Yankee a racial slurr?

[Aries]

I have a dilemma.

I was talking with a bunch of my peers here in KAf when i started talking about our southern neighbours and called the "yanks".Well, the Sgt overheard this and stormed up to me and told me stop using such foul language and to stop using yank as a racial slurr. He said he'd try to have me charged for racism next time it was mentioned.

So, I have 2 questions reference this situation

1. Do any of you fellas consider yank a racial slurr(should i write it as y**k)
2. Do any y**ks on this forum take actual offense to the term.


Mainly be i refuse to call them "americans"...because it's a term propagated by ignorance(we're all american), and United Statesians is too long for my lazy mouth to form.

Thanks to anyone for helping me clear this up!

 

[Mike Baker]

I don't see anything wrong with calling American's Yanks or Yankee. It is just like calling us Newfoundlanders Newfies. But if used in a "bad" sense, such as "you stuped, no good for nothing Newfie" I can see where it is being used as a racial slurr. I think that you should be able to call Americans Yanks or Yankees, like people call us Newfies, no real harm done unless it's used in a racial slurr, as was said.

 

[zanshin]

The Racial Slur database (there's a Racial Slur Database  ???) refers to Yankee as:

Slang used by the British. Also used in the former Confederate states to refer in a derogatory fashion to people of the Union states. Slur perhaps originally used derisively against the Dutch, calling them "John Cheese" (they made/ate a lot of cheese); Non-English speaking Dutch called back to the Americans, yelling "Yankee" (mispronunciation). Might also be a bastardization of "Jan-Kees", a common Dutch name.

But... it's seems a wee bit odd that anyone would think of it as a racial slur in today's day and age.  Was that a CDN Sgt that jacked you up, or was it a brit?

 

[ArmyRick]

Is this SGT a loser or what is his story?

 

[Pvt. Pukepail]

Yanks, Brits, Canucks...I think they all fall into the same category, definitely not racially motivated, especially considering 'American, Britian or Canadian' aren't races (cultural slur?).  It might not have been the word itself that got the sergeants ire, but maybe he felt your tone was condescending, which likely it wasn't...the sergeant might have been having a bad day and decided to rip into the nearest man.

 

[xo31@711ret]

I don't see how you said 'yank' can be considered a racial slur; eg song 'I'm a Yankee doodle dandy'. I'm originally from NL, some consider 'Newfie' to be derogatory; I consider it with pride and good natured ribbing depending on how it's used; eg (while I was in the BTN; 'Hey Newf / Newfie, wanna another beer?" v/s what some ignorant drunken civvie said to me one time (a long time while ago) " You f**kin' newfies, all you do is fish, f**k & fight! Go back to the rock!" I didn't know whether to shake his hand or smack 'I'm  ;D...we both ended up with some cuts & bruises   : (this was just after I joined, about 25 years ago). I was also called 'killer' because at joining, I was the smallest in the platoon (would that be considered a slur against thin people?). 25 years plus later some of my old RCR buds still call me 'killer'. I wear it with pride...people need to grow a thicker skin or tone down on the 'political correctness' mentality (which will never happen!)

my rant

-gerry

 

[muskrat89]

The Sergeant is off his rocker. Yankee is used in a "light-derogatory" way by Southerners to refer to northerners... (from the civil war)

Mainly be i refuse to call them "americans"...because it's a term propagated by ignorance(we're all american)

Granted, though technically correct, perhaps - this is kind of goofy too  :

 

[old medic]

That seems particularly absurd.  Makes me wonder what he thinks of Warner Bros. and
James Cagney:  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0035575/

Of course, we never heard the context of this conversation you mentioned.

 

[Trooper Hale]

As a "Skippy" and a "Bogan" (Anglo-Australian & working class australian) its my right to call a Brit a "Pom", an American a "Yank" or a Canadian some sort of slanderous term.
Your taking yourself a it to serious if you think Yank is offensive, when i was in Canada you folks called me a "Convict" and what did i do? Well the police still havent proved it so technically i did NOTHING. We bag each other and have fun at the others expense, but generic terms like these cant seriously be seen as offensive.

 

[zanshin]

Years ago I remember reading a comic book wherein the pilot of the Zero, (while chasing a Mustang) was screaming "Yankee Dog Die!!!"  ... hmm... or was that a MIG-15 chasing a Sabre...  a MIG-21 chasing a Phantom?

Anywaz... ever since, whenever I'm driving over in Maine and someone cuts me off, I just scream "Yankee Dog Die!" out the window.  Then they pull over and say they're sorry.  ;D

 

[zanshin]

...or a Canadian some sort of slanderous term...

I can help you out with that, Hale.  It's called NDP...

 

[dglad]

I was on a battlefield tour of Gettysburg a few years ago.  Our tour, a fellow who retired from the US Marine Corps in the 1960s (yup...he landed at Iwo Jima as a private) mentioned in a side conversation that there are still some in the southeastern US who refer to the Civil War as the "War of Northern Aggression" and would definitely consider "Yankee" an extremely derogatory term.  You may have crossed paths with one such gentleman (if he was American). 

