Chinks

Chink (also chinki, chinky, chinkie, chinka, chinkapoo or chinker) is an English-language ethnic slur usually referring to a person of Chinese ethnicity. The word is also sometimes indiscriminately used against people of East Asian appearance. The use of the term is considered offensive.

Various dictionaries provide different etymologies of the word chink; for example, that it originated from the Chinese courtesy ching-ching, that it evolved from the word China, or that it was an alteration of Qing (Ch'ing), as in the Qing Dynasty.

Another possible origin is that chink evolved from the Indo-Iranian word for China. That word is now pronounced similarly in various Indo-European languages. But this also comes from the Chin dynasty.

The first recorded use of the word chink is from approximately 1880. As far as can be ascertained, its adjective form, chinky, first appeared in print in 1878. The derogatory word Chinky remains in use in Britain as slang for Chinese food.

Around the turn of the 20th century, many white North American perceived Chinese immigration as a threat to their living standards. However, Chinese workers were still desired on the West Coast due to a persistent labor shortage. Chinese butcher crews were held in such high esteem that when Edmund A. Smith patented his mechanized fish-butchering machine in 1905, he named it the Iron Chink, which is seen by some as symbolic of anti-Chinese racism during the era. Usage of the word continued, such as with the story "The Chink and the Child" by Thomas Burke, which was later adapted to film by D.W. Griffith. Griffith altered the story to be more racially sensitive and renamed it to Broken Blossoms.

Although chink refers to those appearing to be of Chinese descent, the term has also been directed towards people of other East and Southeast Asian ethnicities. Literature and film about the Vietnam war contain examples of this usage, including the film Platoon (1986) and the play Sticks and Bones (1971, also later filmed).

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