white nigger

White nigger is a slur referring to a lower-class White person. The term nigger is a racial slur that refers to a Black American, typically one of low socio-economic status.

United States

Dating from the nineteenth-century United States, "white nigger" was a derogatory and offensive term for a "black person who defers to white people or accepts a role prescribed by them," or "a white person who does menial work."{{Cite book |last1=Ayto |first1=John |url=http://archive.org/details/stonecrowsoxford0000unse |title=Oxford Dictionary of Modern Slang |last2=Simpson |first2=John |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=2008 |isbn=978-0-19-954370-0 |edition=2nd |pages=357 |language=en}} It was later used as a slur against white activists involved in the civil rights movement such as Viola Liuzzo,{{cite web | url=https://www.eastvillagemagazine.org/2023/04/10/remembering-viola-liuzzo-murdered-58-years-ago-in-the-cause-of-voting-rights-a-personal-reflection/ | title=Remembering Viola Liuzzo, murdered 58 years ago in the cause of voting rights: A personal reflection | East Village Magazine }} James Groppi,Frank A. Aukofer, City with a Chance: A Case History of Civil Rights Revolution, 2nd edn (Milwaukee: Marquette University Press, 2007), 114. Bill Baxley,{{Cite web | url=https://getd.libs.uga.edu/pdfs/young_paige_e_200308_ma.pdf | title=Unknown martyr: the murder of Willie Eedwards, jr., and civil rights violence in Montgomery, Alabama | website=getd.libs.uga.edu | first=Paige Eugenia | last=Young}} and Jonathan Daniels.{{cite web | url=https://www.salon.com/2015/08/23/something_happened_to_me_in_selma_50_years_ago_a_young_white_seminary_student_risked_everything_for_the_call_of_civil_rights/ | title="Something happened to me in Selma": 50 years ago, a young white seminary student risked everything for the call of civil rights | date=23 August 2015 }}

The term "white niggers" was uttered twice by Democratic Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia in an interview on national television in 2001.Andrew D. Todd, [http://historynewsnetwork.org/article/1220 What Is a "White Nigger" Anyway?], History News Network (20 March 2001). Byrd was a former member of the Ku Klux Klan.{{Cite news |last=Pianin |first=Eric |date=2005-06-19 |title=A Senator's Shame |language=en-US |newspaper=The Washington Post |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/2005/06/19/a-senators-shame/95f623af-7bed-4389-9369-05a428ae4994/ |access-date=2023-12-21 |issn=0190-8286}}

= Italian immigrants =

During all the 19th century until the early part of the 20th, Italian immigrants in the United States were often referred to as "white niggers".[https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/10/12/opinion/columbus-day-italian-american-racism.html How Italians Became ‘White’], New York Times

= Irish immigrants =

The term was applied to Irish immigrants and their descendants. Irish were also nicknamed "Negroes turned inside-out" (while African Americans would be referred to as "smoked Irish").{{cite news|last1=McKenna|first1=Patrick|title=When the Irish became white: immigrants in mid-19th century US|url=http://www.irishtimes.com/blogs/generationemigration/2013/02/12/when-the-irish-became-white-immigrants-in-mid-19th-century-us/|access-date=16 December 2016|newspaper=The Irish Times|department=Generation Emigration|date=12 February 2013}}

= Polish immigrants =

Texas blacks referred to Polish immigrants as dem white niggahs or dem white niggas whom they hold in undisguised contempt but were apparently stunned by their high literacy rates.{{cite journal|last=Daniels|first=R. L.|date=March 1883|title={{thinsp}}'Polanders' in Texas|journal=Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science|volume=new series 5|location=Philadelphia, PA|publisher=J. B. Lippincott|oclc=656599432|page=299|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=GV8wAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA301|access-date=April 23, 2013}} Polish farmers commonly worked directly with southern blacks in east Texas, and they were commonly in direct competition for agricultural jobs. Blacks frequently picked up a few words of Polish, and Poles picked up some of the black English dialect in these areas during the late 19th century. R. L. Daniels in Lippincott's Monthly Magazine wrote a piece on "Polanders" in Texas in 1888, praising their industriousness and hard work ethic. He cited instances where Polish farmers called their landlords {{linktext|massa}},{{sfn|Daniels|1883|p=299}} denoting a subordinate position on level with slavery, and, when asking a woman why she left Poland, she replied "Mudder haf much childs and 'Nough not to eat all".{{sfn|Daniels|1883|p=297}} Daniels found that Poles were efficient farmers and planted corn and cotton so close to their homes as not to leave even elbow room to the nearby buildings.{{cite book|last=Baker|first=T. Lindsay|year=1982|title=The Polish Texans|publisher=The University of Texas Institute of Texas Cultures-San Antonio|page=86|location=San Antonio}}

Canada

In another use of the term, Pierre Vallières's work White Niggers of America refers to French Canadians. Vallières used the phrase to highlight a feeling among French-speaking Québécois people of being treated as second-class citizens under an English-speaking ruling class in Quebec.{{cite news |last=DePalma |first=Anthony |date=26 December 1998 |title=Pierre Vallieres, 60, Angry Voice of Quebec Separatism, Dies |newspaper=New York Times |location=New York |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1998/12/26/world/pierre-vallieres-60-angry-voice-of-quebec-separatism-dies.html |access-date=21 September 2014}}

