The term "Gypsy"?

crookedpinky

Sorry but I find the term n#gro to be totally unaccetable. As far as I can see it's a term instigated by white people to denigrate others. As for term gypsy I have only ever used it as a term of respect both in relation to the music and the people who originated it. However I also know that some gypsy groups do not identify with others and, in some cases, are openly hostile to other gypsy/sinti/rom/etc groups. Sad but true. I remember that Stochelo stated that he felt that the term gypsy was not derogatory and I'm pretty sure that Lollo Meier told me the same thing but I'm also sure that there are terms in Dutch and other lnaguages which they would find ans which are designed to be offensive. Maybe we need to learn a bit more about the various gypsy cultures and the difference between them. As to the term used by Obama I don't think we have the same term here in the U.K although we do have a phonetically identical word "jip" which means, usually, a minor niggling health issue.

S@nderV

The term "Gypsy" is rarely used in The Netherlands and Germany outside of the context of for instance 'Gypsy Jazz'. It's not a word in Dutch or German, so maybe that's why it is not regarded as derogatory. I've never met a Sinti who was offended by this term.
It translates however in both Dutch and German into 'Zigeuner', and a lot of Sinti find that word to be derogatory. Some Sinti think this word is derived from the german 'ziehende gauner' (travelling bandit).

Buco

The German word invokes Nazi persecution. Even in Yugoslavia where I lived until mid 90s, in Sarajevo, where Gypsy population was in pretty large numbers, saying Cigan (Gypsy) in front of or to them was always OK but the other was a nono.

Funny thing, pick pocketers were fairly abundant in the city and I was present several times where they were "revealed". It was always a regular Bosnian dude that was a "small business license holder", never seen a Gypsy. Yet they were always the "not to be trusted" group. Always well received at the same time and people were generally very sympathetic towards them, but common wisdom was that of non-trust.

They mostly went around trying to make a buck or two///animal protection groups affiliates skip the rest of the sentence/// with their dancing Bears, who were chained and made to stand up on their hind paws and growl whenever they heard the sound of the tambourine, fixing broken umbrellas, singing/playing music on the tram or selling double sided razors. Somehow they got the market cornered with Gillette razors, you'd hear from afar yelling "Gillette, Gillette here, sharp as your mother-in-law, or whatever they might yell to get your attention. They were often very funny which is pretty amazing how in their hard living conditions they always kept up their optimism. Or maybe they didn't even see it that way.

I remember the TV group doing a small report from one of their camps in the city and one of the questions was how come they have such large families if they live in the near poverty. The answer was "you guys have your TVs and radios, you can entertain that way. When night falls around here what's our entertainment? We f### what else is there to do", leaving the young pretty reporter agasp (there was no TV censoring).

scot

There is a large community of so-called "Irish Travellers" in Aiken S Carolina. At least 22 of them have recently copped to federal racketeering charges after a long investigation. There's nothing romantic about these folks - it's a large clan of confidence-style crooks who always look for the most vulnerable to bilk. It was actually a traveller from the Texas clan who beat that child in Indiana. She had innocently given away the scam in a Sears or Walmart store if I remember it right. These groups are wily and as with other crime clans like bike gangs or the mob, they rarely talk to cops or rat each other out. But in Aiken, the cops supposedly managed to turn a few. They don't send their kids to school and many of them are illiterate. Two travellers stole a car from me in Florida back in the 70s. The lot of them occupied an entire apartment building in my Ft Lauderdale neighborhood - every experience I ever had with them was negative. I know some Kalderasha gypsies here in Charlotte, they hate travellers (they call them vlachs) - they feel like they give true gypsies a bad name. And this from a guy who makes and sells fake green cards and driver's licenses...

Elí Saúl

crookedpinky wrote: »

Sorry but I find the term n#gro to be totally unaccetable. As far as I can see it's a term instigated by white people to denigrate others.

