me, India is way over
>>> there near Europe.
>>
>> But that's where Asia is. The people to the north of you in the
>> eastern part of Mainland Earth are Orientals.
>
>But they're the ones we call Asian. Perhaps we could start referring to
>Indians as Occidentals.
Fair enough from where you are. Then the inhabitants of the Americas
would be Orientals. The Chinese, etc., would be Northerners (for
want of a more technical sounding word). We in the UK and Ireland
would be your Antipodes (which we already are even though the word
is not (rarely?) used.
Peter Moylan
> On Sun, 08 Oct 2006 18:16:55 +1000, Peter Moylan
> <pe...@ozebelgDieSpammers.org> wrote:
>
>> Peter Duncanson wrote:
>>> On Sat, 07 Oct 2006 23:54:37 +1000, Peter Moylan
>>> <pe...@ozebelgDieSpammers.org> wrote:
>>>> Despite having heard the English usage many times, I still have
>>>> trouble thinking of an Indian as "Asian". To me, India is way
>>>> over there near Europe.
>>> But that's where Asia is. The people to the north of you in the
>>> eastern part of Mainland Earth are Orientals.
>> But they're the ones we call Asian. Perhaps we could start
>> referring to Indians as Occidentals.
>
> Fair enough from where you are. Then the inhabitants of the Americas
> would be Orientals.
So far, so good. More acceptable than "yanks" or "septics", I think.
> The Chinese, etc., would be Northerners (for want of a more technical
> sounding word).
No, we have to call them South-East Asians or East Asians, as
appropriate. The term "Northerners" is already reserved for
banana-benders, aka Queenslanders.
> We in the UK and Ireland would be your Antipodes (which we already
> are even though the word is not (rarely?) used.
It's used, but sloppily. The true antipous of my present location is in
deep water, about 1000 km WNW of the Canary Islands. That of London is a
long swim away from the south island of New Zealand. Belfast's partner
is in the Southern Ocean, south of New Zealand and a lot closer to
Antarctica than I had suspected.
My late father-in-law, who lived in Antwerp, used to speak of us as
being at "the opposite corner of the world", but we never managed to
establish where the other two corners were.
Solo Thesailor
> .... Then the inhabitants of the Americas
> would be Orientals. The Chinese, etc., would be Northerners (for
> want of a more technical sounding word). We in the UK and Ireland
> would be your Antipodes (which we already are even though the word
> is not (rarely?) used.
Hahahaha... Good one. It's all relative, right?!
While I was living in the UK 'Asians' meant 'South Asians' ie Indians,
Sri Lankans, Pakistanis, etc. Now living in Australia 'Asians'
generally mean, to some Australians, 'Far East Asians' (ie Chinese,
Japanese, Koreans, etc) and 'South East Asians' (ie Burmese, Thais,
Laotians, Vietnamese, Indonesians, etc) although they cannot
differentiate these two groups or think of how large Asia is. My
conclusion was that geography in class just wasn't taken up very well,
both in the UK and in Australia.
And we haven't even counted those from the middle-East, central Asia,
and Russia Asia yet... Would anyone call them Asians?? Do they
themselves?
While in the UK my colleagues kept referring to Australians as 'the
antipodeans' from 'the antipode', however in Australia I don't think
people here use the terms at all, AFAIK.
Solo Thesailor
http://sailingstoriesandtips.blogspot.com
Leslie Danks
[...]
> My late father-in-law, who lived in Antwerp, used to speak of us as
> being at "the opposite corner of the world", but we never managed to
> establish where the other two corners were.
Is it flat then? I thought it was cubic.
--
Les
John Holmes
"Peter Moylan" <pe...@ozebelgDieSpammers.org> wrote in message
news:4528b3f6$0$25207$afc3...@news.optusnet.com.au...
> Peter Duncanson wrote:
> > On Sat, 07 Oct 2006 23:54:37 +1000, Peter Moylan
> > <pe...@ozebelgDieSpammers.org> wrote:
>
> >> Despite having heard the English usage many times, I still have
> >> trouble thinking of an Indian as "Asian". To me, India is way over
> >> there near Europe.
> >
> > But that's where Asia is. The people to the north of you in the
> > eastern part of Mainland Earth are Orientals.
>
> But they're the ones we call Asian. Perhaps we could start referring
to
> Indians as Occidentals.
I think the Indian sub-continent just makes it into Asia, as a sort of
appendage, not really Asia proper. The Middle East starts at Afghanistan
and Iran.
--
Regards
John
for mail: my initials plus a u e
at tpg dot com dot au
John Holmes
"Matthew Huntbach" <m...@dcs.qmul.ac.uk> wrote in message
news:Pine.LNX.4.64.06...@frank.dcs.qmul.ac.uk...
Not a direct reply to anything specific in the previous post.
Matthew, you might be interested in this web site about Africans in
Australia.
http://www.africanoz.com/af_f/af_f.html
There's one chap there who I used to work with (Francis, about a third
of the way down the page). Born in Chelsea, UK; lived part of his life
there and part in Nigeria before moving to Australia. We definitely used
to consider him a Pom because of his accent and the fact that he played
soccer. He's now an Australian citizen and soccer commentator.
Stephen Calder
>
> The true antipous of my present location is in
> deep water, about 1000 km WNW of the Canary Islands. That of London is a
> long swim away from the south island of New Zealand. Belfast's partner
> is in the Southern Ocean, south of New Zealand and a lot closer to
> Antarctica than I had suspected.
>
> My late father-in-law, who lived in Antwerp, used to speak of us as
> being at "the opposite corner of the world", but we never managed to
> establish where the other two corners were.
>
On the analogy of octopus (former alternative plural octopodes) wouldn't
the singular of antipodes be antipus?
Not that I would want to get into a cat fight.
