186
submitted 5 months ago by jeffw@lemmy.world to c/news@lemmy.world
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[-] Semi-Hemi-Demigod@kbin.social 9 points 5 months ago

I'd love to see a citation on that because then I'd feel more comfortable repeating it, as it's a pretty good fact if true

[-] billiam0202@lemmy.world 21 points 5 months ago

It's something I had heard before but didn't see an attribution (though the perjorative "boy" referring to Black men vs "hand" for white men seemed to me to give credence to the idea). The Rancho Los Cerritos Historic Site makes the same claim:

Originally, White cowboys were called cowhands, and African Americans were pejoratively referred to as “cowboys.” African American men being called “boy” regardless of their age stems from slavery and the plantation era in the South. Many southerners moved to the West and westerners would have been familiar with southern racial etiquette. So, it is no surprise that the racial issues prevalent in the North and South were also impacting the American West.

While they do provides sources for that blog post, they don't directly attribute that statement to a particular work. However, this clip from PBS is an interview with Tyree A. Boyd-Pates, curator at the Autry Museum of the American West and he also states that "cowboy" would have referred to a Black cowhand.

[-] preach224@lemmy.world 4 points 5 months ago

just to tack on come context from wikipedia -

“"Cowboy" was first used in print in 1725, and was used in the British Isles from 1820 to 1850 to describe young boys who tended the family or community cows.”

not to say it might have taken on some racial connotations later (or, in fact, if we believe swift’s words literally), but i’m not sure it’s 100%.

this post was submitted on 07 Apr 2024
186 points (86.0% liked)

News

22831 readers
4168 users here now

Welcome to the News community!

Rules:

1. Be civil


Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.


2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.


Obvious right or left wing sources will be removed at the mods discretion. We have an actively updated blocklist, which you can see here: https://lemmy.world/post/2246130 if you feel like any website is missing, contact the mods. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted seperately but not to the post body.


3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.


Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.


4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source.


Posts which titles don’t match the source won’t be removed, but the autoMod will notify you, and if your title misrepresents the original article, the post will be deleted. If the site changed their headline, the bot might still contact you, just ignore it, we won’t delete your post.


5. Only recent news is allowed.


Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.


6. All posts must be news articles.


No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials or celebrity gossip is allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis.


7. No duplicate posts.


If a source you used was already posted by someone else, the autoMod will leave a message. Please remove your post if the autoMod is correct. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.


8. Misinformation is prohibited.


Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.


9. No link shorteners.


The auto mod will contact you if a link shortener is detected, please delete your post if they are right.


10. Don't copy entire article in your post body


For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS