Honkie

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A derogatory term used to refer to a white person, often implying racial prejudice
2. A pejorative label applied to Caucasians, typically in contexts of racial tension or discrimination
3. An insulting expression directed at white individuals, reflecting negative stereotypes or cultural biases

Etymology: Before the word described white people, it was a term for a Hungarian or any Eastern European, a shortening of "hunky," itself an African-American vernacular clipping of "Hungarian." The sense "factory hand" is attested from 1946, which fits the immigrant laborers of northern industrial cities, and related forms like "hunky" and "bohunk" carried the same ethnic sting. The leap to a general term for white people is usually traced to "hunky" used as "any white person," which the word "honky" then took over. A competing idea links it to the Wolof "xonq," meaning "red" or "pink," a word used in many African languages for white men. Scholars regard the "hunky" route as the more likely source. The term became a weapon of racial abuse when the Black Panther Party popularized it from 1967 onward, using it as a deliberate counterpart to the slur "nigger," so that white people would be insulted in kind.