racial epithets

[George Thompson]

In the very distant past of my life as an English major, someone told
me that the term "blue-gum" appeared in one of Faulkner's novels.

It might be possible to look up where, though be damn if I see any
reason to.  I'll take requests, though.

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 <wilson.gray at RCN.COM>
Date: Friday, July 29, 2005 2:51 am
Subject: Re: racial epithets

> On Jul 28, 2005, at 4:20 PM, Mullins, Bill wrote:
>
> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> > -----------------------
> > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster:       "Mullins, Bill" <Bill.Mullins at US.ARMY.MIL>
> > Subject:      racial epithets
> > -----------------------------------------------------------------
> ------
> > --------
> >
> > high yellow -- HDAS has 1923, OED has 1951
> > "At the Theatres" | Nebraska | Lincoln | The Lincoln Daily Star |
> > 1916-06-22 p. 3. col 3.
> > "They present the typical minstrel nigger and high yaller octoroon."
> >
> > "Honey Boy" Minstrels Please Large Audience at Atlanta
> > The Atlanta Constitution; Mar 12, 1915; pg. 12 col 3.
> > "Eldon Durand is a classic in make-up in his part of the Miss
> > Flooeyanna
> > Wilkins, the "high yellow," for whose charms "Lasses" inevitably
> > falls."
> >
> > blue gum -- not in OED nor HDAS, as near as I can tell
> >
> > THE MAGIC CHARM
> > The Atlanta Constitution; Oct 18, 1891; pg. 11 col 3.
> > "Their bite is as bad as a blue gum nigger."
> >
> > "BLUE GUM NEGROES"
> > Ohio | Lima | The Times Democrat | 1897-07-23 p. 7 col 4.
> > "Among the numerous superstitions of the old plantation days which
> > still
> > linger in the south none is more pronounced or more widely diffused
> > than
> > the belief in the fatal effecs of the "blue gum nigger's" bite." "
> >
> > [I had heard "blue gum" as an epithet for AA for years, usually
> taking> it to mean "a black person whose skin is so dark their
> gums look blue
> > in
> > comparison".  But I've never heard this business about the bite
> of a
> > blue gum.
> >
>
> If this term is in actual use an epithet, it must be used by only a
> vanishingly-small portion of the white population, since even you are
> unaware of the term's referent. I personally have never heard it
> spokenby anyone anywhere. It's strictly a literary term that I'm
> familiarwith only as a consequence of having read the book,
> Mandingo, by Kyle
> Onstott (1957 et paperbacks seq.), in which the term appears.
> Accordingto a white character in the novel, blue-gummed black
> people, such as
> the Ibo, are inferior to pink-gummed black black people, such as the
> Mandingo. It's not clear whether this is Onstott's own opinion or
> merely that of his character. It's more likely only that of his
> character. For his time, Onstott was way liberal. Anyway, if not for
> this novel, your mention of it would have come as a surprise to me.
>
> I've had a series of friendly discussions with one of my sisters-
> in-law
> as to whether white Americans have any idea of what black people
> actually look like. Your post supports my claim: that white people
> haveno real idea of what black people look like.
>
> Allow me to run it down to you.
>
> Some black people are non-distinct from white people WRT the color of
> their gums. Other black people, among them your humble correspondent,
> have gums that are a kind of mottled pink and blue(-ish) in color.
> Thismottling is what the term, "blue(-)gum," refers to. This
> phenomenondoes not correlate in any way with the bearer's skin
> tone - i.e. the
> percentage of white ancestry that a black person has - or with any
> other visible feature. Within a given nuclear family, some members may
> be blue gums and other members may not be. A pink-gummed black couple
> may have blue-gummed children and vice-versa. It appears to be one of
> those random, benign mutations that has no application but doesn't die
> out.
>
> -Wilson Gray
>