What Are We Supposed to Call White People?

During my freshman year in college, I made a woman in my ethnic studies class cry. Because I referred to her people as "white folks." As she sulked, I sat awkwardly and flipped through my mental collection of labels I've encountered for my fairer-skinned counterparts — there just aren't that many. Sure, I've become accustomed to being asked about the best way to refer to people of my background (Asian vs. Oriental?), and likewise heard plenty about the debates between terms like black and African, Hispanic and Latino and Native and Indian. But how often is the question turned around? What exactly do we call white people? I'd really like this to be settled for me, especially since I myself am not white...I mean Caucasian...I mean, let's just move onto the next paragraph.

I'm sure I wasn't the only one who was confused by my classmate's reaction to the term "white folks," because there were many blond, brown and red eyebrows that were also cocked in confusion. Still, though, we all know racial labels are sensitive. In the same way that many people of color have different preferences for racial labels, so do people of...not-color. So before I delve into this topic that could potentially offend, let me preface the following with a familiar alibi — some of my best friends are white! In fact, I'm sitting next to one right now. And as we sit in this café reflecting on this post, the answer to a singular label seems to elude him as much as I. So where does this leave us? Let's look at our options:

1. White: One of the most common comments I get in response to my posts is in regard to my use of the term "white people." A typical one goes something like, "Snow's white, glue's white, paper's white.  I am not white." And this is true, in the same way that my skin pigment is not the same as that of a puddle of urine. In my recent post about the casting of white characters in the Prince of Persia movie, I was barraged by responses pegging me as ignorant and chastising me for not realizing that many Persians are light-skinned. But as with other color-coded racial labels, the use of the term "white" obviously doesn't refer to #FFFFFF.

2. Caucasian: This is the term many people of color use when they want to "politely" refer to white folks. It just sounds more sophisticated. However, an etymological investigation shows that the word is actually quite archaic, as it descends from the "Caucasoid" term that Johann Friedrich Blumenbach used in the 1700's to link physical human attributes with intelligence....hecka dumb. Furthermore, the term was invalidated by the 1923 Supreme Court decision United States v. Bhagat Singh Thind, where Thind argued for American naturalization on the basis that he was from the Caucasus Mountains, and thereby definitively "Caucasian." The Supreme Court's response was, and I quote, "Ummm....yeah....we meant white."

3. European American: One seldom-used term to describe white people is "European-American." This dismays or confuses many, as it is more commonly used to refer to immigrants of European descent, and doesn't distinguish those who were actually born and raised in the United States. (Likewise, of course, Asian Americans, African Americans and Hispanic Americans also remain confused...especially those from Hispania.)

4. American: If you've somehow made your way to Change.org's Race in America section, I'd like to think that you already understand why it's problematic to use the term "American" synonymously with the term "white." However, doing so is more common than one would hope. In fact, many of my family members — both immigrants and native-born — make this slip. It speaks as much to the fact that the archetypal American is still envisioned as white, as it does to the fact that many people of color don't feel that society actually sees them as American.

5. Honkey: I know, I know. But any conversation about racial labels would be incomplete without an interrogation of the offensive ones — even when the subject is white people. The term was deemed offensive when black militants in the 60's picked it up in retaliation for white use of the term nigger. One theory is that it originates from the west African Wolof term "honk nopp," meaning "white person" — and that it was used by Wolof-speaking slaves in the U.S. Whatever the case, nowadays, it's offensive. It's not really an option.

Of course, there are plenty of other terms that can be pulled from regions and time periods, but hopefully the point has been made that there's incredible variation here, as with any other race.

Instead of concluding which term is the "right" one, I'd like to pose this question: Would it be wrong for me to determine the answer? The obvious answer would be "yes," because I'm not white. But if we look across the spectrum of labels for all races, a common thread is that the vast majority of them are derived from European cultures. Why is that okay? If the answer is because we are operating within the English language — which, after all, originates from Europe — given our increasingly diverse society, perhaps it's time to reevaluate our labels.

Perhaps we could start by asking why the only offensive term in the list above is the one that evolved from a non-European language — and which, in reality, is just the common Wolof term.  That would be some real post-race stuff.

Photo Credit: LittleDebbie