--
Stephen
Lennox Head, Australia
Solo Thesailor
> I think the Indian sub-continent just makes it into Asia, as a sort of
> appendage, not really Asia proper. The Middle East starts at Afghanistan
> and Iran.
I think that India is slap bang in the middle and too huge to be an
appendage (cf Japan?). See my notes upthread or a nice-size map at
http://www.norseaodyssey.com/Our_Travels/Asia/asia.htm
Solo Thesailor
http://sailingstoriesandtips.blogspot.com
Mizter T
Well if there are only two corners then we're in the realm of 2
dimesions and they're not corners at all - they're just two ends of a
line.
Re Peters statement regarding where the other two corners were, there's
no requirement for a corner to have three opposing corners to make it a
'real' corner - a corner is merely:
"The position at which two lines, surfaces, or edges meet and form an
angle"
<http://www.answers.com/corner>
I lived in a room in a flat that had eight corners if I remember right.
The architect obviously liked puzzles (there were no void spaces
between rooms). I didn't like the architect.
R H Draney
>
>Peter Duncanson wrote:
>
>> The Chinese, etc., would be Northerners (for want of a more technical
>> sounding word).
>
>No, we have to call them South-East Asians or East Asians, as
>appropriate. The term "Northerners" is already reserved for
>banana-benders, aka Queenslanders.
Is China the only country that has actually *named* itself for its position in
the geographic scheme of things?...the place is actually called the "middle
kingdom", for heaven's sake....
Apparently we can't count Japan...its name, referring to the "rising sun" which
would imply "east", seems originally to have been bestowed by foreigners....r
Mizter T
Solo Thesailor wrote:
> Peter Duncanson wrote:
> > .... Then the inhabitants of the Americas
> > would be Orientals. The Chinese, etc., would be Northerners (for
> > want of a more technical sounding word). We in the UK and Ireland
> > would be your Antipodes (which we already are even though the word
> > is not (rarely?) used.
>
> Hahahaha... Good one. It's all relative, right?!
>
> While I was living in the UK 'Asians' meant 'South Asians' ie Indians,
> Sri Lankans, Pakistanis, etc. Now living in Australia 'Asians'
> generally mean, to some Australians, 'Far East Asians' (ie Chinese,
> Japanese, Koreans, etc) and 'South East Asians' (ie Burmese, Thais,
> Laotians, Vietnamese, Indonesians, etc) although they cannot
> differentiate these two groups or think of how large Asia is. My
> conclusion was that geography in class just wasn't taken up very well,
> both in the UK and in Australia.
>
A possible explaination. There are lots of South Asians in the UK, and
they're from more than one country (India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri
Lanka), but the people from all those origin countries share
similarities (and I'm talking of more than physical similarities here),
so they get thrown together as Asians.
There is of course a Chinese diaspora here in a lesser yet significant
number, but they don't get throw together with anyone else. There isn't
a critical mass of Koreans here, so I guess the Chinese were never
really 'labelled' as Asian - if anything they were labelled as anything
else historically it would've been as an Oriental - so the Asian
'label' was available for the newcoming South Asians and duly taken up
for and by them.
Oriental is now definitely viewed as a derogatory term in the states.
The term is in less common currency here in the UK now, perhaps because
of the American influence on British English, now but I wouldn't say it
has the status of other offensive racial epithets.
It's about Japaese stereotypes as opposed to Chinese ones, but
nontheless you might be interested to read about Banzai, a British
television programme that didn't raise an objection when shown here but
caused controversy when shown in the US where the Asian-American lobby
objected to it. An objector said ""It's just all the backward images of
Asian-American people. This is like an Asian minstrel show. Can you
imagine the black version of Banzai?"
One could argue this two ways: (1) it shows that East Asians haven't
reached a critical mass in the UK to protect themselves from ridicule;
or (2) many the yanks don't get the sense of humour. Personally I found
the whole thing hilarious and incredibly absurd.
See <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banzai_%28television_show%29>.
But you're probably right in saying that many British people's
geography is a bit dodgy!
> And we haven't even counted those from the middle-East, central Asia,
> and Russia Asia yet... Would anyone call them Asians?? Do they
> themselves?
>
> While in the UK my colleagues kept referring to Australians as 'the
> antipodeans' from 'the antipode', however in Australia I don't think
> people here use the terms at all, AFAIK.
>
Referring to Ozzies and Kiwis as antipodeans is very common here (I do
it myself). The OED mini-dictionary that I have to hand says this:
* antipodes n. pl. - places on opposite sides of the earth, esp.
Australia and New Zealand (opposite Europe). antipodean a. & n.
This American dictionary definition is obviously different:
* antipodes pl.n. - [1] Any two places or regions that are on
diametrically opposite sides of the earth.
[2] [...]
<http://www.answers.com/antipodes>
I've just now asked my friend for his off the cuff definition of
antipodes and straight off he said "Australia and New Zealand". I think
many Brits would come out with that.
Robert Bannister
After driving through Turkey, Iran and Afghanistan, driving down the
Khyber Pass into Pakistan was definitely like entering a different world.
--
Rob Bannister
Peter Moylan
Have you ever heard the expression "the eight corners of the world"? In
my youth it was always four.
Peter Moylan
I agree with you, but at the time I wrote the above the cat was within
scratching distance of my legs, and I didn't want to upset her.
Mike Page
<pe...@ozebelgDieSpammers.org> wrote:
>Leslie Danks wrote:
>> Peter Moylan wrote:
>>
>> [...]
>>
>>> My late father-in-law, who lived in Antwerp, used to speak of us as
>>> being at "the opposite corner of the world", but we never managed
>>> to establish where the other two corners were.
>>
>> Is it flat then? I thought it was cubic.
>
>Have you ever heard the expression "the eight corners of the world"? In
>my youth it was always four.
