# Words I didn't realize were pejorative until later in life **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [July 22, 2024, 1:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-i-didnt-realize-were-pejorative-until-later-in-life/1004604 "2024-07-22T13:00:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 11
**Author:** ![Odesio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/odesio/32/20003_2.png) [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2024, 9:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-i-didnt-realize-were-pejorative-until-later-in-life/1004604/201 "2024-07-27T21:15:56Z")
> [@engineer\_comp\_geek](#): > > I also grew up not knowing that “gypped” was a pejorative and that “gypsy” was often considered to be a pejorative (although apparently some Romani don’t consider it to be such). I believe the “free spirit” version is mostly from the U.S. in the 60s and 70s, where the negative connotations dominate in Europe. Being a free spirit fit well into the counter-culture ideology of the Hippie generation. A year or two ago I was with some friends and was telling me I shouldn’t use that word. Friend #1: You shouldn’t use the word gypsy. It’s as bad as the N word. Friend #2: Not it isn’t. You were willing to say gypsy but wouldn’t say the N word. I’m more than happy to call people what they want to be called. I’ve stopped using the g word for the most part. ---
**Author:** ![Odesio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/odesio/32/20003_2.png) [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2024, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-i-didnt-realize-were-pejorative-until-later-in-life/1004604/202 "2024-07-27T21:36:19Z")
> [@Ludovic](#): > > However, most specific nouns referring to people’s ethnicities sound vaguely offensive to me, (e.g. “Chinaman” versus “Chinese person”). And plus, people who didn’t speak _that_ type of native american language never called themselves squaws. Language is funny. If I were to refer to someone as an Englishman or Frenchman I don’t think anyone would get upset. But I sure wouldn’t refer to someone as a Chinaman. > [@minor7flat5](#): > > So has “oriental” passed from common usage completely? I remember learning _here_ of all places that _oriental_ was for things and _Asian_ for people (e.g. an oriental rug sold by by an Asian shopkeeper). Has that usage gone away? I thought it had completely passed, but there are some older Asians who prefer to be referred to as Oriental rather than Asian. I read an article a few years ago written by a younger Asian man who cringed at the world but his father would say, “I’m Oriental, not Asian.” I tend to use Asian when describing a person. ---
**Author:** ![needscoffee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/needscoffee/32/1076_2.png) [@needscoffee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/needscoffee)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2024, 4:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-i-didnt-realize-were-pejorative-until-later-in-life/1004604/203 "2024-07-28T04:42:03Z")
> [@Odesio](#): > > Language is funny. If I were to refer to someone as an Englishman or Frenchman I don’t think anyone would get upset. But I sure wouldn’t refer to someone as a Chinaman. But the equivalent to “Chinaman” would be “Englandman” and “Franceman”. Or “Floridaman”. ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2024, 6:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-i-didnt-realize-were-pejorative-until-later-in-life/1004604/204 "2024-07-28T06:06:09Z")
Also, a [Chinaman](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinaman_(ship)) is a name given to a trading ship from the age of sail that took trade goods from China to America. I suspect that calling someone after a ship might be considered insulting, or at least inaccurate. ---
**Author:** ![Die\_Capacitrix](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/die_capacitrix/32/9_2.png) [@Die\_Capacitrix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Die_Capacitrix)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2024, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-i-didnt-realize-were-pejorative-until-later-in-life/1004604/205 "2024-07-28T16:38:43Z")
> [@Crafter\_Man](#): > > Growing up in the 1970s, everyone around me used the term “Japs” when referring to the Japanese in WWII. Even my grade school history teacher used the term. I learned it was perjorative in the 1980s. Then I moved to the east coast and heard “JAPs”, which is Jewish American Princesses. Also pejorative, but with a different meaning. > [@teelabrown](#): > > Years ago, I heard an English person use “bint” to describe an obnoxious woman, and I liked the word, so I used it for awhile. It was less harsh than “bitch”, I thought. I’ve been playing a game where the goal is to find words. I’ve found that I can’t use the typical 4-letter words (which I find annoying, because they are words, just swear words), but weirdly enough I’ve found I can use a lot of perjorative words, including “gip” and “bint”. No idea what word list the game company’s using. ---
