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Macaca (slur)
Encyclopedia
Macaca is a word used by George Allen
in 2006 that began a controversy because it sounds similar to the French word "macaque". It was reported by journalists to be a racial slur against African immigrants in some European cultures; and by Zairian painter Tshibumba Kanda Matulu to be a pejorative epithet used by francophone
colonialists in Central Africa
's Belgian Congo
for the native population. It may be derived from the name of the genus
comprising macaque
monkeys. The macaque's genus
name, Macaca, is a latinization of the Bantu
(Kongo
) ma-kako, meaning "monkey".
In the United States
, the term was at the center of a controversy during the 2006 United States Senate election in Virginia
when it was used by the Republican incumbent, George Allen. Most Americans were unfamiliar with the term until continual media coverage alleged it to be a racial slur. Allen alleged that he was unaware of its racial context. Relating to the Allen controversy, "macaca" was named the most politically incorrect
word of 2006 by Global Language Monitor
, a nonprofit group that studies word usage. The word was also a finalist for the American Dialect Society
"Word of the Year" that same year.
, colonial whites called Africans macaques. The term sale macaque (filthy monkey) was occasionally used as an insult. In the ceremony in 1960 in which Congo gained its independence from Belgium
, Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba
gave a speech accusing Belgian King Baudouin of presiding over "a regime of injustice, suppression, and exploitation" before ad-libbing at the end, Nous ne sommes plus vos macaques! (We are no longer your macaques!), as the Congolese in the audience rose to their feet cheering. Lumumba was reportedly still stung by being called a sale macaque by a Belgian woman years earlier.
"Macaca" is a direct translation for "female monkey" in Portuguese language
. The translation for "male monkey " (english) is "macaco
" (Portuguese). In Portugal and Portuguese speaking countries, racists often call black people "macaco" or "macacos" (plural form) as an insult, because their african origins. "Macaco" is also the Portuguese generic word to designate any kind of ape
.
In the Adventures of Tintin written by Belgian writer-artist Hergé
, Captain Haddock
uses the term macaque as an insult, along with other random terms. In a 1994 essay, literary scholar Patrick Colm Hogan discussed the racist symbolism surrounding the name Makak, the protagonist in Derek Walcott
's 1967 play Dream on Monkey Mountain.
English gossip columnist Taki Theodoracopulos
referred to Bianca Jagger
, who is of Nicaraguan origin, as macaca mulatta
in 1996. Theodoracopulos has frequently used racial slurs in his published work. Note that Macaca mulatta is the scientific name for the Rhesus monkey. The photographer Marc Garanger recounts the use of Macaque as a slur against Algerian women in a 1990 issue of Aperture
magazine.
The failed re-election campaign of Republican U.S. Senator
George Allen
of Virginia
generated much controversy after he used the word macaca in reference to an Indian American
. On August 11, 2006, at a campaign stop in Breaks, Virginia
, near the Kentucky
border, George Allen twice used the word macaca to refer to S. R. Sidarth, who was filming the event as a "tracker" for the opposing Jim Webb
campaign. Prior to this, the term was almost completely unknown in the U.S.
Sidarth is of Indian ancestry, but was born and raised in Fairfax County, Virginia
. Allen's mother, born Sarah Lumbroso, is of French Tunisian descent and commentators have suggested that she may have learned the pejorative during her childhood and introduced it to her son. Even though Allen claimed that he made up the word and said that he did not understand its derogatory meaning, a media outcry erupted following his use of the term. After two weeks of negative publicity, Allen publicly apologized for his statement and asserted that he in no way intended those words to be offensive. The term "Macacawitz," referring to the September 2006 discovery of Allen's Jewish heritage, was coined by conservative pundit John Podhoretz
and was widely used afterwards. A campaign staffer for Democratic Congressional candidate Al Weed
used the phrase and was fired for her comment.
The controversy created by Allen's use of the alleged slur is seen to have turned a seemingly inevitable re-election of Allen into a victory for Webb.
