A columnist in Cricinfo mentioned in one of his articles how in some households of Bengal..dark or wheatish skin color is described as ‘moila’ (translates to ‘dirty’) without them being accused of being racists. Thats because they do it with no racial connotations what so ever. The context was how different words mean different things in various cultures/people. Apparently, its ok or atleast less offensive to direct a ’maa ki’ expletive than call some one a ‘monkey’ in some places.
You describe someone’s skin as ‘Moila’ or its equivalent in any other country …and you are in big trouble.
Nevertheless, I feel the word ‘moila’ at the very outset is outright racial…we shouldn’t be using it even to harmlessly describe anyones skin tone given its meaning…its sad that the word has got ingrained in Bengali vocab and some other Hindi dialects.
Im sure its the Brits who used to refer to us as that (with definite intentions of meaning it)and we got used to it and continued using it even in our present day parlance without actually thinking too much about its meaning. Sad!
Why should skin color be referred as ‘dirty’….however innocuous the context is?
‘dirty’ is not a skin color..Perhaps one of banes in disguise the english left us with…
Racism is ‘dirty’ not skin…period.
Sudha said,
February 5, 2008 at 6:40 pm
Okay, totally off topic, but: I love your new template! And that songs widget, whatever it is. =)
Sudha said,
February 14, 2008 at 2:28 pm
You hath been tagged! Here: http://umeed-se-dugna.blogspot.com/2008/02/coraline-le-chevalier-deon-kyle-xy-and.html