Chinaman

The term Chinaman has been historically used in a variety of ways, including legal documents, literary works, geographic names, and in speech.

One census taker in El Dorado County wrote, "I found about 80 Chinese men in Spanish Canion who refused to give me their names or other information."

[13] As the Chinese in the American West began to encounter discrimination and hostile criticism of their culture and mannerisms, the term would begin to take on negative connotations.

Washington's attorney general, in his argument, stated that Japanese people could not fit into American society because assimilation was not possible for "the Negro, the Indian and the Chinaman".

[16] Mary Paik Lee, a Korean immigrant who arrived with her family in San Francisco in 1906, writes in her 1990 autobiography Quiet Odyssey that on her first day of school, girls circled and hit her, chanting: Ching Chong, Chinaman, Sitting on a wall.

[17] A variation of this rhyme is repeated by a young boy in John Steinbeck's 1945 novel Cannery Row in mockery of a Chinese man.

In musical works, the term appears in Mort Shuman's 1967 translation of the Jacques Brel song "Jacky": "Locked up inside my opium den / Surrounded by some Chinamen.

[29] In its original sense, Chinaman is now almost entirely absent from British English, with the word shifting from its former descriptive use to a more derogatory usage some time before 1965.

[30] However, chinaman (not capitalized) remained in use in an alternative sense to describe a left-arm unorthodox spin bowler in cricket, although the use of the term is declining due to the racial overtones associated with it.

[29] On April 9, 1998, television sitcom show Seinfeld aired an episode in which a character referred to opium as "the Chinaman's nightcap".

The episode prompted many Asian American viewers, including author Maxine Hong Kingston, to send letters of protest.

NBC's executive vice president for broadcast standards and content policy sent MANAA a letter stating that the network never intended to offend.

[6] In 2001, the Chicago Sun-Times was chastised by William Yashino, Midwest director of the Japanese American Citizens League, for using the term Chinaman in two of its columns.

[8] In March 2007, media mogul Ted Turner used the term in a public speech before the Bay Area Council of San Francisco, California.

Vincent Pan, director of the organization Chinese for Affirmative Action, said it was "a bit suspect" for someone involved in domestic and world politics like Turner to be unaware that the term is derogatory.

Yvonne Lee, a former commissioner of the U.S. Civil Rights Commission, said the apology was the first step, but wanted Turner to agree to further "dialogue between different communities".

[33] In 2010, the Pan Asian Repertory Theatre released a statement explaining their decision to produce a play by Lauren Yee titled Ching Chong Chinaman, a term which has at times been used in doggerel verse with racist overtones.

[34] Artistic Producing Director Tisa Chang explained that "Ching Chong Chinaman takes its controversial title from the late 19th century pejorative jingle and uses irony and satire to reverse prejudicial attitudes towards Asians and other outsiders.

"[35] In 2014, New York Mets pitching coach Dan Warthen referred to Daisuke Matsuzaka's Japanese American interpreter as a "Chinaman".

A proposal to request that the Hawaii Tourism Authority officially disfavour the name Mokoliʻi over Chinaman's Hat failed.