In 2016, the then U.S. President Barack Obama signed a legislation that made the words “Negro” and “Oriental” things of the past, striking the racially-charged terms from federal law.
In a rare instance of bipartisan cooperation, the measure passed easily through Republican-controlled House and received unanimous support in the Senate.
Meanwhile back in the North Atlantic, it is unlikely that the use of the Faroese equivalent of “Negro”, ‘nekari‘ , will be prohibited anytime soon.
According to a new poll, created on Facebook yesterday, an overwhelming majority of Faroe Islanders do not perceive the word ‘nekari’ as offensive.
A Facebook user asked the members of the group “Føroysk Rættstaving” (Faroese orthography) “whether they perceive the Faroese word “nekari” (Negro) as offensive or not.”
The poll is still not closed, but the tendency is pretty clear.
No less than 69.6% of respondents said they do not find the word ‘nekari’ derogatory.
27.09% of respondents said they found the word offensive, while the rest are undecided.
1809 people have participated in the poll so far (as of 22 May 2019, 2.40pm).