AIR, it was used frequently by Michael Bentine in his TV show
'It's a square world' in the 1960s.
Mike Page
Matthew Huntbach
> Solo Thesailor wrote:
>> While I was living in the UK 'Asians' meant 'South Asians' ie Indians,
>> Sri Lankans, Pakistanis, etc. Now living in Australia 'Asians'
>> generally mean, to some Australians, 'Far East Asians' (ie Chinese,
>> Japanese, Koreans, etc) and 'South East Asians' (ie Burmese, Thais,
>> Laotians, Vietnamese, Indonesians, etc) although they cannot
>> differentiate these two groups or think of how large Asia is. My
>> conclusion was that geography in class just wasn't taken up very well,
>> both in the UK and in Australia.
> A possible explaination. There are lots of South Asians in the UK, and
> they're from more than one country (India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri
> Lanka), but the people from all those origin countries share
> similarities (and I'm talking of more than physical similarities here),
> so they get thrown together as Asians.
In the UK, the vast majority of people of Asian ethnicity are of
Indian subcontinental origin. They vastly outnumber the proportion of
people of far east Asian origin. Therefore, the usage "Asian" when applied
to people and meaning their ethnicity has come to mean "from the Indian
subcontinent" and most people forget that formally it has a wider meaning.
I guess the same process has worked with the opposite effect in those
parts of the world where most people of Asian origin are of far east
Asian origin.
Matthew Huntbach
Amethyst Deceiver
> It's about Japaese stereotypes as opposed to Chinese ones, but
> nontheless you might be interested to read about Banzai, a British
> television programme that didn't raise an objection when shown here
> but caused controversy when shown in the US where the Asian-American
> lobby objected to it. An objector said ""It's just all the backward
> images of Asian-American people. This is like an Asian minstrel show.
> Can you imagine the black version of Banzai?"
>
> One could argue this two ways: (1) it shows that East Asians haven't
> reached a critical mass in the UK to protect themselves from ridicule;
> or (2) many the yanks don't get the sense of humour. Personally I
> found the whole thing hilarious and incredibly absurd.
>
> See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banzai_%28television_show%29.
It's possible that in order to appreciate Banzai you have to have some
familiarity with Japanese tv game shows. I don't know whether they're shown
much in the States, but they've been showing bits of them on UK tv for,
what, nearly 20 years I'd guess. But I would also agree that there aren't
all that many Japanese people resident in the UK. Lots of Chinese people,
but not many Japanese at all.
Solo Thesailor
> ...... But I would also agree that there aren't
> all that many Japanese people resident in the UK. Lots of Chinese people,
> but not many Japanese at all.
Why's that? Don't Japanese like the UK? Or is it just a matter of time,
ie the Chinese immigrated much earlier? Or maybe there are but most
people cannot tell them apart so assume they're all Chinese??
Or maybe all the Japanese went to Canada? Why do they like Canada
specially, anyway?
Solo Thesailor
http://sailingstoriesandtips.blogspot.com
Matthew Huntbach
> Amethyst Deceiver wrote:
>> ...... But I would also agree that there aren't
>> all that many Japanese people resident in the UK. Lots of Chinese people,
>> but not many Japanese at all.
> Why's that? Don't Japanese like the UK? Or is it just a matter of time,
> ie the Chinese immigrated much earlier? Or maybe there are but most
> people cannot tell them apart so assume they're all Chinese??
Ethnic minorities in the UK tend to originate from those countries
which were formerly British colonies, as people may have acquired right of
abode through colonial involvement. So the Chinese population in the UK
mainly derives from Hong Kong, Singapore and Malaysia. More recent arrivals
in the UK come as refugees.
Japan was never a British colony, and isn't the sort of country people
flee from as refugees, hence there isn't a big Japanese population
resident in the UK, what Japanese population there is coem from people
making business links.
Matthew Huntbach
Peter Duncanson
<notforspa...@gmail.com> wrote:
There is no particular reason why the Japanese should move to the
UK. And no, for various reasons it is unlikely they would be
mistaken for Chinese.
About Chinese in the UK:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/static/in_depth/uk/2002/race/chinese_britain.stm
The history of Chinese Britain goes back some 200 years. The
first Chinese arrivals were sailors who lived in ports but
rarely stayed longer than a few years.
The largest influxes came in the 1970s onwards when Hong Kong
Chinese arrived, followed by refugees from Vietnam.
The general British view of the community is that it is
homogenous. But the Chinese population has brought with it the
diversity of south-east Asia. Only 12% of British Chinese are
thought to have come from mainland China. Many others are from
Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore and Vietnam. At least a quarter
are the British-born children of immigrants.
The first generation of the modern community gravitated towards
catering. The community numbers between 200,000 and 400,000. A
precise figure will emerge when the 2001 Census is published.
The Commonwealth membership of Hong Kong, Malaysia, and Singapore is
likely to have been relevant. (Hong Kong is now out of the
Commonwealth because it has been taken over by China.)
As for Canada and any other country that attracts immigrants from a
particular place, we need to bear in mind that any set of immigrants
will attract relatives, friends, etc to follow them. This
particulary so if the new country offers better conditions and/or
opportunities than the old one.
The ethnic Chinese refugees from Vietnam were desperate but would
have preferred to settle in a place where there were already ethnic
Chinese living.
Evan Kirshenbaum
> "On the ball" is certainly a very widely used expression in
> association football here in Britain - basically when a player has
> the ball (in possesion of it) they're "on the ball".
>
> I don't know the roots of the phrase, which as you say could apply
> to all sorts of sport, but these two guys seem to think it comes
> from baseball...
>
> http://www.phrases.org.uk/bulletin_board/13/messages/1424.html
> http://www.phrases.org.uk/bulletin_board/13/messages/1423.html
>
> ... so maybe it does.
