Words About Words: Mysterious Black English

by samclem

The word “ofay” — you’ve probably never heard it used. I’m 66 and white, but I didn’t encounter it until recently, when I was reading about the first half of the 20th century. The word was used by African Americans amongst themselves, and refers to a white person. It was often, but not always, used contemptuously. It appears mainly in Black newspapers between 1898 and the 1930s, usually in columns discussing vaudeville and Black performers.

Years ago, many etymologists suggested it came from Pig Latin. That’s not an unreasonable first guess, but, alas, almost it’s certainly a wrong one. The kind of Pig Latin that would have made the theoretical word “foe” turn into “ofay” just wasn’t popular — or even around — in the 1890s; it became a popular pastime in the 1920s and later.

The next theory was it comes from “au fait,” meaning “experienced,” “expert,” “socially proper,” or “genteel.” Many still cling to this as an explanation, but I tend to disagree. There really is no evidence that it did; besides, why would American blacks borrow a French phrase? There was also a school of thought that it might come from some West African language, much as some words in Black English come from the Gullah dialect of the slaves of 200+ years ago. Not likely.

So, where does that leave us? Still searching. As recently as the mid 1990s, Jonathan Lighter wrote the definite tome on American slang. He had only gotten back to 1925 at that time. Although the pace of etymological research is picking up — with the advent of electronic databases full of optically scanned pages, one can do in 15 minutes what took researchers years of daily labor only 20 years ago — it still requires meticulous care.

I’ll try to update you if anything significant comes up, but in the meanwhile, does anyone have a theory?