Well it depends on the cultural context, for example here in México calling someone "Negro" usually is just a nickname for a variety of reasons, most commonly because the person is well, darker than usual.
But it's not an offensive term really, here people call "wero" to anyone who is kind of white which has kind of the same context.
but on average, we're kind of brown.
However on the recent years i've noticed young folks having this kind of identity crisis with their race and it's quite amusing for me to see people here acting as closet-racist to people here that is brown.

when i was younger there were a family of gypsies living like 4-5 houses next to mine, i never interacted much with them much but i remember asking them about their dialect, then explained me some about it. People used to be very defensive towards them, although they really seemed to not care about it as they were always playing or partying, they seemed pretty fun. I remember one of them explained me that they didn't like that much being catalogued as scamers/thiefs. but they refered themselves as Gitanos or Rom.

But i guess mexican gypsies have now very little to do with europe ones. here they are not really know for playing instruments, they sell/buy stuff and predict future, etc. or playing movies on their camps.

ChrisMartin

crookedpinky wrote: »

Sorry but I find the term n#gro to be totally unaccetable. As far as I can see it's a term instigated by white people to denigrate others. ..............
.... As to the term used by Obama I don't think we have the same term here in the U.K although we do have a phonetically identical word "jip" which means, usually, a minor niggling health issue.

Well I have never heard of a negative connotations to the word negro on its own, although how it is used may change that. In the Oxford English dictionary it means a person of black appearance or African origin. Can't see anything wrong with that. I am well aware the word 'nigger' came from that and was certainly a derogatory term, (at least until the hip-hop youth recently started using it about themselves), but negro is no worse than Asian, Caucasian, Indian or aboriginal in an anthropological context. Of course then there are those who would call someone else by one of the above labels in an insulting way, if you call me white Anglo with enough venom I guess you could twist its meaning into an insult but that does not mean the words themselves are bad.
By the way, the term Caucasian has different meanings to different people too. In USA it is taken to mean any 'white' person, but the original meaning of the word which is still the case in Europe, defines people from the Caucasus region between the Caspian and Black seas (Turkey, Iran etc) and these races are usually not quite what we would call 'white' but have a light colouring. Curiously, Dictionary.com defines Gypsy as "a member of a nomadic, Caucasoid people of generally swarthy complexion, who migrated originally from India, settling in various parts of Asia, Europe, and, most recently, North America." So Gypsies are the real Caucasians?

Also, maybe it is a regional thing, but I was always aware that the verb gyp means to cheat or swindle and had always thought of it as being derived from gypsy. As a kid growing up in Barnet, (just north of London) famous for the annual Barnet Fair I was always taught to be wary of the horse traders and fair people who came to town in the first week of September. The ones who sold clothes pegs or lavender door-to-door, or offered to sharpen knives seemed harmless enough by day, but back then all children were told of many horrors that awaited any child who should be caught in their camp at night.

As for the other meaning of 'gyp' or 'jip'; yes, although I too was aware of it as a slang term for an annoying minor pain, as in 'my knee is giving me jip' it is not widely used and curiously the only online dictionary reference I could find suggests it is a slang term from northern England.

I would like to remind the American readers on here that although a fairly small island, Britain does have many different variations of the English language, local slang terms, dialects and accents meaning even us Brits will rarely agree on such linguistic discussions.

As for my credentials to comment on all of this?
After nearly fifty years in England I relocated to Australia in 2003.
I have travelled Europe and USA and the only subjects I excelled at in school were languages.
Not only that, but coincidentally I was born in a caravan, (see birth certificate scan below).

Bones

Chris, here in the US I think it is generally best to tread carefully considering our checkered past (and present) with brown/black people. For example, I would not go around Compton and use the word Negro. You might get away with it but...I think Black or African-American would be a safer bet. Best case, Negro would be considered pretty 'old skool'. Like if you are a 95 year old white granny from Texas and you called a Black person 'Negro' they might just shake it off as senility or being out of touch. But being a white guy from California I really can't say how the Black community views it so, again, best to be respectful.