**Author:** ![Mama\_Zappa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/71e660/32.png) [@Mama\_Zappa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mama_Zappa)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2024, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-i-didnt-realize-were-pejorative-until-later-in-life/1004604/206 "2024-07-29T16:43:18Z")
> [@pulykamell](#): > > And there apparently are other words for other mixes that seem to vary (like one source calls a “sambo” a mix of mulatto and black, so 3/4 black 1/4 white. This seems so bizarre to me from a modern viewpoint, and then, on the other hand, it somehow does not.) Back when race was defined by how MUCH of the “bad” race you contained, these terms may well have been important. The whole “one drop” rule pretty much made them moot, of course, but other places had different conventions. Pretty sure the technical term now is “people were, and remain, morons”. Supposedly in Nazi Germany, you were okay if you were less than 1/8th Jewish. I don’t know if they had words corresponding to mulatto / quadroon etc. for Jewish ancestry. ---
**Author:** ![EinsteinsHund](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/einsteinshund/32/8400_2.png) [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2024, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-i-didnt-realize-were-pejorative-until-later-in-life/1004604/207 "2024-07-29T16:46:34Z")
> [@Mama\_Zappa](#): > > I don’t know if they had words corresponding to mulatto / quadroon etc. for Jewish ancestry. None I have ever heard of, but they called them Halbjuden or Vierteljuden (half or quarter Jews), which is dehumanizing enough. ---
**Author:** ![I\_Love\_Me\_Vol.I](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/i_love_me_vol.i/32/521_2.png) [@I\_Love\_Me\_Vol.I](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/I_Love_Me_Vol.I)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2024, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-i-didnt-realize-were-pejorative-until-later-in-life/1004604/208 "2024-07-29T23:41:26Z")
> [@sunacres](#): > > The new kid in town when I was in the sixth grade pointed out that “pud” was short for “pudenda,” which was a reference to external genitalia, usually a woman’s. Welp, I learned something today. I always thought that _pudenda_ was only for females. ---
**Author:** ![markn\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f9ae1b/32.png) [@markn\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/markn_1)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2024, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-i-didnt-realize-were-pejorative-until-later-in-life/1004604/209 "2024-07-30T22:23:38Z")
The OED does not agree with the new kid in town as to the etymology of “pud”. It says it’s from “pudding” and indeed it has several quotations from the 17th and 18th century that use “pudding” to mean “penis”. ---
**Author:** ![sunacres](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/4491bb/32.png) [@sunacres](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sunacres)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2024, 12:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-i-didnt-realize-were-pejorative-until-later-in-life/1004604/210 "2024-07-31T12:14:14Z")
> _Pudendum_ is a term that has been part of the formal anatomical nomenclature for a millennium. [https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/ca.23706](https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/ca.23706) ---
**Author:** ![sunacres](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/4491bb/32.png) [@sunacres](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sunacres)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2024, 12:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-i-didnt-realize-were-pejorative-until-later-in-life/1004604/211 "2024-07-31T12:17:26Z")
Nevermind, I see. The new kid might have thought he was using “pud” as a short form of pudenda, but he really wasn’t. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2024, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-i-didnt-realize-were-pejorative-until-later-in-life/1004604/212 "2024-07-31T16:48:46Z")
“Pudenda” means “shameful bits”, therefore is not literally especially descriptive. It’s true that anatomists name, for example, pudendal arteries (not the same as the vaginal artery or uterine artery). ---
**Author:** ![guizot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guizot/32/3636_2.png) [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2024, 5:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-i-didnt-realize-were-pejorative-until-later-in-life/1004604/213 "2024-10-19T05:56:58Z")
Pejorative connotations are by nature socially constructed through use. Connotations are not intrinsic to words. They don’t come from some form of immutable DNA in the word itself but rather from the purposes for which the words are employed in discourse. ---
**Author:** ![F.U.Shakespeare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aca169/32.png) [@F.U.Shakespeare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.U.Shakespeare)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2024, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-i-didnt-realize-were-pejorative-until-later-in-life/1004604/214 "2024-10-27T19:43:46Z")
I remember the joke, “If you’re one eighth Scottish, you’re a macaroon”. ---
