Laowai isn't 'foreigner', it's 'Asian'.

[imron]

I didn't hear it much in China, but it gets used quite a bit by Mandarin speakers outside of China.

[Hofmann]

I thought it was Cantonese specific, but apparently it's spread to other languages.

[AlexBlackman]

I didn't hear it much in China, but it gets used quite a bit by Mandarin speakers outside of China.

The same, I hear and read it a lot amongst young Chinese expats in Australia.

Some of whom happen to be friends with me, so I really doubt its usage is confined to hardcore racists.

[fanglu]

鬼妹 too

[Lu]

I've heard Chinese people argue that “鬼子” is a perfectly acceptable term, and that despite being a bit outdated it doesn't carry any prejudice towards the Japanese.

I generally think that it's the people referred to who are to judge how acceptable the term is. Just because Han Chinese think it's fine to call people 鬼子 or 黑鬼 (or 阿卓仔 ['pointy-nose'] or 番仔 ['barbarian'] or what have you) doesn't make it okay.

[AlexBlackman]

阿卓仔 Adogah, is rather cute in a childish way, and it's no more otherising than laowai.

[dnevets]

老外 is white people. If you're black, you're not 老外, you're 黑人.

 

And is 老外 a perjorative term? Depends who is saying it, and how, and to whom. Was talking to a guy (didn't know him very well, but is a colleague of a good friend) and we were all going out to dinner one evening. We got talking about cultural differences (or whatever, as you do) and he dropped 老外 into a sentence, suddenly remembered that he was talking to a white face, and immediately backtracked and used 外国朋友 instead. So to him, a Chinese person, 老外 was clearly a perjorative term and he was afraid of offending me.

[Lu]

Adogah is probably not actively intended pejoratively, but I'm a person, not a nose, and I would prefer to be referred to as such. You see how weird it really is when you consider what it would sound like if you called all Asians 'slanty'. Just because people don't have bad intentions doesn't mean it's not racist.

Perhaps I have thin skin, and fortunately I've never run into anything really bad in this respect, but I still don't think such things are nice. Whether 老外 is pejorative depends on the situation, I think, but there certainly are other words that can be more suitable.

[metal.lunchbox]

The Chinese language is very Chinese, more culturally specific than English. I've seen some very widespread ideas in China that would be rejected as unacceptably xenophobic or racist in the U.S., and I expect the language to reflect that. Multi-culturalism isn't something most people here (in China) are familiar with. It means foreigner (usually white), but it carries with it all the ideas about foreigners that are common in China. The comparison made above with the English word "Negro" is apt. It just meant "black person", but it was loaded with all the racist ideas commonly held at the time, when attitudes changed so did the word. In time such changes may come to China, in which case, the word will probably change as well. I find the word offensive, only to the extent that I find peoples racist and xenophobic attitudes here offensive. Naturally, everyone is an individual and the above doesn't apply to everyone, but language is made by consensus, not by individuals, and the consensus (in China) is that people who look not-east-asian should be defined by that otherness above all else.

 

The overwhelming majority have good intentions, and are totally racist.

 

In response to the above comment that there must surely be some term more suitable, I usually tell people that if they want to call me something they can call me "James" or perhaps whatever other word they prefer to call humans. 

 

Much of the above may not apply to Taiwan, I have never been there, but I know that there are important differences.

 

In regards to cultural changes, I do not see any anti-racism campaign, or any other attempt to push the culture towards more inclusive or mult-cultural attitudes. Actual mixing with foreigners just isn't common enough to change the culture, and the mixing that does happen is brief and superficial enough that it as often leads to misunderstandings as it does to more open-minded attitudes. I think my time here has lead to as many people hating foreigners even more, as it has lead to people realizing that foreigners are people just like them who should not be treated with prejudice, and that's not because I'm an asshole. It's because sometimes people see what they want to see. So I'm just another negro. Some people use it as a racist slur, for others its just an unemotional label for my otherness, either way, it is my name now.

[studychinese]

I was called a 鬼佬 in Sydney, Australia just last week. The speaker was from Guangdong, however. 

 

I used to not be much of a fan of 老外 until people called me  鬼佬. To those people that used the latter, I asked them to use 老外 instead. 鬼佬 definitely doesn't have a friendly vibe to it. I will be OK with 鬼佬 when Chinese people are OK with 黄鬼.

[AlexBlackman]

Maybe it is a Sydney thing, I first heard it here.

[liuzhou]

 

I've never heard 鬼佬 used by Mandarin speakers. Is it common in the south?

 

It's Cantonese so you will only find it in Cantonese speaking parts of China, where it is largely the preferred term.

 

I sometimes hear 洋人, too.

[Kenny同志]

我国 = China 

 

 

I don't agree. Any country can use 我國 because it just means our country. The Mainland uses it, Taiwan uses it, and  Singapore uses it.