I'm not sure I buy that "to be on the ball" is related to "to have
something on the ball". I would assume that it comes from a game in
which the ball flows, but probably one in which it isn't held, so
that one could play "on" or "off the ball". Soccer would be the
obvious candidate, but looking at the _New York Times_, the first
actual mention I see is from a photo caption from 1934 dealing with,
of all things, polo:
Lieutenant George W. Read Jr. riding up on Arthur Kaye of South
Shore, who is on the ball. [10/24/1934]
Another polo caption from the next year:
Jimmy Mills, who scored two goals as Midwick defeated Los Indios,
12 to 11, at Los Angeles recently, is on the ball. [3/3/1935]
But wait! Here's a slightly older one which gives it a different (but
still relevant) sense from golf. From a 1924 ad:
Why do international golf "stars", like Bobby Jones and Walter
Hagen, dress with exceeding care? Not for vanity, but for
efficiency. Not for the admiration of the spectator, but for the
advantage of the player. Well they know that the consciousness of
looking fit steadies the stance, eases the swing and betters
"form". The mind is off self and the eye is on the ball.
[4/14/1925]
That sense of "on the ball" could equally apply to baseball (or
cricket, for that matter), but from the batter's (rather than the
pitcher's) point of view.
--
Evan Kirshenbaum +------------------------------------
HP Laboratories |This isn't good. I've seen good,
1501 Page Mill Road, 1U, MS 1141 |and it didn't look anything like
Palo Alto, CA 94304 |this.
| MST3K
kirsh...@hpl.hp.com
(650)857-7572
Evan Kirshenbaum
> Leslie Danks wrote:
>> Peter Moylan wrote:
>> [...]
>>
>>> My late father-in-law, who lived in Antwerp, used to speak of us
>>> as being at "the opposite corner of the world", but we never
>>> managed to establish where the other two corners were.
>> Is it flat then? I thought it was cubic.
>
> Have you ever heard the expression "the eight corners of the world"?
> In my youth it was always four.
Mine, too. It's a tetrahedron. Of course, then it doesn't have a
well-defined "opposite corner".
--
Evan Kirshenbaum +------------------------------------
HP Laboratories |Theories are not matters of fact,
1501 Page Mill Road, 1U, MS 1141 |they are derived from observing
Palo Alto, CA 94304 |fact. If you don't have data, you
|don't get good theories. You get
kirsh...@hpl.hp.com |theology instead.
(650)857-7572 | --John Lawler
Evan Kirshenbaum
> Peter Duncanson wrote:
>> On Sat, 07 Oct 2006 23:54:37 +1000, Peter Moylan
>> <pe...@ozebelgDieSpammers.org> wrote:
>
>>> Despite having heard the English usage many times, I still have
>>> trouble thinking of an Indian as "Asian". To me, India is way over
>>> there near Europe.
>> But that's where Asia is. The people to the north of you in the
>> eastern part of Mainland Earth are Orientals.
>
> But they're the ones we call Asian. Perhaps we could start referring
> to Indians as Occidentals.
You think you've got it bad? We're the ones who have all the western
countries to the east and the Far East to the west.
--
Evan Kirshenbaum +------------------------------------
HP Laboratories |People think it must be fun to be a
1501 Page Mill Road, 1U, MS 1141 |super genius, but they don't
Palo Alto, CA 94304 |realize how hard it is to put up
|with all the idiots in the world.
kirsh...@hpl.hp.com | Calvin
(650)857-7572
Evan Kirshenbaum
> John Holmes wrote:
>> I think the Indian sub-continent just makes it into Asia, as a sort
>> of appendage, not really Asia proper. The Middle East starts at
>> Afghanistan and Iran.
>
> I think that India is slap bang in the middle and too huge to be an
> appendage (cf Japan?).
Not only is it an appendage, a mere fifty million years ago it wasn't
even *on* the continent.
--
Evan Kirshenbaum +------------------------------------
HP Laboratories |Never ascribe to malice that which
1501 Page Mill Road, 1U, MS 1141 |can adequately be explained by
Palo Alto, CA 94304 |stupidity.
kirsh...@hpl.hp.com
(650)857-7572
Tony Cooper
<ma...@peterduncanson.net> wrote:
>There is no particular reason why the Japanese should move to the
>UK.
Emigrants from Japan have the same reasons to move to the UK that
emigrants from other countries have with the exception of emigrants
who leave their native country because of persecution.
>And no, for various reasons it is unlikely they would be
>mistaken for Chinese.
>
I have trouble there. I can usually visually tell a Korean from a
Chinese or Japanese person, but not a Chinese person from a Japanese
person. Perhaps that's because I know few of either personally and
consider it impolite to ask.
My doctor is of either Japanese or Chinese descent, and I've been
seeing him for years and never figured out which. His last name is
"Irish/American", so that doesn't help.
--
Tony Cooper
Orlando, FL
Tony Cooper
I vote for the baseball origin. We speak of pitchers having something
"on the ball" because they can control the speed, spin, or path of the
pitched ball. I don't see the term being used to mean seeing the ball
(as a batter or golfer does), but rather to mean something done *to*
the ball in the area of control.
When the pitcher has something on the ball, he's in control. When I
say that someone is "on the ball", I mean he's in control of the
situation. He's anticipating what has to be done just like a pitcher
in control can anticipate how and where to direct the pitched ball.
Donna Richoux
> Leslie Danks wrote:
> > Peter Moylan wrote:
> >
> > [...]
> >
> >> My late father-in-law, who lived in Antwerp, used to speak of us as
> >> being at "the opposite corner of the world", but we never managed
> >> to establish where the other two corners were.
> >
> > Is it flat then? I thought it was cubic.