**Author:** ![Kropotkin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kropotkin/32/18045_2.png) [@Kropotkin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kropotkin)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2024, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-i-didnt-realize-were-pejorative-until-later-in-life/1004604/215 "2024-10-28T01:58:47Z")
> [@engineer\_comp\_geek](#): > > of folks used “Jerry-rigged” as the non-offensive version. It was only much later that I learned that “Jerry” in this case referred to Germans, and that the phrase was a pejorative against German folk. The OED notes “jerry-built” dates from the mid 19th century, origin unknown, and “jury-rigged” from the late 18th century, so Jerry=German may be a folk etymology ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2024, 11:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-i-didnt-realize-were-pejorative-until-later-in-life/1004604/216 "2024-10-28T11:58:34Z")
To expand on this, etymonline gives the following: > [@](#): > > [jerry-built (adj.)](https://www.etymonline.com/word/jerry-built#etymonline_v_1714) > > “_built_ hastily of shoddy materials,” 1856, in a Liverpool context, from _jerry_ “bad, defective,” probably a pejorative use of the male nickname _Jerry_ (a popular form of [Jeremy](https://www.etymonline.com/word/Jeremy); compare _Jerry_-sneak “sneaking fellow, a hen-pecked husband” [OED], name of a character in Foote’s “The Mayor of Garret,” 1764). Or from or influenced by nautical slang [jury](https://www.etymonline.com/word/jury#etymonline_v_6573) (adj.) “temporary,” which came to be used of all sorts of makeshift and inferior objects. And _Jerry_ for German isn’t attested until 1919, as well. ---
**Author:** ![Jasmine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jasmine/32/2964_2.png) [@Jasmine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jasmine)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2024, 12:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-i-didnt-realize-were-pejorative-until-later-in-life/1004604/217 "2024-10-28T12:06:57Z")
> [@teelabrown](#): > > I’ve always used the word “pollywog” interchangeably with “tadpole”, but my boss said that she thought “pollywog” was related to “golliwog” and was probably a racist term. PC run amok. I just extensively researched the term, and nowhere was there any other connection outside of “tadpole”. ---
**Author:** ![Kropotkin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kropotkin/32/18045_2.png) [@Kropotkin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kropotkin)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2024, 12:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-i-didnt-realize-were-pejorative-until-later-in-life/1004604/218 "2024-10-28T12:29:02Z")
Perhaps it is more ignorance, imprecision, mishearing, and a desire not to be offensive than “PC run amok,” which implies someone somewhere has decreed something is now taboo and someone else is now offended by the suggestion they use another word. See “jerry-built,” above, also “niggardly” and “chink” as in “chink in his armor.” Apart from here on the sdmb, I’d rather drop a word than have someone, however mistakenly, think I was being offensive. Taking the time to point out the correct etymology can make one sound smug and superior while trying to use offensive words without being called out. It’s tadpoles all the way down for me. ---
**Author:** ![Jasmine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jasmine/32/2964_2.png) [@Jasmine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jasmine)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2024, 12:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-i-didnt-realize-were-pejorative-until-later-in-life/1004604/219 "2024-10-28T12:32:13Z")
> [@Kropotkin](#): > > Perhaps it is more ignorance, imprecision, mishearing, and a desire not to be offensive than “PC run amok,” which implies someone somewhere has decreed something is now taboo and someone else is now offended by the suggestion they use another word. Understood. I don’t suppose you have much reason to use the word “polywog” at work but, if you did, what would be his reaction? I guess that would be the acid test. LOL ---
**Author:** ![Kropotkin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kropotkin/32/18045_2.png) [@Kropotkin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kropotkin)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2024, 12:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-i-didnt-realize-were-pejorative-until-later-in-life/1004604/220 "2024-10-28T12:34:34Z")
I resent the implication that I have taken LSD or would recommend someone else do so, however accurate such an implication might be! 🙂 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-i-didnt-realize-were-pejorative-until-later-in-life/1004604.md?page=10) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-i-didnt-realize-were-pejorative-until-later-in-life/1004604.md?page=12)