Tom Geoghegan
Formula One commentator Martin Brundle is being investigated by media watchdog Ofcom after using the term "pikeys" in a television broadcast. But where does the word come from and how offensive is it?
It's a word rarely heard on television. In an interview with motor racing chief Bernie Ecclestone before Sunday's Canadian Grand Prix in Montreal, ITV sports journalist Brundle referred to repairs being made to the track.
"There are some pikeys out there putting down new tarmac at Turn 10. Are they out of the way yet?"
Ofcom said it had received seven complaints and ITV apologised to viewers. Brundle isn't the first media figure to be condemned for using the word, which is considered insulting by the traveller community.
The authoritative Oxford English Dictionary (OED) says it's an offensive term. Last year on ITV's Hell's Kitchen, chef Marco Pierre White said: "I don't think it was a pikey's picnic tonight."
According to the Oxford English Dictionary, its first use in print was in the Times in 1837, referring to strangers who had come to the Isle of Sheppey island to harvest. Later that century it meant a "turnpike traveller" or vagabond.
But in more recent years it has become a term of abuse and in the eyes of the law using it can even be deemed a racist offence, given its association with Irish travellers and Roma Gypsies. In December, at Lewes Magistrates' Court, Lee Coleman, 28, admitted using racially-aggravated threatening words and behaviour after a row with a nightclub manageress.
He had told her: "I'm not paying you, pikey."
Charlotte Brewer, Oxford University lexicographer, says the OED clearly labels it as an offensive term that came from the word "pike" meaning a road on which a toll is collected.
ITV has apologised for Brundle's comments. It didn't make the early editions of the OED at the start of the 20th Century, which probably means it did not have any literary or newspapers sources at the time, although it was used. However "piker" did get into the first edition, which meant much the same thing.
In 1955, Peter Wildeblood, a champion of gay rights whose campaigning later helped decriminalise homosexuality, used the word as a badge of pride: "My family's all pikeys, but we ain't on the road no more."
Then it was a slang word, says Ms Brewer, but not necessarily an unpleasant or insulting one.
"But as we can see from the 2006 entry, the word seems to have come back into use more recently, and the OED editors use the words 'squalid, disreputable, vulgar' to define it. They are sure it is an insulting term.".
This is the language of social discrimination and it's quite shocking that this language is now being bandied about said slang expert Tony Thorne.
There is no word more offensive to a traveller, says Cliff Codona, a Roma Gypsy and chairman of the National Travellers Action Group.
"I'm very proud of Lewis Hamilton. It's fantastic what he's doing for the reputation of the country, absolutely outstanding. I would never think of calling that boy a certain derogatory word - that's what 'pikey' is to me and my community."
He senses that it is gaining popularity as a term of abuse because people have realised how insulting it is.
Slang expert Tony Thorne says "pikey" was being used as far back as the 16th Century but has only become more offensive in the mainstream in the past four or five years.
"Teenagers have been using it for the last few years to replace 'chav'. It's used pejoratively as someone who is sub-proletariat like 'gypsy' or 'gyppo' was used in the 1940s and 50s."
It used to be a word only used among country people who were speaking disapprovingly of a tramp. Brundle probably thinks he can still use the word "pikey" in that innocent way, but his attitude is naive, says Thorne, because it has become an insult and no-one would accept it as a description of themselves.
When used now in urban circles, it usually means a person is beyond the class system, someone without an identity who doesn't matter, and is off the social radar, Thorne suggests. Only in the villages is it likely to have retained its ethnic association with the traveller or gypsy community.
Boris Johnson and David Cameron
Is "posh-bashing" just as bad?
Thorne detects its increased use as reflecting a period in which, post-political correctness, social prejudice is now more acceptable.
Formula One commentator Martin Brundle is being investigated by media watchdog Ofcom after using the term "pikeys" in a television broadcast. But where does the word come from and how offensive is it?
It's a word rarely heard on television. In an interview with motor racing chief Bernie Ecclestone before Sunday's Canadian Grand Prix in Montreal, ITV sports journalist Brundle referred to repairs being made to the track.
"There are some pikeys out there putting down new tarmac at Turn 10. Are they out of the way yet?"
Ofcom said it had received seven complaints and ITV apologised to viewers. Brundle isn't the first media figure to be condemned for using the word, which is considered insulting by the traveller community.