ChrisMartin

Bones, thanks for the explanation. I know this has wandered off the original subject but it is probably a similar issue as to whether a word can stay in the dictionary with its original meaning while at the same time becoming unacceptable to use to someone's face. I was not aware the PC brigade had total control of the English language these days, but it seems to be going that way. So when do you think (in America at least) the word negro became impolite, or even insulting? I well remember during the '70s the rise of the Black Power movement tried to gain respect for 'Black' people, 'Say It Loud, I'm Black And I'm Proud' said James Brown, but since then at some point the word black apparently became replaced as the preferred term of racial identity by African-American. Last time I was in LA was ten years ago and even then I only stayed in a hotel on Lincoln Boulevard for a few days before heading north, but I do remember being advised to avoid Compton (and some other areas). Is your advice above only in relation to specific areas of known racial tension, such as the poorer neighbourhoods of major cities, or is it now nationwide? So now, while the word negro is still allowed as a concept when discussing anthropology, it is now not acceptable to use it to refer to an individual person of such origin? I wonder if this also applies in other countries? Someone who was born and raised in Kenya for instance can not be called an African-American, so while geographically he is obviously African, and nationally a Kenyan, anthropologically he is still a negro. I wonder if that is acceptable to him? Strange indeed how the English language is constantly changing.
As I said, I do make allowances for the American use of certain words as the example of the alternate meaning of Caucasian (white) shows. So. It would seem from previous comments all of the above would often apply to Gypsies too. The word itself still exists and is ok as an abstract concept, but maybe not always polite to label individuals as such (depending on where in the world you are, and linguistic trends).

Bones

Yeah we are straying off topic, if related. I just used Compton as an example of an area with a large African-American population. I'm 61 and I grew up in a semi "integrated" suburb of LA and I never heard anyone use the word Negro referring to African-Americans. That would have sounded very old fashioned even back when I was a kid. I'm not a linguistics student but my gut tells me that 'Negro' is sort of 'polite' old skool Southern type of jargon (impolite being the 'n' word). As long as I can remember it was either Black or African-American and I was born in the late 50s so my awareness probably starts in the late 60's.

This is an interesting topic WRT 'Gypsy' Jazz and I certainly hope that no one is offended by the label because it seems to have stuck. As I mentioned there was a previous thread about this issue and the consensus as I recall was that it was not considered offensive in Europe WRT this musical genre. Heck, IMHO this music is obviously heritage to be very proud of and 'they' seem to have carried the proverbial torch keeping it alive all these years so it seems like it is a positive thing and not derogatory?

Actually, truth be told, I kind of feel uncomfortable even talking about what groups of people prefer to be called since it is kind of like lumping everyone together.

ChrisMartin

Bones wrote: »

Actually, truth be told, I kind of feel uncomfortable even talking about what groups of people prefer to be called since it is kind of like lumping everyone together.

Well that was part of what I was trying to say. I never think about what label anyone belongs to when addressing them personally anyway. I would never say "hello negro" to a black person, same as I would never say "hello Jew" to Woody Allen, or "hello gypsy" if I should meet Tchavolo. But neither would I even think to address the latter as "hello Manouche person", or "good day my Sinti friend" or whichever tribe is appropriate.

I am just a year older than Bones, and I too lived for ten years with a very mixed population in Hendon, a London suburb which was a very Jewish area also home to a large part of the Japanese business community and the area was referred to by some taxi drivers as J&J for that reason. This was taken in good humour by people of both races and I never heard of anyone being offended. It also had many Indian residents, but irrespective of race, I only ever addressed anyone by name. It never occurred to me to try 'lumping everyone together', and from my experience everyone got along fine without any need to identify by race.

My use of the word negro, as with any other variants of the human race was, as I said, a legitimate term in anthropology if not in street language, and I mistook this post to be an anthropological debate, rather than a discussion of what terminology is politically correct for this year.

I also should have taken into account this forum is hosted by an American business with probably a large percentage of American readers, and Americans generally might have reasons to regard certain issues as more sensitive, and have over the years changed the meanings of many words in the English language. Apologies to anyone who may have taken offence where none was intended, but remember, as Captain Beefheart once said "everybody must be coloured, else we wouldn't be able to see 'em".

But for now back to my first post, and I will watch again tonight the 'Les Fils du Vent' DVD to try to understand what Ninine was saying about the labels he finds acceptable or otherwise.