No More Blue: Adding ‘Person of Color’ to the Irish Lexicon | Ireland

The Irish language has always wrestled with describing non-white people. The black man It can refer to a man of any color with black hair or black skin. When writing in capital letters, black man He also referred to Satan.

For generations, Irish speakers have used a strange substitution, blue person (blue person), to refer to non-white people. use of others nonwhite (nonwhite).

One version conjured creatures from the movie Avatar; Language chanted by others associated with the apartheid regime in South Africa.

Now the Guardians of the Irish Language have entered a new term in the National Glossary: nonwhite (nonwhite).

“We were happy to use it,” said Doncha O’Croen, chief terminologist at Foras na Gaeilge, a public body that promotes Irish in the Republic. Ireland And the northern Ireland.

Coiste Téarmaíochta, the Foras na Gaeilge commission that governs the new terms and words, was approved last week nonwhite, which is now included in an online dictionary and database, tearma.ie.

The adoption reflects the evolution of concepts as well as Ireland’s transition from a mono-ethnic society to one where African, Asian and Latino communities are growing, Crone said.

“The concept has a much wider range of applications. You cannot call a Hispanic person black. For people of color, you are talking about any shade of skin other than white.”

The new term was proposed by Ola Majekodunmi, broadcaster and board member of Foras na Gaeilge. The daughter of Nigerian immigrants, she was educated in Irish and felt the terms nonwhite And the blue person It was old.

«blue Not outright offensive or racial slur, but it doesn’t refer to someone like me. I remember when I was in school wondering: Who are these people? I am not blue. «

Committee discussion about nonwhite focused on Preposition. considered person of color (people of color) and nonwhite (People of Color) as alternatives before settling on the literal translation of people of color.

Majekodunmi thinks so black person (black person) It is fine to describe blacks, because Ireland has been secularized and the term no longer risks being associated with Satan. “Today people should not be afraid to say black personShe said.

Instead of the traditional salutation Hello (God and Mary be with you), as many Irish speakers say now Hi (Welcome).

Less than 2% of the population speaks Irish, according to census figures, but revival efforts have been boosted by the Motherfoclóir podcast and other Irish-language content, including the movie Aracht.