>
> Have you ever heard the expression "the eight corners of the world"? In
> my youth it was always four.
There was quite a nice discussion of "the four corners of the world" in
2002. I think nearly every theory was knocked down by someone else's
evidence, but some possibilities remained. The thread starts here:
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.usage.english/browse_frm/thread/18ec8
d63072de7f/241e197dafee7a67?tvc=1&hl=en#241e197dafee7a67
Or if that doesn't work, the headers are:
From: John Hall <wweexxsseesss...@telusplanet.net>
Newsgroups: alt.usage.english
Subject: The four corners of the world?
Message-ID: <qmppbug3qmmha633m...@4ax.com>
Date: Wed, 17 Apr 2002 03:23:06 GMT
I like the idea that the corners were internal angles, formed by
crossing lines, such as those that divided a Roman camp. Corner as
"quarter," really.
--
Best -- Donna Richoux
Matthew Huntbach
> On Mon, 09 Oct 2006 14:46:49 +0100, Peter Duncanson
> <ma...@peterduncanson.net> wrote:
>> There is no particular reason why the Japanese should move to the
>> UK.
c
> Emigrants from Japan have the same reasons to move to the UK that
> emigrants from other countries have
No, they don't have all those reasons associated with coming in a former
colony of Britain that led to most of the large immigrant communities
we have here now. My wife, for example, arrived here because her parents
were former servants of the Crown in Kenya, and like most East African
Asians were given the ultimatum after independence "Either renounce your right
to British citizenship, or get out". They got out. They would have been
entitled to Portuguese citizenship as well, having been born in Goa.
Matthew Huntbach
Peter Duncanson
An approximate opposite is "off the ball" as in the phrase "took his
eye off the ball". Many of the examples found by Google are literal
uses in sport. Others are metaphorical meaning "he failed to
concentrate on something he should have concentrated on".
Quoted in a discussion at:
http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=3638
Bush "took his eye off the ball" in shifting his focus to Iraq
while Iran and North Korea developed nuclear programs
(reuters.co.uk)
That was two years ago.
Evan Kirshenbaum
> I have trouble there. I can usually visually tell a Korean from a
> Chinese or Japanese person, but not a Chinese person from a Japanese
> person. Perhaps that's because I know few of either personally and
> consider it impolite to ask.
>
> My doctor is of either Japanese or Chinese descent, and I've been
> seeing him for years and never figured out which. His last name is
> "Irish/American", so that doesn't help.
There's an interesting test at
http://www.alllooksame.com/exam_room.php
They show you pictures of young adults, taken in New York City. Some
are Chinese, some Japanese, some Korean. I usually think of myself as
pretty good at distinguishing faces. The first time I took this test,
back in 2002, I got precisely chance (6 of 18)
I just took it again and got 9 out of 18 right. I got three right
each for Chinese, Japanese, and Korean. I missed all three Chinese
women (identifying one as Japanese and two as Korean) and identified
one Chinese man as Japanese. I identified one Chinese man as Japanese
and one as Korean, one Chinese woman as Korean, one Japanese man and
one Japanese woman as Korean, one Japanese woman as Chinese, and one
Korean man and one Korean woman as Chinese. The only mistake I didn't
make was identifying a Korean as Chinese.
--
Evan Kirshenbaum +------------------------------------
HP Laboratories |Of course, over the first 10^-10
1501 Page Mill Road, 1U, MS 1141 |seconds and 10^-30 cubic
Palo Alto, CA 94304 |centimeters it averages out to
|zero, but when you look in
kirsh...@hpl.hp.com |detail....
(650)857-7572 | Philip Morrison
Evan Kirshenbaum
> I just took it again and got 9 out of 18 right. I got three right
> each for Chinese, Japanese, and Korean. I missed all three Chinese
> women (identifying one as Japanese and two as Korean) and identified
> one Chinese man as Japanese. I identified one Chinese man as
> Japanese and one as Korean, one Chinese woman as Korean, one
> Japanese man and one Japanese woman as Korean, one Japanese woman as
> Chinese, and one Korean man and one Korean woman as Chinese. The
> only mistake I didn't make was identifying a Korean as Chinese.
No. I have no idea how all that fits together. Let's try again:
Truth My Response
------- ---------------
Chinese
Men: 3 CHINESE, 2 Japanese
Women: 2 Korean
Japanese
Men: 2 JAPANESE, 1 Korean
Women: 1 Chinese, 1 JAPANESE, 1 Korean
Korean
Men: 1 Chinese, 1 KOREAN
Women: 1 Chinese, 2 KOREAN
--
Evan Kirshenbaum +------------------------------------
HP Laboratories |I like giving talks to industry,
1501 Page Mill Road, 1U, MS 1141 |because one of the things that I've
Palo Alto, CA 94304 |found is that you really can't
|learn anything at the Harvard
kirsh...@hpl.hp.com |Business School.
(650)857-7572 | Clayton Christensen
| Harvard Business School
http://www.kirshenbaum.net/
Tony Cooper
<ma...@peterduncanson.net> wrote:
>>>That sense of "on the ball" could equally apply to baseball (or
>>>cricket, for that matter), but from the batter's (rather than the
>>>pitcher's) point of view.
>>
>>I vote for the baseball origin. We speak of pitchers having something
>>"on the ball" because they can control the speed, spin, or path of the
>>pitched ball. I don't see the term being used to mean seeing the ball
>>(as a batter or golfer does), but rather to mean something done *to*
>>the ball in the area of control.
>>
>>When the pitcher has something on the ball, he's in control. When I
>>say that someone is "on the ball", I mean he's in control of the
>>situation. He's anticipating what has to be done just like a pitcher
>>in control can anticipate how and where to direct the pitched ball.
