Wog

This highly insulting term for a foreigner is confined almost entirely to British usage, although it has a minor currency in Australian English. Recorded from 1929, it was originally used only of people of color, especially Arabs and blacks. But in recent decades wog has subsequently been applied in a general xenophobic way to any foreigner (just as gook in American English has been applied to Asians). The common saying “the wogs begin at Dover” encapsulates the worldview behind the usage ( Times Literary Supplement , April 11, 1958). The aspect of color is important, since wog would not be used, say, of Scandinavians or Slavs.

The origin is uncertain, the Oxford English Dictionary commenting that the form is “often said to be an acronym” (the principal claimant being “worthy oriental gentleman”), but the authority continues: “none of the many suggested etymologies is satisfactorily supported by the evidence.” A remote possibility is the abbreviation of the term gollywog , dating from the late nineteenth century. The word is sufficiently inflammatory for personal use to be avoided, as is shown in this instance from 1973: “Judge Sheldon heard that the trouble started when the girlfriends of coloured soldiers … were taunted by members of the Royal Scots as ‘wog lovers’” ( Daily Telegraph , May 31, 3). For the same reason, the word has never been “adopted” or “reclaimed” by the targeted foreigners, in the way that nigger has.