There could be other reasons this individual found the term offensive, ranging from public (the term "Yank" or "Yankee" is often used in a derogatory way by those around the world protesting any number of things about the US) to personal (and who knows what personal meaning the term could have for this fellow?)  I think it would be more than a bit of a stretch to have use of the term treated as a "racial slur" and subject to disciplinary action, though.

 

[Sig_Des]

I can help you out with that, Hale.  It's called NDP...

You can call me a canuck, but call me NDP, and you're pushing your luck

 

[GAP]

Did he have a southern Accent? If so tell him to get over it, the war was a long time ago.

Anything else tell him to have you charged then...or blow it out his....

 

[armyvern]

 I think it would be more than a bit of a stretch to have use of the term treated as a "racial slur" and subject to disciplinary action, though.

Absolutely true. Perhaps then he just happened to to have just suffered through having his favourite ball team with the biggest payrole going, the New York Yankees, knocked out of the post season, just didn't want to hear anymore about them, and the remark just set him off, re-iterating to him how badly his team sucks!! 

 

[geo]

Yasnkee defined - per Wikpedia.org

The origins of the term are disputed. One theory claims that it originated in the 1760s from an English rendering of the Dutch language "Jan-Kees" (two of the most common given names of the Dutch), a nickname used by Dutch settlers in upstate New York referring to the New Englanders who were migrating to their region. (See Martin Van Buren.) Another theory holds that the term may be derived from a name used by the Native American tribes that allied with the French during the French and Indian wars (1689 to 1763) to refer to English settlers. It is thought that the Native American tribes fighting with the French against the expansion of English settlements north and west from New York into the Upper Hudson River valley, the Ohio river valley, the Eastern Great Lakes, and the southern banks of the ST. Lawrence River, began to use the pejorative French term for the English settlers - "L'Anglais" - to describe all non-French white settlers coming into the region. The Native American tribes pronounced the word "yangleez", which is believed to have later been corrupted to "yangeez". [See James Fennimore Cooper's "The Leatherstocking Tales"]. The first recorded use of the term by an Englishman to refer to Americans appears in the 1780s, in a letter by Admiral Lord Nelson.

One influence on the use of the term throughout the years has been the song Yankee Doodle, which was popular at the time of the American Revolutionary War (1775–1783). Though the British intended to insult the colonials with the song, following the Battle of Concord, it was adopted by Americans as a proud retort and today is the state song of Connecticut.

An early use of the term outside the United States was in the creation of Sam Slick, the "Yankee Clockmaker", in a column in a newspaper in Halifax, Nova Scotia, in 1835. The character was a plain-talking American who served to poke fun at American and Nova Scotian customs of that era, while trying to urge the Canadians to be as clever and hard-working as the Yankees.

During the American Civil War (1861 - 1865) citizens of The Confederate States of America used it as a derogatory term for their Northern enemies - "Damn Yankees". The term also referred to the border territories.

 

[geo]

Yankees as ethnocultural group

As an ethnocultural group, large numbers of Yankees dispersed throughout New England, upstate New York, the northern Midwest, and the Pacific Northwest--and even Hawaii. They brought along their religion (Congregational, but also Methodist and Northern Baptist), their politics (Republican), their drive for education, their complex social structure that emphasized brainpower over manual skills, and favored intricate rule-based organizations, like corporations. They tended to dominate business, finance, philanthropy and higher education, but after 1880 were much less successful in politics, where the Irish Americans seemed to have the advantage.

The Yankees, who dominated New England, much of upstate New York, and much of the upper Midwest were the strongest supporters of the new Republican party in the 1860s. This was especially true for the Congregationalists and Presbyterians among them and (during the war), the Methodists. A study of 65 predominantly Yankee counties showed they voted only 40% for the Whigs in 1848 and 1852, but became 61-65% Republican in presidential elections of 1856 through 1864. [Kleppner p 55]

Yankees originally lived in villages (avoiding spread-out farms), fostered local democracy through town meetings, and emphasized puritanical morality. They left agriculture as soon as possible for careers in the city. They created high schools and colleges and sent their children, building human capital that was highly rewarding in growing cities. Many were characterized by introspection of the sort that produces diaries.

 

[geo]

guess that Sgt must come from the South

 

[Cloud Cover]

http://www.nonstick.com/sounds/Yosemite_Sam/ltys_050.wav

 

[captjtq]

If I were to call my wife's grandmother a Yankee, there'd be no Corona waiting for me next time we visited down south. ;-)  She still calls it the War of Northern Agression.

If it was a US Sgt from the South, I could see where he/she'd not like to be called a Yank/Yankee, but otherwise, it's such a conventional way of referring to Americans these days that I can't see anyone seriously charging someone with racism for using the term. It would be more appropriate to mention that he finds the term offensive, and not to use it in his hearing. I think the Sgt went overboard on that one.

One of my American counterparts referred to Canada as 'America North' the other day here on KAF, and I wasn't offended - I just reminded her how superior our Timmies is to their Green Beans, and it shut her up... sorta.  ;D