>
>An approximate opposite is "off the ball" as in the phrase "took his
>eye off the ball". Many of the examples found by Google are literal
>uses in sport. Others are metaphorical meaning "he failed to
>concentrate on something he should have concentrated on".
We differ. "On the ball", in my opinion, derives from the action of
the ball. "He took his eye off the ball" would derive from the action
of the eye.
Gene Wirchenko
[snip]
>Apparently we can't count Japan...its name, referring to the "rising sun" which
>would imply "east", seems originally to have been bestowed by foreigners....r
It is the Chinese again.
Sincerely,
Gene Wirchenko
Computerese Irregular Verb Conjugation:
I have preferences.
You have biases.
He/She has prejudices.
Peter Duncanson
What follows will seem to be horrifically stereotypical and possibly
prejudiced, but bear with me.
In the street or other public place:
If there is a group of people of C or J appearance and they are
sightseeing with cameras (taking pictures of anything and
everything): very probably Japanese.
If a person of C or J appearance is going about his or her
business like anyone else: probably Chinese.
These crude statements are simply a reflection of the fact that
there are more people of Chinese origin in Britain than there are of
Japanese. I think it is the case that the Chinese are more widely
spread and visible because so many are in the Chinese restaurant and
take-away businesses.
In medical, business, and other professional contexts, the person's
name might help to distinguish C from J.
I've never met a Japanese/Irish or Japanese/British person. No doubt
there are, or will, be a few.
The Tory politician Iain Duncan Smith is one-eighth Japanese. This
ancestry is memorable because it is so unusual.
Mizter T
> Leslie Danks wrote:
> > Peter Moylan wrote:
> >
> > [...]
> >
> >> My late father-in-law, who lived in Antwerp, used to speak of us as
> >> being at "the opposite corner of the world", but we never managed
> >> to establish where the other two corners were.
> >
> > Is it flat then? I thought it was cubic.
>
> Have you ever heard the expression "the eight corners of the world"? In
> my youth it was always four.
>
Well the world used to be black and white and 2D, now it's colour and
3D. What's next?!
R H Draney
>
>What follows will seem to be horrifically stereotypical and possibly
>prejudiced, but bear with me.
>
>In the street or other public place:
>
> If there is a group of people of C or J appearance and they are
> sightseeing with cameras (taking pictures of anything and
> everything): very probably Japanese.
>
> If a person of C or J appearance is going about his or her
> business like anyone else: probably Chinese.
I tried the test with the pictures a few weeks ago when it was brought to my
attention...here's another hint that seems to help:
If a person of C or J appearance under the age of 25 has red, light brown, or
blond hair, that person is most likely Japanese...the practice of "chapatsu" is
most widespread in Japan, although not unknown elsewhere....r
--
"Keep your eye on the Bishop. I want to know when
he makes his move", said the Inspector, obliquely.
Robert Bannister
Wrap-around sound and instant downloads of new countries.
--
Rob Bannister
Robert Bannister
>
> In the UK, the vast majority of people of Asian ethnicity are of
> Indian subcontinental origin. They vastly outnumber the proportion of
> people of far east Asian origin. Therefore, the usage "Asian" when applied
> to people and meaning their ethnicity has come to mean "from the Indian
> subcontinent" and most people forget that formally it has a wider meaning.
On the other hand, most British people seem to call them all "Pakis",
even though most are from Bangladesh and many from India. Seems strange
to buy "an Indian" from a place staffed by "Pakis".
--
Rob Bannister
Gene Wirchenko
>Mizter T wrote:
[snip]
>> Well the world used to be black and white and 2D, now it's colour and
>> 3D. What's next?!
>>
>Wrap-around sound and instant downloads of new countries.
Several countries have been released under version 1.0. Two
examples are the Czech Republic and Slovakia, but the feeling is that
we have seen it all before.
Gene Wirchenko
>Matthew Huntbach wrote:
Bangladesh used to be called "East Pakistan".
Matthew Huntbach
> Matthew Huntbach wrote:
>> In the UK, the vast majority of people of Asian ethnicity are of
>> Indian subcontinental origin. They vastly outnumber the proportion of
>> people of far east Asian origin. Therefore, the usage "Asian" when
>> applied to people and meaning their ethnicity has come to mean "from the
>> Indian subcontinent" and most people forget that formally it has a wider
>> meaning.
> On the other hand, most British people seem to call them all "Pakis",
No they do not. "Paki" is considered an offensive racist term, of similar
standing to "nigger", and has the same sort of restricted usage that
other terms deemed offesnively racist have i.e. used only by a few
old-fashioned people who are unaware that the word is now considered
offesnive, and by a few hard-core racists who know and don't care.
> even though most are from Bangladesh
No they are not. While a significant proportion of the Asian-origin
popualtion of the UK is of Bangladeshi origin, it is a fairly small
proportion, nowhere near "most".
> and many from India. Seems strange to buy "an Indian" from a place
> staffed by "Pakis".
Yes, the Bangladeshis dominate the Indian food takeaway market, though
the food they sell is loosely based on Indian food, not Bangladeshi.
One thing I ever understood is why the Tamils dominate the petrol
station market. In London at least, go to fill your car, and when you
pay, chances are you'll be served by a Tamil. The corner shops are
Gujeratis, of course. Sikhs are the only Asian group to have made
inroads into the sort of skilled manual jobs which in London are
overwhelmingly white still.
Matthew Huntbach
Matthew Huntbach
> What follows will seem to be horrifically stereotypical and possibly
> prejudiced, but bear with me.
>
> In the street or other public place:
>
> If there is a group of people of C or J appearance and they are
> sightseeing with cameras (taking pictures of anything and
> everything): very probably Japanese.
>
> If a person of C or J appearance is going about his or her
> business like anyone else: probably Chinese.
