use of "sunshine" as a racial slur against blacks

[Wilson Gray]

Ditto "Wow," George. I thought that you were around my age. "Shine" is
the song with which Frankie Laine initially gained his fame. That's
news to you? Clearly, you're much younger than I had hoped, uh,
thought. OTOH, I had long been under the impression that the song
wasn't new, since it seemed to be unpleasantly familiar to the 'rents.
I had no idea, though, that it went back to the days when mother was a
girl. It was similar to the way that they were somehow pissed off by
the fact that Paul Whiteman, snidely referred to by, IIRC, Nat Hentoff
as "the aptly-named," was billed as The King of Jazz on his TV show. I
was still young enough, at the time, that I had never heard of
Whiteman before he got his TV show. As Stan Kenton once pointed out,
he maintained an all-white orchestra because the colored were simply
incapable of playing jazz. Given that assumption, it naturally
followed that the aptly-named one should be the crown-ed king of the
genre. It made perfect sense to me and I didn't get the point that
Hentoff was trying to make. (Again, IIRC, Hentoff used the phrase in
his Downbeat review of Whiteman's show.)

These days, of course, the fact that that once made complete sense to
me tends to give me the jaws.

-Wilson
–––
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-----
-Mark Twain



On Mon, Mar 2, 2009 at 9:56 PM, George Thompson <george.thompson at nyu.edu> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender: Â  Â  Â  American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster: Â  Â  Â  George Thompson <george.thompson at NYU.EDU>
> Subject: Â  Â  Â Re: use of "sunshine" as a racial slur against blacks
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Frankie Laine recorded this? Â Wow.
>
> The version I know is by Louis Armstrong, ca. 1930. Â I see that the song is credited to Ford Dabney, Cecil Mack and Lew Brown. Â Mack and Brown I don't know, off hand, but Dabney was black, a band leader prominent in the Hrlem music scene of the 1910s. Â No doubt he wrote the music.
>
> GAT
>
> George A. Thompson
> Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern Univ. Pr., 1998, but nothing much lately.
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com>
> Date: Monday, March 2, 2009 8:32 pm
> Subject: Re: use of "sunshine" as a racial slur against blacks
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>
>> "Sunshine" as a slur is more commonly used in its short form, "shine."
>> As a WAG, it may be the case that the popularity of "boot," from
>> _bootblack_, who *shines* boots, and "shoe," from _shoeshine boy_ gave
>> the the shortened form its impetus.
>>
>> As a child, I used to wonder why my parents disliked one of my
>> favorite songs, Shine, by Frankie Laine:
>>
>> Hey now, just because my hair is curly
>> Just because my teeth are pearly
>> Just because I always wear a smile
>> That is why they call me
>> "SHINE"!
>>
>> Just because I'm glad I'm living
>> And take my troubles all with a smile
>> Just because my color's shady
>> That's the difference, maybe
>> That is why they call me
>> "SHINE"!
>>
>> Etc.
>>
>> -Wilson
>>
>> I was, well, unaware of the subtext.
>> –––
>> All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
>> come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
>> -----
>> -Mark Twain
>>
>>
>>
>> On Mon, Mar 2, 2009 at 7:15 PM, Jonathan Lighter
>> <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com> wrote:
>> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
>> > Sender: ?? ?? ?? American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> > Poster: ?? ?? ?? Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
>> > Subject: ?? ?? ??Re: use of "sunshine" as a racial slur against blacks
>> > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> >
>> > I've never heard it so used, but I *have* heard it once or twice as
>> a
>> > playful form of address (as by older waitresses to male diners in downscale
>> > Southern eateries), i.e., "How are you today, sunshine?"
>> >
>> > The earliest ex. I know of is in James Forbes's play "The Show Shop"
>> > (1914) in _The Famous Mrs. Fair and Other Plays_ (N.Y.: George H. Doran,
>> > 1919), p. 99:
>> >
>> > "ROSENBAUM: Hello, Sadie. [To TOMPKINS] Hello, Sunshine. We've got
>> to slam
>> > this show through."
>> >
>> > Tompkins's first name is given as "Wilbur."
>> >
>> > JL
>> >
>> > On Mon, Mar 2, 2009 at 7:02 PM, Jocelyn Limpert
>> > <jocelyn.limpert at gmail.com>wrote:
>> >
>> >> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>> >> -----------------------
>> >> Sender: ?? ?? ?? American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> >> Poster: ?? ?? ?? Jocelyn Limpert <jocelyn.limpert at GMAIL.COM>
>> >> Subject: ?? ?? ??use of "sunshine" as a racial slur against blacks
>> >>
>> >> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> >>
>> >> Does anyone have any information as to the origins of or current
>> usage of
>> >> "sunshine" being used in speech today in a derrogatory way as a
>> racial slur
>> >> against blacks/African-Americans?
>> >>
>> >> A friend asked me for information concerning this and I could find
>> little
>> >> in
>> >> the online searches that I did. Usually I'm much more successful,
>> so I
>> >> would
>> >> appreciate any help that you can give me.
>> >>
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