George Allen (U.S. politician)
George Felix Allen is a former United States Senator from the Commonwealth of Virginia, and the son of former NFL head coach George Allen. Allen served Virginia in the state legislature, as the 67th Governor, and in both bodies of the U.S. Congress, winning election to the Senate in 2000...
in 2006 that began a controversy because it sounds similar to the French word "macaque". It was reported by journalists to be a racial slur against African immigrants in some European cultures; and by Zairian painter Tshibumba Kanda Matulu to be a pejorative epithet used by francophone
Francophone
The adjective francophone means French-speaking, typically as primary language, whether referring to individuals, groups, or places. Often, the word is used as a noun to describe a natively French-speaking person....
colonialists in Central Africa
Central Africa
Central Africa is a core region of the African continent which includes Burundi, the Central African Republic, Chad, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Rwanda....
's Belgian Congo
Belgian Congo
The Belgian Congo was the formal title of present-day Democratic Republic of the Congo between King Leopold II's formal relinquishment of his personal control over the state to Belgium on 15 November 1908, and Congolese independence on 30 June 1960.-Congo Free State, 1884–1908:Until the latter...
for the native population. It may be derived from the name of the genus
Genus
In biology, a genus is a low-level taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms, which is an example of definition by genus and differentia...
comprising macaque
Macaque
The macaques constitute a genus of Old World monkeys of the subfamily Cercopithecinae. - Description :Aside from humans , the macaques are the most widespread primate genus, ranging from Japan to Afghanistan and, in the case of the barbary macaque, to North Africa...
monkeys. The macaque's genus
Genus
In biology, a genus is a low-level taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms, which is an example of definition by genus and differentia...
name, Macaca, is a latinization of the Bantu
Bantu languages
The Bantu languages constitute a traditional sub-branch of the Niger–Congo languages. There are about 250 Bantu languages by the criterion of mutual intelligibility, though the distinction between language and dialect is often unclear, and Ethnologue counts 535 languages...
(Kongo
Kongo language
The Kongo language, or Kikongo, is the Bantu language spoken by the Bakongo and Bandundu people living in the tropical forests of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Republic of the Congo and Angola. It is a tonal language and formed the base for Kituba, a Bantu creole and lingua franca...
) ma-kako, meaning "monkey".
In the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, the term was at the center of a controversy during the 2006 United States Senate election in Virginia
Virginia United States Senate election, 2006
The 2006 United States Senate election in Virginia was held on November 7, 2006. Incumbent Republican U.S. Senator George Allen ran for re-election to a second term, but lost to Democrat Jim Webb.-Background:...
when it was used by the Republican incumbent, George Allen. Most Americans were unfamiliar with the term until continual media coverage alleged it to be a racial slur. Allen alleged that he was unaware of its racial context. Relating to the Allen controversy, "macaca" was named the most politically incorrect
Political correctness
Political correctness is a term which denotes language, ideas, policies, and behavior seen as seeking to minimize social and institutional offense in occupational, gender, racial, cultural, sexual orientation, certain other religions, beliefs or ideologies, disability, and age-related contexts,...
word of 2006 by Global Language Monitor
Global Language Monitor
The Global Language Monitor is an Austin, Texas-based company that collectively documents, analyzes and tracks trends in language usage worldwide, with a particular emphasis upon the English language...
, a nonprofit group that studies word usage. The word was also a finalist for the American Dialect Society
American Dialect Society
The American Dialect Society, founded in 1889, is a learned society "dedicated to the study of the English language in North America, and of other languages, or dialects of other languages, influencing it or influenced by it." The Society publishes the academic journal, American Speech...
"Word of the Year" that same year.
Uses
According to Robert Edgerton, in the Belgian CongoBelgian Congo
The Belgian Congo was the formal title of present-day Democratic Republic of the Congo between King Leopold II's formal relinquishment of his personal control over the state to Belgium on 15 November 1908, and Congolese independence on 30 June 1960.-Congo Free State, 1884–1908:Until the latter...