>
> These crude statements are simply a reflection of the fact that
> there are more people of Chinese origin in Britain than there are of
> Japanese.
No, it's a reflection of the fact that tourists are likely to be
Japanese, and permanent residents are likely to be Chinese.
For what it's worth, I feel that Japanese have a slightly more
European appearance than Chinese. But then Chinese covers a lot
of people, and I guess appearance varies. Chinese people in Britain
are mostly of Cantonese origin, thus what I feel is a stereotypical
"Chinese" look may just be Cantonese.
Matthew Huntbach
Peter Moylan
> If a person of C or J appearance under the age of 25 has red, light
> brown, or blond hair, that person is most likely Japanese...the
> practice of "chapatsu" is most widespread in Japan, although not
> unknown elsewhere....r
That might be true where you live. In Australia (at least, in my part of
Australia), the great majority of young Chinese are red-haired.
--
Peter Moylan http://www.pmoylan.org
Please note the changed e-mail and web addresses. The domain
eepjm.newcastle.edu.au no longer exists, and I can no longer
receive mail at my newcastle.edu.au addresses. The optusnet
address could disappear at any time.
T.H. Entity
<m...@dcs.qmul.ac.uk> wrought:
> "Paki" is considered an offensive racist term, of similar
>standing to "nigger", and has the same sort of restricted usage that
>other terms deemed offesnively racist have i.e. used only by a few
>old-fashioned people who are unaware that the word is now considered
>offesnive, and by a few hard-core racists who know and don't care.
Considered offensive by whom? Not by most Northerners who live in
communities with large Asian populations, such as Oldham, where
"Paki", as used in "Paki shop", for example, is no more racist than
"Ukey club" (Ukranian immigrants' social club, of which Oldham has
several).
Yes, it's often used as part of an insult -- "Paki bastard" is an
unpleasant racist taunt, obviously -- but it's no more offensive in
itself than the "Geordie" part of "Geordie bastard" or the "Southern"
part of "Southern cunt"; it's all in the speaker's intent.
For many Northerners, "Paki" is just another slang word to denote
someone's place of origin, like "Aussie", "Jock", "Scouser", "Taff"
and so on.
Cf. <www.paki.com> So what's this all about -- self-loathing?
--
THE
"If you or I use a word inappropriately, that's an error. If a newspaper
uses a word inappropriately, that's a citation source for the dictionaries."
-- Peter Moylan
Amethyst Deceiver
> Amethyst Deceiver wrote:
>> ...... But I would also agree that there aren't
>> all that many Japanese people resident in the UK. Lots of Chinese
>> people, but not many Japanese at all.
>
> Why's that? Don't Japanese like the UK? Or is it just a matter of
> time, ie the Chinese immigrated much earlier? Or maybe there are but
> most people cannot tell them apart so assume they're all Chinese??
I think most of us can tell the difference between Japanese and Chinese
people. Most of the Japanese people who come to the UK are tourists or
students. They come for a set time and then leave. But they don't seem to
migrate here.
Matthew Huntbach
> On Tue, 10 Oct 2006 09:19:03 +0100, Matthew Huntbach
> <m...@dcs.qmul.ac.uk> wrought:
>> "Paki" is considered an offensive racist term, of similar
>> standing to "nigger", and has the same sort of restricted usage that
>> other terms deemed offesnively racist have i.e. used only by a few
>> old-fashioned people who are unaware that the word is now considered
>> offesnive, and by a few hard-core racists who know and don't care.
> Considered offensive by whom? Not by most Northerners who live in
> communities with large Asian populations, such as Oldham, where
> "Paki", as used in "Paki shop", for example, is no more racist than
> "Ukey club" (Ukranian immigrants' social club, of which Oldham has
> several).
Well, that may be so in the north, but I can assure you that in
London, the word "Paki" is regarded as an offensive racist term,
and would now not be used by anyone unless they had racist intent.
It happened to be the case that "Paki-shop" remained in use for
some time after just "Paki" dropped out and you sometimes heard
the argument "Yes, 'Paki' is racist, but 'Paki shop' is ok", but
I think even that has gone now.
> Yes, it's often used as part of an insult -- "Paki bastard" is an
> unpleasant racist taunt, obviously -- but it's no more offensive in
> itself than the "Geordie" part of "Geordie bastard" or the "Southern"
> part of "Southern cunt"; it's all in the speaker's intent.
>
> For many Northerners, "Paki" is just another slang word to denote
> someone's place of origin, like "Aussie", "Jock", "Scouser", "Taff"
> and so on.
Part of the issue is that it *doesn't* denote place of origin when used
as a generic term for anyone with a brown skin. Most people in London
with brown skins are not Pakistani, part of the offence may indeed come
from India-Pakistan rivalry, and part from the sense that it is
intended as a deliberate wind-up "all you brown skinned people are the
same, so I might as well call you all 'paki' regardless of what ethnic
group you really are".
> Cf. <www.paki.com> So what's this all about -- self-loathing?
But part of it is just the way any term gets to be considered
pejorative if it gains a wide use amongst people who dislike what
it is used for, or who use it when they are abusing that thing.
After all, "nigger" is just a variation on the Latin for "black", so
what's to get upset about? "Darky" is self-evidently just a description
of the skin tone being darker.
Matthew Huntbach
Peter Duncanson
<m...@dcs.qmul.ac.uk> wrote:
>On Tue, 10 Oct 2006, Peter Duncanson wrote:
>
>> What follows will seem to be horrifically stereotypical and possibly
>> prejudiced, but bear with me.
>>
>> In the street or other public place:
>>
>> If there is a group of people of C or J appearance and they are
>> sightseeing with cameras (taking pictures of anything and
>> everything): very probably Japanese.
>>
>> If a person of C or J appearance is going about his or her
>> business like anyone else: probably Chinese.