[fanglu]

Speaking of Singapore, I saw a Singaporean news article with an interesting title just now: 我国超越中国 成为上半年亚洲最大跨境房地产投资者

[Kenny同志]

I was called a 鬼佬 in Sydney, Australia just last week.

 

If my understanding is correct, this Cantonese word does not carry any negative connotation but speakers who have no knowledge of Cantonese may see it in a different way.

 

I sometimes hear 洋人, too.

 

I use it as a neutral word sometimes, for example 現在翻譯行情不好，洋人也在拼命壓價. By 洋人, I mean those non-Chinese people who run translation agencies in the West.

[陳德聰]

鬼佬 is almost exclusively pejorative here. We only call white people that when we are talking sht about them.

[Guest realmayo]

I was thinking about this recently.

 

In China 老外 are treated as both incompetent and deserving of extra help, often at the same time (e.g. 'this foreigner can't possibly understand that you need to take a numbered ticket from the dispenser and join the queue, so it's best if I take him to the front of the queue straight away').

 

I think that same ambiguity also comes across with the word 老外 -- simultaneously condescending and respectful.

 

And fair enough, most white people in China are a lot less capable of many everyday activities than Chinese people are: communication is the most obvious area. Also food, etiquette/conventions, buying train tickets, whatever.

 

But when a Chinese person overseas refers to natives as 老外 it can give off a less nice impression. Because it seems to carry over that 'not-as-competent-as-us' flavour. But overseas the Chinese person isn't more capable than the 老外 in the terms mentioned above, e.g. communication, food etc. Because now we're overseas, the 老外 is native. So what can that 'not-as-competent-as-us' refer to? It can only mean: 'we Chinese generally are better than foreigners'.

 

Okay, it doesn't have to mean that. People could just be using the term out of habit, or for some other neutral reason. But if that sense of superiority is being carried over from the word's in-China usage, then logically it can only mean 'we Chinese are generally better than foreigners'. And while most people in the world probably think they are better than foreigners, they tend to avoid saying so overseas.

[imron]

If my understanding is correct, this Cantonese word does not carry any negative connotation

Kenny, sometimes a word can have widespread use and be used in way where the person doesn't have any negative intention, however the word itself is just inherently negative and or derogatory.  鬼佬 is one of those words.  It's like if I went around calling you 'chink', but not in a negative way and without meaning any ill intent.  I might not have negative intent, but the word is simply derogatory.

 

Maybe it is a Sydney thing

Nope, definitely Melbourne also.

[Kenny同志]

鬼佬（讀音 : guãy lõw）或者番鬼佬即係高加索人，係廣東話嘅俗語，響普通話俗語就叫「洋鬼子」。跟字面解即係「鬼佬」^[1]，由於廣東人觀念認為高加索人大多數都係紅鬚綠眼，又或者源自19世紀因外國軍隊入侵中國，而產生「鬼佬」呢個詞 ^{[未記出處或冇根據]}。連英文都有gweilo呢個字。

類似嘅，高加索女人叫鬼婆，細路仔叫鬼仔，細路女就叫鬼妹。衍生出嚟，有人叫黑人做黑鬼。有啲高加索人認為「鬼佬」呢個稱呼係對佢哋嘅侮辱^[2]。響1980年代，有啲廣東人響「鬼佬」呢個詞前面加個「死」字，即係咒人哋去死，令呢個稱呼變得有侮辱性。

有好多粵語人口響公衆地方都一樣叫啲白種人或者西方人做「鬼佬」，佢哋認為呢個稱呼冇貶義或者爭議^[3]。「鬼佬」呢個稱呼有出現響香港嘅兒歌^[4]，當時都冇人認為有問題。

有啲白種人覺得鬼佬呢個稱呼係對佢哋嘅侮辱。重有根據香港法例，喺一個工作地方、學校、公共機構等，任何人如基於另一人嘅種族…作出唔受歡迎嘅行徑 （可包括口頭或者書面陳述）…作出嗰個行徑嘅人即屬對第個人作出騷擾（原文：第602章 第7條 種族騷擾）。即係話如果對方唔歡迎或者唔鍾意呢個稱呼，叫佢「鬼佬」有可能會犯法。另一方面，而家有啲住響香港嘅西方人偶然會笑笑吓自稱「鬼佬」，呢點反 映出思想開始變化，由當呢個詞係污蔑至入鄉隨俗。

 

link: http://zh-yue.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E9%AC%BC%E4%BD%AC

 

I was wrong.

 

 

What do you folks like to be called? To be fair, 洋人 is merey neutral at best.

[陳德聰]

I personally like 白人/西人 but I have noticed those seem somehow less desirable when Chinese people choose their words.