"Canadian" as crypto-racist term (again)

[Benjamin Zimmer]

Last April Mircea Sauciuc posted a query about the use of "Canadian"
as code for "black" (as when used by restaurant workers to refer to
poor-tipping black customers). Now this usage is receiving wider
attention thanks to an incident involving an assistant district
attorney in Houston, as reported by the National Post (Canada):

-----
http://www.nationalpost.com/most_popular/story.html?id=261254
It was a routine e-mail from the boss sent to congratulate a junior
prosecutor in Houston, Tex., who had won manslaughter convictions
against an intoxicated driver.
"He convicted Mr. Sosa of a double intoxication manslaughter, got a
weak jury to give him 12 years in each, and then convinced Judge
Wallace to stack the sentences," Harris County assistant district
attorney Mike Trent wrote in an office-wide memo. Then came the odd
part: "He overcame a subversively good defence by Matt Hennessey that
had some Canadians on the jury feeling sorry for the defendant and
forced them to do the right thing."
The e-mail was sent in 2003 but came to light only this month as part
of an unrelated controversy with his office, forcing Mr. Trent to
defend himself against accusations of bigotry -- not because he
offended the people of Canada, but because "Canadian" has apparently
become a code word for blacks among American racists.
It was a routine e-mail from the boss sent to congratulate a junior
prosecutor in Houston, Tex., who had won manslaughter convictions
against an intoxicated driver.
"He convicted Mr. Sosa of a double intoxication manslaughter, got a
weak jury to give him 12 years in each, and then convinced Judge
Wallace to stack the sentences," Harris County assistant district
attorney Mike Trent wrote in an office-wide memo. Then came the odd
part: "He overcame a subversively good defence by Matt Hennessey that
had some Canadians on the jury feeling sorry for the defendant and
forced them to do the right thing."
The e-mail was sent in 2003 but came to light only this month as part
of an unrelated controversy with his office, forcing Mr. Trent to
defend himself against accusations of bigotry -- not because he
offended the people of Canada, but because "Canadian" has apparently
become a code word for blacks among American racists.
-----

The National Post article goes on to quote a number of sources,
including Mircea Sauciuc's ADS-L query (though neither Sauciuc nor
ADS-L are mentioned by name). The story has been picked up by a number
of popular blogs, including Boing Boing and Gawker.

http://www.boingboing.net/2008/01/27/southern-racists-ado.html
http://gawker.com/5002598/canadian-is-the-new-nigger


--Ben Zimmer

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org