>>
>> These crude statements are simply a reflection of the fact that
>> there are more people of Chinese origin in Britain than there are of
>> Japanese.
>
>No, it's a reflection of the fact that tourists are likely to be
>Japanese, and permanent residents are likely to be Chinese.
Yes. I omitted to mention the first point in your sentence.
I searched for information on the numbers of people of Chinese and
Japanese origin in Britain. The results were unhelpful. The author
of one webpage gave an estimate of 200 to 400 thousand Chinese in GB
and was expecting a more accurate figure to come out of the 2001
Census. The summary information from the census reported only
100,000 people who classified themselves as ethnically Chinese. This
does not invalidate the higher estimate.
Another site estimated that there are 55,000 Japanese in GB. This
number was said to represent an increase from a lower, unstated,
figure as a result of the takeover of some British manufacturing
businesses by Japanese companies.
>For what it's worth, I feel that Japanese have a slightly more
>European appearance than Chinese. But then Chinese covers a lot
>of people, and I guess appearance varies. Chinese people in Britain
>are mostly of Cantonese origin, thus what I feel is a stereotypical
>"Chinese" look may just be Cantonese.
>
The first, and only, Chinese person I worked closely with was from
Shanghai. It is just possible that you have heard of him, Matthew.
His name was Yao Chen (ECY Chen). He was a computer scientist at
Manchester University in the late 1950s and 1960s. I'm not sure of
his status there. He did not teach. He worked on part of the Atlas
computer that was being built and developed there. He may have been
employed by MU for the project. He was co-author of a paper
presented in 1962:
F.H. Sumner, G. Haley, and E.C.Y. Chen, "The Central Control
Unit of the Atlas Computer," in C.M. Popplewell (ed.),
Information Processing 1962, Proceedings of IFIP Congress 62,
Munich, Germany, August 27 - September 1, 1962. North-Holland,
1962, pp. 657-663.
Judging by the absence of later papers with his name on them I'd
guess he went into business.
I lost contact with him, but we had a near miss when he visited
Belfast some years later. I wasn't in my office when he visited and
by the time I had been contacted he had gone.
I Googled for him some years ago and found him at World Systems
(Europe) in Luxembourg, mentioned in connection with a European
Commission project: "METAWARE IST-1999-12583, Statistical Metadata
Support for Data Warehouses".
He is not the only Chen in the computing world. There is no shortage
of them.
I was told, not by Yao, that his father had owned a textile business
in China, and that he, Yao, had come to England to study Textile
Technology at Huddersfield Technical College with the intention of
working in the family business. When the communists seized the
business his father was retained as manager. He sent a message to
the effect "stay where you are Son". So Yao looked around and chose
computing.
His arrival was far from typical of Chinese in Britain but possibly
not unique.
Mizter T
> On Tue, 10 Oct 2006 09:19:03 +0100, Matthew Huntbach
> <m...@dcs.qmul.ac.uk> wrought:
>
> > "Paki" is considered an offensive racist term, of similar
> >standing to "nigger", and has the same sort of restricted usage that
> >other terms deemed offesnively racist have i.e. used only by a few
> >old-fashioned people who are unaware that the word is now considered
> >offesnive, and by a few hard-core racists who know and don't care.
>
> Considered offensive by whom? Not by most Northerners who live in
> communities with large Asian populations, such as Oldham, where
> "Paki", as used in "Paki shop", for example, is no more racist than
> "Ukey club" (Ukranian immigrants' social club, of which Oldham has
> several).
>
> Yes, it's often used as part of an insult -- "Paki bastard" is an
> unpleasant racist taunt, obviously -- but it's no more offensive in
> itself than the "Geordie" part of "Geordie bastard" or the "Southern"
> part of "Southern cunt"; it's all in the speaker's intent.
>
> For many Northerners, "Paki" is just another slang word to denote
> someone's place of origin, like "Aussie", "Jock", "Scouser", "Taff"
> and so on.
>
I feel that it's usage up North by some has definite racist undertones.
Plus calling all Asians "Pakis" is lazy, as if they're from India they
ain't a Pakistani.
Perhaps some Pakistani's are trying to reclaim it, like people have
attempted to do with "nigger" - but (a) "nigger" can still very much be
a racist slur depending on context, and (b) I don't really feel that
there is any popular movement to reclaim "Paki".
Matthew Huntbach
> The first, and only, Chinese person I worked closely with was from
> Shanghai. It is just possible that you have heard of him, Matthew.
>
> His name was Yao Chen (ECY Chen). He was a computer scientist at
> Manchester University in the late 1950s and 1960s. I'm not sure of
> his status there. He did not teach. He worked on part of the Atlas
> computer that was being built and developed there.
Way before my time, and I have no interest in hardware anyway,
have hardly touched or read anything hardware related since my ug days.
> He is not the only Chen in the computing world. There is no shortage
> of them.
There is no shortage of Chinese people in the computing world.
Three of the lecturers in my department are Chinese (and one is
Japanese).
> I was told, not by Yao, that his father had owned a textile business
> in China, and that he, Yao, had come to England to study Textile
> Technology at Huddersfield Technical College with the intention of
> working in the family business. When the communists seized the
> business his father was retained as manager. He sent a message to
> the effect "stay where you are Son". So Yao looked around and chose
> computing.
>
> His arrival was far from typical of Chinese in Britain but possibly
> not unique.
Not unique for many ethnic minorities in Britain. Many of the African
communities in Britain started off with students who managed to get
permanent residency here, quite often due to events back home.
Some of the African v. West Indian rivalry is tied up with this,
Africans who came here to study from an African aristocracy background
don't want to mix with West Indians who came here to do manual
labouring jobs (and whose ancestors were sold into slavery by the
ancestors of the Africans).
Matthew Huntbach