, colonial whites called Africans macaques. The term sale macaque (filthy monkey) was occasionally used as an insult. In the ceremony in 1960 in which Congo gained its independence from Belgium
Belgium
Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...
, Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba
Patrice Lumumba
Patrice Émery Lumumba was a Congolese independence leader and the first legally elected Prime Minister of the Republic of the Congo after he helped win its independence from Belgium in June 1960. Only ten weeks later, Lumumba's government was deposed in a coup during the Congo Crisis...
gave a speech accusing Belgian King Baudouin of presiding over "a regime of injustice, suppression, and exploitation" before ad-libbing at the end, Nous ne sommes plus vos macaques! (We are no longer your macaques!), as the Congolese in the audience rose to their feet cheering. Lumumba was reportedly still stung by being called a sale macaque by a Belgian woman years earlier.
"Macaca" is a direct translation for "female monkey" in Portuguese language
Portuguese language
Portuguese is a Romance language that arose in the medieval Kingdom of Galicia, nowadays Galicia and Northern Portugal. The southern part of the Kingdom of Galicia became independent as the County of Portugal in 1095...
. The translation for "male monkey " (english) is "macaco
Macaco
Macaco can refer to:*Macaco - a martial arts technique used in capoeira*Macaco - a musical band.*A comics character and periodical created by K-Hito *The Portuguese variant of the pejorative epithet, Macaca...
" (Portuguese). In Portugal and Portuguese speaking countries, racists often call black people "macaco" or "macacos" (plural form) as an insult, because their african origins. "Macaco" is also the Portuguese generic word to designate any kind of ape
Ape
Apes are Old World anthropoid mammals, more specifically a clade of tailless catarrhine primates, belonging to the biological superfamily Hominoidea. The apes are native to Africa and South-east Asia, although in relatively recent times humans have spread all over the world...
.
In the Adventures of Tintin written by Belgian writer-artist Hergé
Hergé
Georges Prosper Remi , better known by the pen name Hergé, was a Belgian comics writer and artist. His best known and most substantial work is the 23 completed comic books in The Adventures of Tintin series, which he wrote and illustrated from 1929 until his death in 1983, although he was also...
, Captain Haddock
Captain Haddock
Captain Archibald Haddock is a fictional character in The Adventures of Tintin, the series of classic Belgian comic books written and illustrated by Hergé...
uses the term macaque as an insult, along with other random terms. In a 1994 essay, literary scholar Patrick Colm Hogan discussed the racist symbolism surrounding the name Makak, the protagonist in Derek Walcott
Derek Walcott
Derek Alton Walcott, OBE OCC is a Saint Lucian poet, playwright, writer and visual artist who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1992 and the T. S. Eliot Prize in 2011 for White Egrets. His works include the Homeric epic Omeros...
's 1967 play Dream on Monkey Mountain.
English gossip columnist Taki Theodoracopulos
Taki Theodoracopulos
Taki Theodoracopulos , originally named Panagiotis Theodoracopulos is a Greek/American journalist, socialite, and political commentator.Better known as Taki, diminutive for Panagiotis, he is a Greek-born journalist and writer living in New York City, London and Switzerland...
referred to Bianca Jagger
Bianca Jagger
Bianca Jagger is a Nicaraguan-born social and human rights advocate and a former actress and model...
, who is of Nicaraguan origin, as macaca mulatta
Mulatto
Mulatto denotes a person with one white parent and one black parent, or more broadly, a person of mixed black and white ancestry. Contemporary usage of the term varies greatly, and the broader sense of the term makes its application rather subjective, as not all people of mixed white and black...
in 1996. Theodoracopulos has frequently used racial slurs in his published work. Note that Macaca mulatta is the scientific name for the Rhesus monkey. The photographer Marc Garanger recounts the use of Macaque as a slur against Algerian women in a 1990 issue of Aperture
Aperture (magazine)
Aperture is a quarterly photography magazine and a book publisher based in New York, New York. The magazine is published by Aperture Foundation, a non-profit organization devoted to fine art photography.-Magazine:...
magazine.
