I was taught ‘tiger’ and ‘monkey’, but picked up ‘n…’ in grade school. Polack jokes were prevalent, too.
I’m 42, and grew up in NE Indiana.
24, raised in South Texas. We said “tiger” and I never heard any other version until the whole Southwest Airlines/Eeny, meeny… topic was brought up on this board.
nigger, 38, Gisborne, New Zealand
Tiger always when I was a kid. 22 Tennessee
I never heard the “nigger” version until the Southwest Airlines flap.
-Lil
Tiger. 30, California, never heard the old version until I read it as an adult.
Another “tiger” here. 33, Chicago suburbs.
The only other variation I remember encountering was “Indian” in a children’s book (I think it was a Mary Poppins book).
Tiger. 26 MA/NH. I’ve known about the “n” version for a long time though, since my parents told me when I was a teenager that they were glad that it had changed to tiger by the time I was born.
Tiger, 35, rural NE Illinois. The only exposure to blacks any of us had on a daily basis was seeing them on TV.
19, grew up in southestern Wisconsin, tiger. Didn’t even know there were other versions for a very long time.
27, North Florida (yes, that is part of the South). Tiger. Didn’t know differently until the SW Air thing. Even though I heard the ‘n’ version in Pulp Fiction, I thought it was made up for the movie to underscore the bigotry of the character speaking it.
“Nigger”
Age 61, grew up in Wichita KS.
I have a very vivid memory of using the “n” word in kindergarten and being soundly scolded by the teacher for referring to a black classmate by that term, yet for many years after that it was OK to continue using “nigger” in the rhyme.
46, the midwest, the “n” word, followed by “tiger” when I learned from my mom that the former was inappropriate.
Both “nigger” and “tiger”. 34. Erie, PA
Tiger, 38 Texas. didn’t hear it with ‘nigger’ until I was in grade school.
Tiger, never heard anything else.
30, Chattanooga, TN
“Possum” or “nigger,” depending upon the company.
43, Assboink, SC
59, raised between Southern VA and Northern VA.
“nigger” when in the company of playmates, not so when my mom was involved. I THINK she used tiger.
SLight hijack of my own thread here…what happened with Southwest Airlines and “Eeny Meeny?” Did an employee use the N-word version for some reason? What were the circumstances? What was the outcome?
Patty
I always said ‘nigger’. I had no idea what it meant at the time, we were just dumb kids. It wasn’t until my teens that I made the connection, and I at last understood why it was written with using other things to catch.
For choosing teams and whatnot, we used ‘one potato, two potato’ and I think some other one that I can’t at this moment recall. Oh yeah, it was “Ink, pink, you, stink.”
Dunedin, New Zealand, 34
44, UK
When I was very young (early to mid 1960s), it was always ‘nigger’, though even then I can remember a feeling that there was something peculiar about the word, without understanding what.
Somewhere around the late 60s, it changed to ‘tigger’.