The authoritative Oxford English Dictionary (OED) says it's an offensive term. Last year on ITV's Hell's Kitchen, chef Marco Pierre White said: "I don't think it was a pikey's picnic tonight."
According to the Oxford English Dictionary, its first use in print was in the Times in 1837, referring to strangers who had come to the Isle of Sheppey island to harvest. Later that century it meant a "turnpike traveller" or vagabond.
But in more recent years it has become a term of abuse and in the eyes of the law using it can even be deemed a racist offence, given its association with Irish travellers and Roma Gypsies. In December, at Lewes Magistrates' Court, Lee Coleman, 28, admitted using racially-aggravated threatening words and behaviour after a row with a nightclub manageress.
He had told her: "I'm not paying you, pikey."
Charlotte Brewer, Oxford University lexicographer, says the OED clearly labels it as an offensive term that came from the word "pike" meaning a road on which a toll is collected.
ITV has apologised for Brundle's comments. It didn't make the early editions of the OED at the start of the 20th Century, which probably means it did not have any literary or newspapers sources at the time, although it was used. However "piker" did get into the first edition, which meant much the same thing.
In 1955, Peter Wildeblood, a champion of gay rights whose campaigning later helped decriminalise homosexuality, used the word as a badge of pride: "My family's all pikeys, but we ain't on the road no more."
Then it was a slang word, says Ms Brewer, but not necessarily an unpleasant or insulting one.
"But as we can see from the 2006 entry, the word seems to have come back into use more recently, and the OED editors use the words 'squalid, disreputable, vulgar' to define it. They are sure it is an insulting term.".
This is the language of social discrimination and it's quite shocking that this language is now being bandied about said slang expert Tony Thorne.
There is no word more offensive to a traveller, says Cliff Codona, a Roma Gypsy and chairman of the National Travellers Action Group.
"I'm very proud of Lewis Hamilton. It's fantastic what he's doing for the reputation of the country, absolutely outstanding. I would never think of calling that boy a certain derogatory word - that's what 'pikey' is to me and my community."
He senses that it is gaining popularity as a term of abuse because people have realised how insulting it is.
Slang expert Tony Thorne says "pikey" was being used as far back as the 16th Century but has only become more offensive in the mainstream in the past four or five years.
"Teenagers have been using it for the last few years to replace 'chav'. It's used pejoratively as someone who is sub-proletariat like 'gypsy' or 'gyppo' was used in the 1940s and 50s."
It used to be a word only used among country people who were speaking disapprovingly of a tramp. Brundle probably thinks he can still use the word "pikey" in that innocent way, but his attitude is naive, says Thorne, because it has become an insult and no-one would accept it as a description of themselves.
When used now in urban circles, it usually means a person is beyond the class system, someone without an identity who doesn't matter, and is off the social radar, Thorne suggests. Only in the villages is it likely to have retained its ethnic association with the traveller or gypsy community.
Boris Johnson and David Cameron
Is "posh-bashing" just as bad?
Thorne detects its increased use as reflecting a period in which, post-political correctness, social prejudice is now more acceptable.
Thomas L. Blair is a sociologist and political blogger on the Chronicleworld 'for creative renewal in Black Britain and Afro-Europe'. His work is honoured in the British Library's archive of "social, historic and culturally significant web-based material from the UK domain". He won top prize in the blogging competition on The-Latest.
Sumantra Maitra is a freelance journalist from Mumbai, India. He is a correspondent for All Sports magazine, and a foreign affairs blogger for the Washington Examiner. He has written articles for news website Merinews.com and other regional publications. Sumantra runs a blog at DailyWorldWatch.wordpress.com. He provided exclusive eyewitness reports for The-Latest on the Mumbai bombings of 2008.
Brian Usher is photography consultant for The-Latest.Com. He is a highly experienced editorial and commercial photographer whose work has been published throughout the world, appearing in many well known magazines and newspapers. Brian has featured in several books and has been a writer for the Royal Photographic Society magazine.
Heidi Kingstone has spent time in Afghanistan reporting for a number of publications. Her work has appeared in the Financial Times, The Spectator, The Sunday Times and other international journals. She has also reported from places like Iraq, Rwanda, Lebanon, Sudan, Democratic Republic of Congo, and Kenya. Heidi is The-Latest's Editor at large.
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