wog
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: ipa: /wɒɡ/
ipa: /wɔɡ/
ipa: /wɑɡ/
rhymes: -ɒɡ
Forms: form: wogs
Etymology: The origins are not entirely clear. The term was first noted by the lexicographer F.C. Bowen in 1929, in his Sea Slang: a dictionary of the old-timers’ expressions and epithets, where he defines wogs as "lower class Babu shipping clerks on the Indian coast."
The most common theory is that it is a clipping of golliwog, which was first used as the name of a black-faced doll in Florence Upton’s 1895 book The Adventures of Two Dutch Dolls and a Golliwogg. A variety of folk etymologies exist, with the most common claiming that the word is an acronym for one of either westernized, worthy, wily, or wonderful preceding “Oriental gentlemen”. Another erroneous claim is that it was used in the mid 1800s, with WOGS (meaning Working On Government Service) stencilled on the shirts of Indian workers in Egypt.
The Scientologist sense is from the usage of L. Ron Hubbard, who apparently accepted the folk etymology from “worthy Oriental gentleman” but employed the term to mean “common ordinary run-of-the-mill garden-variety humanoid”.
Senses: examples: text: 'One of the little Indian girls whose name is Polly has just come in to ask, " Miss D., what is a wog? One white boy called me a polliwog, and I thought a wog must be something bad."'
ref: 1889, The American Missionary Volume 43 p. 81:
text: "The King Edward's Horse called the Indian Cavalry 'The Wogs'—which is the diminutive of 'Golliwogs',—a description that was very apt of these dark apparitions in khaki and tin-hats."
ref: 1921, Lionel James, chapter 18, in The History of King Edward's Horse, page 188:
glosses: Any person who looks in-between "white" and "black": originally specifically an Indian, but later also broadened to anybody of Middle Eastern or Mediterranean descent.
examples: text: 'Every fucking aussie. Go to Cronulla Beach Sunday for some Leb and wog bashing Aussie Pride ok.'
ref: 2015, Johnny Lieu, “Cronulla Riots: What happened on one of Australia's darkest days”, in Mashable:
glosses: Specifically someone of Mediterranean descent, including Italians, Spaniards, Portuguese, Lebanese, Greeks, and Maltese.
examples: text: So yes, they do keep records, but no they are not 'accurate' in the wog world meaning of the word.
ref: 1998 December 31, Hartley Patterson, “Documented Membership??”, in alt.religion.scientology (Usenet), message-ID <76gomd$tae$1@news4.svr.pol.co.uk>:
text: I'm of course talking about Hubbard's books (including Book One) being extensively rewritten, and Scn's decision to remove any mention of LRH from materials intended for wogs.
ref: 2007 June 21, Dave Touretzky, “date correction for DM's big revelation”, in alt.religion.scientology (Usenet), message-ID <467ab5da$1@news2.lightlink.com>:
text: At the Org there were mixed feelings towards wogs because, at any given time, there were wogs in our midst. Wogs coming in off the street in search of Scientology services were looked upon favourably […]
ref: 2012, Bruce Clark, Love, Sex, Fleas, God:
topics: Scientology
lifestyle
religion
glosses: A person who is not a Scientologist.
Synonyms: sense: person of Italian descent
word: dago
sense: person of Italian descent
word: Eyetie
sense: person of Italian descent
word: goombah
sense: person of Italian descent
word: greaseball
sense: person of Italian descent
word: guido
sense: person of Italian descent
word: guinea
sense: person of Italian descent
word: wop
Derived terms: clog wog
wogball
wog box
woggish
woggy
wogspeak