honky

1. (Canada, US, derogatory, ethnic, slur) A white (Caucasian) person.
2. (US, obsolete) A factory hand or general unskilled worker.

Etymology

Sense of “factory hand” attested from 1946. Compare hunky, bohunk.
Most likely from hunky (“Hungarian, Slav, eastern European; any white person”), an African-American vernacular shortening of Hungarian. Another possible etymon is Wolof xonq (“red, pink”), a term frequently used in African languages to describe white men.
As a term of racial abuse it was popularized by the Black Panther Party starting from 1967, who sought a rebuttal to nigger.

Synonyms

honkie

honkey

whitey

Caucasian

white

White

Translations

الرّجل الأبيض

białas