Schvartze (from ; cf. German: ; OED) is a racial slur for black people in the Yiddish language.

Etymology

''Schvartze'' is derived from the Yiddish word ''schvarts'', which means "black". An article for the Washington Jewish Week refers to it as "the S-word".

About

The term ''schvartze'' has been described as "the Jewish N-word" or "the Yiddish N-word". Upper-middle class Jews during the 1800s and 1900s often used the term to describe their black servants because it was assumed they wouldn't understand the word. Among

white White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no hue). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully reflect and scatter all the visible wavelengths of light. White on ...

South African Jews The history of the Jews in South Africa began during the period of Portuguese exploration in the early modern era, though a permanent presence was not established until the beginning of Dutch colonisation in the region. During the period of ...

, the term has a history of being used to describe black South Africans, as well as

Indian South Africans Indian South Africans are South Africans who descend from indentured labourers and free migrants who arrived from British India during the late 1800s and early 1900s. The majority live in and around the city of Durban, making it one of the l ...

and Coloured South Africans. Black Jewish writer

Michael W. Twitty Michael W. Twitty (born 1977) is an African-American Jews, African-American Jewish writer, culinary historian, and educator. He is the author of ''The Cooking Gene: A Journey through African American Culinary History in the Old South, The Cookin ...

noted in 2017 a handful of public instances in which the term was used. He notes that he had never heard the term used in earlier stages of his life and spoke against a return of the word's use, comparing it to the term " kushi". The Black

Orthodox Jewish Orthodox Judaism is the collective term for the traditionalist and theologically conservative branches of contemporary Judaism. Theologically, it is chiefly defined by regarding the Torah, both Written and Oral, as revealed by God to Moses on M ...

rabbi and writer

Shais Rishon Shais Rishon, also known by the pen name MaNishtana, is an African-American Orthodox rabbi, activist, and writer. He has written for ''Tablet'', '' Kveller'', ''The Forward'', ''Jewcy'', and '' Hevria'', as well as writing a semi-autobiographic ...

has objected to the term as offensive and racist, saying that "It is not merely a 'color' word...American Jews do not say 'Pass me my schvartzer jacket' or 'Today I'm wearing my schvartzer hat', adding that term "was thrown around quite often in my youth, even more so toward my fellow African-American Jews who went to yeshiva, and always in lieu of an actual name. In short, in the exact same contest that 'nigger' was used in the 1960s."

Controversies

In 1991, the stand-up comedian

Jackie Mason Jackie Mason (born Yacov Moshe Maza; yi, יעקב משה מזא; June 9, 1928 – July 24, 2021) was an American stand-up comedian and actor. His 1986 one-man show ''The World According to Me!'' won a Special Tony Award, an Outer Critics Cir ...

was criticized by African-American organizations including the

NAACP The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is a civil rights organization in the United States, formed in 1909 as an interracial endeavor to advance justice for African Americans by a group including W. E.&nb ...

, when he called New York City mayor

David Dinkins David Norman Dinkins (July 10, 1927 – November 23, 2020) was an American politician, lawyer, and author who served as the 106th mayor of New York City from 1990 to 1993. He was the first African American to hold the office. Before enterin ...

"a fancy shvartze with a moustache"; Mason later apologized.Thomas S. Hischak (2003)
''Enter the Players: New York Stage Actors in the Twentieth Century''
/ref> In 2009, Mason referred to

Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the U ...

as a ''shvartze'' during one of his stand-up routines, which prompted members of the audience to walk out. In 2021, the

Republican Jewish Coalition The Republican Jewish Coalition (RJC), formerly the National Jewish Coalition, founded in 1985, is a political group in the United States that supports Jewish Republicans. The organization has more than 47 chapters throughout the United States. ...

and other Jewish groups in North Carolina urged Lieutenant Governor Mark Robinson to apologize for antisemitic comments, including a Facebook post that said the film

Black Panther A black panther is the melanistic colour variant of the leopard (''Panthera pardus'') and the jaguar (''Panthera onca''). Black panthers of both species have excess black pigments, but their typical rosettes are also present. They have been d ...

was created by an "agnostic Jew" and a "satanic Marxist" in order to extract "shekels out of your Schvartze pockets." Robinson refused to apologize.

References

{{Reflist

External links

Letter to the Editor: To Yiddish Speakers, 'Shvartzer' Isn't Hateful

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

African American–Jewish relations Anti-African and anti-black slurs Anti-black racism in Canada Anti-black racism in South Africa Anti-black racism in the United States Yiddish culture in Canada Yiddish culture in the United States Yiddish words and phrases

Etymology

About

Controversies

See also

References

External links