[Ads-l] Further Antedating of "Racist"

[Shapiro, Fred]

I agree with Jon that the meaning of "racist" in the 1924 citation may be considered to be slightly different from the current most common usage of the word.  But, judging by the early citations for "racist" and "racism" in the current OED entries, it is very likely that the OED will consider this to be an antedating of "racist."

Fred Shapiro



________________________________________
From: American Dialect Society [ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] on behalf of Jonathan Lighter [wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM]
Sent: Sunday, January 04, 2015 6:39 AM
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject: Re: Further Antedating of "Racist"

Nice, but it's not quite the current "racist."

Back then, "race" was a frequent, rather positively charged synonym for
"ancestral or cultural ethnicity" or "nationality."  (Americans were not a
"race," but the Irish were, if you get my drift.)

And a "nationalist" isn't necessarily a "racist" in the modern sense.

JL

On Sat, Jan 3, 2015 at 11:05 PM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu>
wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: Further Antedating of "Racist"
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> On Jan 3, 2015, at 10:20 PM, Shapiro, Fred wrote:
>
> > racist (OED 1926)
> >=20
> >=20
> >=20
> > 1924 _Portland Oregonian_ 14 Dec. 70 (America's Historical Newspapers) =
>  The elections show the Germans at the moment want neither racists now =
> [sic] communists -- that is, neither extreme nationalists nor extreme =
> revolutionists.
> >=20
> Well, it was nice while it lasted.
>
> LH=
>
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