[Calpernia]

I had to go look pickaninny up. I thought it meant a bunch of kids that roamed the streets. I didn't know it was racial.

[P-40]

I didn't know it was racial.

Same here. It's from a different age, I guess.

[ExpatGator]

You obviously did not grow up down south!

I heard it used mostly by the older black folks in the neighborhoods I grew up in.

[Fierce Allegiance]

I never heard the term. I drove long haul trucks a couple winters, before college, and never once saw this on a mudflap.

[paulat]

I had to go look pickaninny up. I thought it meant a bunch of kids that roamed the streets. I didn't know it was racial.

The lack of knowledge of history on these threads gives me the shivers.

In a certain sense...FReepers lash out at folks who remember what words mean...because they have no knowledge of the history. I very MUCH know what "pickaninny" means, because old, departed members of my family were out-and-out racists.

I am sure that Jay Leno, walking down the street in LA, could ask teenagers, "What is the Confederate Flag?" and just get blank stares.