Note: The meaning of white in relation to populations has always been fluid, with people of certain ancestry being excluded for a while before being included, and vice versa. The category has also often acted as a grouping in which persons who are not classified as belonging to another category are placed. However, specific parameters are sometimes defined, as in the 2020 U.S. Census, which states that “the `white` category includes anyone who identifies with one or more nationalities or ethnic groups originating in Europe, the Middle East, or North Africa.” Parables that compare the whiteness of complexion, hair and various objects with snow can be found in literature as well as in our everyday language. Some well-known variations are: “White as driven snow” by William Shakespeare, “White as new-fallen snow” by William Wordsworth, “White as dead snow” by Algernon Charles Swinburne and “White as the snow on high hills” by Elizabeth Barrett Browning. The FBI raided his home in 2000 with an affidavit questioning his use of $200,000 from his white supremacist fundraiser. If Congress accurately reflected our nation on the basis of race, about 63 percent would be white, not 80 percent. This evening in the gondola, with an old and two new friends, is marked in my memory with a white stone. But after winning 55% of the blank vote, Duke had a database of supporters that some politicians coveted. Why not visit the pure white limestone cliffs of the flat earth or the grey granite of the hills? Note: This use of white is sometimes used ironically.

You wouldn`t have wanted her white neck to be one less mite or her beautiful arms to be thinner. There were rumors of screams and lightning coming from the fountain, and reports of a figure in white. No one else would dare to show themselves exposed to a foreigner, a white man. Middle English whit, white, back to Old English hwÄ«t, a name derived from hwÄ«t white entry 1 The normal word, as a noun and adjective, in American English (and increasingly elsewhere) for a white person (as opposed to an African American, a Japanese person, etc.). It avoids referring to skin color or racial group and is less politically sensitive than alternatives. It is also, as an adjective and noun, the normal word used in all English-speaking countries for the people, language, etc. of the Caucasus. And she would wear some of the jewelry with the white dress – only a few, of course not many.

The division of the 114th Congress was 80% white, 80% male and 92% Christian. The sign was written in white on a black background. Note: This meaning of the noun white is usually used in the plural and usually in contexts concerning populations, such as in “a policy supported by many rural whites”. Find out which words work together and create more natural English with the Oxford Collocations Dictionary app. The comparison is used to describe the appearance of a woman in a nurse`s uniform. An extension of this first line of Chesterton`s poem, The Mirror of Madmen, is “White as curarfrost.” Note: Although this etymology seems largely likely for Germanic, the details are problematic. The *-t- in the Indo-European etymon would lead to the expectation of a voiced or voiceless fricative rather than a voiceless stop in Germanic. The explanation lies in the hypothesis that the group *-tn- after the accent in the presumed preform *á ̧±uÌ ̄eiÌ ̄t-nÓ- generated a geminated t (intelligent law), which individual Germanic languages usually shortened to a long vowel (although this is probably not the case with Old High German). Occasional spellings tt in Old Frisian, Middle Dutch and Middle Low German can be considered traces of gemination.

(Seebold believes, however, that these forms are late and secondary, and refers to the neutral nominative hwitt in the manuscript Cotton Caligula of the Heliandâsee Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache.) Their descendants in modern languages sometimes also have a short vowel, which leads to an additional hypothesis that these forms can be traced back to a zero-degree adjective *á ̧±uÌ ̄it-nÓ³-. The old literature on *hwÄ«ta- simply accepts that its Indo-European predecessor was *á ̧±uÌ ̄eiÌ ̄d-, where -d- is a different root extension of -t- in Indo-Iranian and Balto-Slavic words. See discussion and references in R. LÃ1/4hr, Expressivitát und Lautgesetz im Germanischen (Heidelberg, 1988), pp. 263-64; and in G. Kroonen, Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic (Brill, 2013), p. 267. Century, in the spirit of meaning 1a Join our community to access the latest language learning and assessment tips from Oxford University Press! An extension by contemporary writer Barry Targan: “White as polished ivory.” Find the answers online with Practical English Usage, your go-to guide to problems in English.