Colonial India

"White Nigger" was a nickname given to the nineteenth-century British explorer Richard Francis Burton by colleagues in the Bombay Army, who ostracized him because he immersed himself so completely into the culture of India, including its languages and dress along with forming close relationships with local Indians.David Shribman, "'That Devil Burton,' the Great Adventurer", The Wall Street Journal (6 June 1990), A14.{{Cite book |last=Newman |first=James L. |url=http://archive.org/details/pathswithoutglor00unse |title=Paths without Glory: Richard Francis Burton in Africa |publisher=Potomac Books |year=2010 |isbn=978-1-59797-287-1 |location=Washington, D.C. |pages=18}}

Northern Ireland

"White nigger" was sometimes used to refer to Irish Catholics, in the context of the Troubles in Northern Ireland.The IRA 12th impression, Tim Pat Coogan, page 448, William Collins, Sons & Co., Glasgow, 1987 An example of this term is found in the lyrics of the Elvis Costello song "Oliver's Army" (1979): "Only takes one itchy trigger. / One more widow, one less white nigger."{{cite web|url=http://www.elviscostello.info/lyrics/af.html |title=The Elvis Costello Home Page |publisher=Elviscostello.info |access-date=18 June 2015}} In 1969, the longest-serving editor of The Irish Times, Douglas Gageby, was allegedly called a "white nigger" by company chairman Thomas Bleakley McDowell, because of his support for the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Movement.{{cite news|url=http://www.independent.ie/national-news/irish-times-major--mcdowell-called-his-editor--a-white-nigger-488144.html|archive-url=https://archive.today/20120907011433/http://www.independent.ie/national-news/irish-times-major--mcdowell-called-his-editor--a-white-nigger-488144.html|url-status=dead|archive-date=7 September 2012|title=Irish Times' Major McDowell called his editor a 'white nigger'|work=Irish Independent|first=Charlie|last=Mallon|date=26 January 2003|access-date=25 January 2010}}{{cite news|url=http://www.independent.ie/opinion/analysis/white-nigger-denial-poses-a-real-dilemma-488276.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111102120135/http://www.independent.ie/opinion/analysis/white-nigger-denial-poses-a-real-dilemma-488276.html|url-status=dead|archive-date=2 November 2011|title='White nigger' denial poses a real dilemma|work=Irish Independent|first=Ronan|last=Fanning|date=2 February 2003|access-date=25 January 2010}}

In May 2016, Irish politician Gerry Adams, the president of Sinn Féin, attracted controversy after tweeting: "Watching Django Unchained — A Ballymurphy Nigger!" After criticism for the use of a racial slur, Adams deleted the tweet and, from a Belfast press conference, he issued a statement saying, "I have acknowledged that the use of the N-word was inappropriate. That is why I deleted the tweet. I apologise for any offence caused." Adams added, "I stand over the context and main point of my tweet, which were the parallels between people in struggle. Like African Americans, Irish nationalists were denied basic rights. I have long been inspired by Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass, Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King and Malcolm X, who stood up for themselves and for justice."{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/may/02/gerry-adams-defends-n-word-tweet-django-unchained|title=Gerry Adams defends N-word tweet|last=McDonald|first=Henry|date=2 May 2016|work=The Guardian|access-date=2 May 2016}}

Haiti

Haiti's first Head of state Jean-Jacques Dessalines called Polish people "the White Negroes of Europe", which was then regarded a great honour as it meant brotherhood between Poles and Haitians after Polish Legionnaires joined the black Haitian slaves during the Haitian Revolution, contributing to the establishment of the world's first free black republic and the first independent Caribbean state.{{cite book|author=Susan Buck-Morss|title=Hegel, Haiti, and Universal History|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gj4sh2Ot76AC&pg=PA75|year=2009|publisher=University of Pittsburgh Pre|isbn=978-0-8229-7334-8|pages=75–}} Dessalines also gave the Poles a special status as Noir (legally considered to be black) and full citizenship under the Haitian constitution.{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6p6QrBL79xEC&q=cazale+haiti&pg=PT142 |title=Haiti: A Shattered Nation |author= Abbott, Elizabeth |date=2011 |publisher=Overlook |isbn=9781468301601 |access-date=1 January 2015}}

About 160 years later, in the mid-20th century, François Duvalier, the president of Haiti who was known for his black nationalist and Pan-African views, used the same concept of "European white Negroes" while referring to Polish people and glorifying their patriotism.{{cite book|author=Riccardo Orizio|title=Lost White Tribes: The End of Privilege and the Last Colonials in Sri Lanka, Jamaica, Brazil, Haiti, Namibia, and Guadeloupe|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=UbicFX_JGjAC&pg=PA159|year=2000|publisher=Simon and Schuster|isbn=978-0-7432-1197-0|pages=159–}}