Olympus-OM
[Top] [All Lists]

Re: [OM] [OT] How white are you?

Subject: Re: [OM] [OT] How white are you?
From: Bob Whitmire <bwhitmire@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Tue, 15 Feb 2011 09:43:45 -0500
Well, Boris, white people are typically referred to as Anglo-Saxon, and 
Anglo-Saxon is a combination of Angles and Saxons, so I suppose some might 
think true Anglo-Saxons (A lot of Brits) would be the whitest of the while. 
Now, where the Irish figure into this I don't know. They are neither Angle nor 
Saxon. And, don't forget, the old ethnographic term for white was "caucasian," 
which derives from individuals in the Caucasus region, which also are neither 
Angle nor Saxon. But then "caucasian," my dictionary says, is now a potentially 
pejorative term rather than an ethnographic distinction. Perhaps that's because 
it was coined by a German, who _might_ have had Saxon in him. As someone from 
what we now refer to as "Eastern Europe," you are not Angle, nor are you Saxon, 
but according to the old German, you qualify as "caucasian."

Which means, of course, that as a descendant of both the British and Irish 
races, with a bit of Scot and German tossed in, I am whiter than you. 
(Hehehe--no offense intended, in case the tone of my response didn't translate 
across cyberspace.)

Ain't it a wonderful world we live in?

--Bob


On Feb 14, 2011, at 11:50 AM, Willie Wonka wrote:

> Is the mentality in UK really that the Brits are the whitest followed by the 
> Irish etc?  Where does this come from?

-- 
_________________________________________________________________
Options: http://lists.thomasclausen.net/mailman/listinfo/olympus
Archives: http://lists.thomasclausen.net/mailman/private/olympus/
Themed Olympus Photo Exhibition: http://www.tope.nl/

<Prev in Thread] Current Thread [Next in Thread>
Sponsored by Tako
Impressum | Datenschutz