Pickanniny

Pickaninny (also picaninny, piccaninny or pickininnie) is a racial slur for African-American children and a pejorative term for Aboriginal children of the Americas, Australia, and New Zealand. The origins of the term are disputed. Along with several words for children in pidgin and creole languages, such as ''piccanin'' and ''pikinini'', it may derive from the Portuguese ('boy, child, very small, tiny').

In the United States, the pickaninny is also a derogatory caricature of a dark-skinned African American child, often depicted with unkempt hair, bulging eyes, and large red lips. Such characters were a popular feature of minstrel shows into the twentieth century.

Origins and usage

The origins of the word ''pickaninny'' (and its alternative spellings ''picaninny'' and ''piccaninny'') are disputed; it may derive from the Portuguese term for a small child, . According to the ''Oxford English Dictionary'', the term evidently spread through trade networks using Portuguese-based pidgins during the 17th century, especially the Atlantic slave trade. It was apparently used by slaves in the West Indies to affectionately refer to a child of any race. ''Pickaninny'' acquired a pejorative connotation by the nineteenth century as a term for black children in the United States, as well as aboriginal children of the Americas, Australia, and New Zealand. The term is now generally considered offensive.

Similar terms in Pidgin and Creole languages

The term ''piccanin'', derived from the Portuguese , has along with several variants become widely used in pidgin languages, meaning 'small'. This term is common in the creole languages of the Caribbean, especially those which are English-based. In Jamaican Patois, the word is found as , which is used to describe a child regardless of racial origin. The same word is used in Antiguan and Barbudan Creole to mean "children", while in the English-based national creole language of Suriname, Sranang Tongo, has been borrowed as for 'small' and 'child'.

The term is found in Melanesian pidgin and creole languages such as Tok Pisin of Papua New Guinea or Bislama of Vanuatu, as the usual word for 'child' (of a person or animal); it may refer to children of any race. For example, Charles III used the term in a speech he gave in Tok Pisin during a formal event: he described himself as (i.e. the first child of the Queen).

In Nigerian as well as Cameroonian Pidgin English, the word is used to mean a child. It can be heard in songs by African popular musicians such as Fela Kuti's Afrobeat song "Teacher Don't Teach Me Nonsense" and Prince Nico Mbarga's highlife song "Sweet Mother"; both are from Nigeria. In Sierra Leone Krio the term refers to 'child' or 'children', while in Liberian English the term ''pekin'' does likewise. In Chilapalapa, a pidgin language used in Southern Africa, the term used is . In Sranan Tongo and Ndyuka of Suriname the term may refer to 'children' as well as to 'small' or 'little'. Some of these words may be more directly related to the Portuguese than to .

United States

The pickaninny became the dominant racial caricature of black children in the United States, and typically depicted untamed, genderless children with unkempt hair, bulging eyes, large mouths, and red lips, often stuffing their mouths with watermelon or fried chicken. The child was often depicted as being threatened or attacked by animals, and resistant or immune to pain. The first famous depiction of a pickaninny was the character of Topsy in Harriet Beecher Stowe's 1852 anti-slavery novel ''Uncle Tom's Cabin'', presented as a poorly dressed and behaved, neglected girl, untamable and corrupted by slavery. These characters were a popular feature of minstrel shows into the twentieth century.

Journalist H. L. Mencken (born 1880) wrote that "in the Baltimore of my youth, ''pickaninny'' was not used invidiously, but rather affectionately."

Commonwealth countries

''Piccaninny'' is considered an offensive term for an Aboriginal Australian child. It was used in colonial Australia and is still in use in some Indigenous Kriol languages.
''Piccaninny'' (sometimes spelled ''picanninnie'') is found in numerous Australian place names, such as Piccaninnie Ponds and Piccaninny Lake in South Australia, Piccaninny crater and Picaninny Creek in Western Australia and Picaninny Point in Tasmania.

The term was used in 1831 in an anti-slavery tract "The History of Mary Prince, a West Indian Slave, related by herself" published in Edinburgh, Scotland. In 1826 an Englishman named Thomas Young was tried at the Old Bailey in London on a charge of enslaving and selling four Gabonese women known as "Nura, Piccaninni, Jumbo Jack and Prince Quarben". ''The New Partridge Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English'' says that in the United Kingdom today, ''piccaninny'' is considered highly offensive and derogatory, or negative and judgemental when used by other black people. It was controversially used ("wide-grinning picaninnies") in a letter quoted by the British Conservative politician Enoch Powell in his 1968 "Rivers of Blood" speech. In a 2002 column for ''The Daily Telegraph'', Boris Johnson wrote, "It is said that the Queen has come to love the Commonwealth, partly because it supplies her with regular cheering crowds of flag-waving piccaninnies."

In popular culture

Literature

* 1911In the novel ''Peter and Wendy'' by J. M. Barrie, the Indians of Neverland are members of the Piccaninny tribe. Writer Sarah Laskow describes them as "a blanket stand-in for 'others' of all stripes, from Aboriginal populations in Australia to descendants of slaves in the United States" who generally communicate in pidgin with lines such as "Ugh, ugh, wah!".
* 1936In Margaret Mitchell's best-selling epic ''Gone with the Wind'', the character Melanie Wilkes objects to her husband's intended move to New York City because it would mean that their son Beau would be educated alongside "Yankees" and "pickaninnies".

Television

* 2015Season 1 Episode 14 of ''Shark Tank Australia'' featured Piccaninny Tiny Tots which has since changed its name to Kakadu Tiny Tots.
* 2020Episode 8 (''Jig-A-Bobo'') of the HBO television series ''Lovecraft Country'' features a character chased by ''Topsy'' and ''Bopsy'', two ghoulish monsters depicted as "pickaninny" caricatures.

See also

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References

Further reading

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External links

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Online exhibit of stereotypical portrayals of African Americans
Haverford College

{{African American caricatures and stereotypes

Anti-African and anti-black slurs
Fictional African-American people
Portuguese words and phrases
Black people in art
Stereotypes of African Americans
History of childhood