2006 Virginia Senate race
United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the United States, and together with the United States House of Representatives comprises the United States Congress. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution. Each...
George Allen
George Allen (U.S. politician)
George Felix Allen is a former United States Senator from the Commonwealth of Virginia, and the son of former NFL head coach George Allen. Allen served Virginia in the state legislature, as the 67th Governor, and in both bodies of the U.S. Congress, winning election to the Senate in 2000...
of Virginia
Virginia
The Commonwealth of Virginia , is a U.S. state on the Atlantic Coast of the Southern United States. Virginia is nicknamed the "Old Dominion" and sometimes the "Mother of Presidents" after the eight U.S. presidents born there...
generated much controversy after he used the word macaca in reference to an Indian American
Indian American
Indian Americans are Americans whose ancestral roots lie in India. The U.S. Census Bureau popularized the term Asian Indian to avoid confusion with Indigenous peoples of the Americas who are commonly referred to as American Indians.-The term: Indian:...
. On August 11, 2006, at a campaign stop in Breaks, Virginia
Breaks Interstate Park
Breaks Interstate Park, also referred as the "Grand Canyon of the South", is located in southeastern Kentucky and southwestern Virginia at the northeastern terminus of Pine Mountain...
, near the Kentucky
Kentucky
The Commonwealth of Kentucky is a state located in the East Central United States of America. As classified by the United States Census Bureau, Kentucky is a Southern state, more specifically in the East South Central region. Kentucky is one of four U.S. states constituted as a commonwealth...
border, George Allen twice used the word macaca to refer to S. R. Sidarth, who was filming the event as a "tracker" for the opposing Jim Webb
Jim Webb
James Henry "Jim" Webb, Jr. is the senior United States Senator from Virginia. He is also an author and a former Secretary of the Navy. He is a member of the Democratic Party....
campaign. Prior to this, the term was almost completely unknown in the U.S.
Sidarth is of Indian ancestry, but was born and raised in Fairfax County, Virginia
Fairfax County, Virginia
Fairfax County is a county in Virginia, in the United States. Per the 2010 Census, the population of the county is 1,081,726, making it the most populous jurisdiction in the Commonwealth of Virginia, with 13.5% of Virginia's population...
. Allen's mother, born Sarah Lumbroso, is of French Tunisian descent and commentators have suggested that she may have learned the pejorative during her childhood and introduced it to her son. Even though Allen claimed that he made up the word and said that he did not understand its derogatory meaning, a media outcry erupted following his use of the term. After two weeks of negative publicity, Allen publicly apologized for his statement and asserted that he in no way intended those words to be offensive. The term "Macacawitz," referring to the September 2006 discovery of Allen's Jewish heritage, was coined by conservative pundit John Podhoretz
John Podhoretz
John Podhoretz is an American neoconservative columnist for the New York Post, the editor of Commentary magazine, the author of several books on politics, and a former presidential speechwriter.-Life and career:...
and was widely used afterwards. A campaign staffer for Democratic Congressional candidate Al Weed
Al Weed
Albert Charles Weed II is a Virginia winemaker, businessman, and Democrat. Weed was the Democratic nominee for election to Virginia's Fifth Congressional District seat, in both 2004 and 2006, running against Republican incumbent Virgil Goode. In 2004, Weed lost 64% to 36%; Goode once again defeated...
used the phrase and was fired for her comment.
The controversy created by Allen's use of the alleged slur is seen to have turned a seemingly inevitable re-election of Allen into a victory for Webb.
External links
- Video of the George Allen (R) statement at YouTubeYouTubeYouTube is a video-sharing website, created by three former PayPal employees in February 2005, on which users can upload, view and share videos....
- Macaca Named Top Politically Incorrect Term of 2006 from Global Language MonitorGlobal Language MonitorThe Global Language Monitor is an Austin, Texas-based company that collectively documents, analyzes and tracks trends in language usage worldwide, with a particular emphasis upon the English language...
- Wilson, Chris (2011, April 26). Wikipedia's "Macaca" Problem. Slate magazine.