"People of color"

Herb Stahlke hfwstahlke at GMAIL.COM
Mon Jun 1 01:36:42 UTC 2009


And for a scholarly and delightful account of the knots people have
tied themselves in over racial terms derived from Noah's sons, by all
means read Edith Sanders' The Hamitic Hypothesis:  Its Origin and
Function in Time Perspective, Journal of African History, Vol. 10, No.
4, (1969) pp. 521-532.

Herb

On Sun, May 31, 2009 at 8:53 PM, Mark Mandel <thnidu at gmail.com> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Mark Mandel <thnidu at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: "People of color"
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> One more language-related observation on Wilson's post:
>
> On Sun, May 31, 2009 at 7:37 PM, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> All non-anti-Semitic - or is that "Semetic"? - blacks are, in general,
>
> (Anti-)semitic, with an "i". Mnemonically, think of "Semite". The idea
> behind the name was that the "races" of mankind were descended from
> Noah's sons (Genesis 9:18-27). ... Time out to check OED.... OMG:
>
> Ā -----
> Ā Ā Ā  A person belonging to the race of mankind which includes most of
> the peoples mentioned in Gen. x. as descended from Shem son of Noah,
> as the Hebrews, Arabs, Assyrians, and AramƦans. Also, a person
> speaking a Semitic language as his native tongue.
> Ā -----
>
> No disclaimer, no "supposed". Isn't it past time to rewrite this and
> throw that racial presupposition out onto the dustbin of history?!
>
> m a m
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>

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



More information about the Ads-l mailing list