What do you think of the word "sallow"?

[Corolla]

I have what I would consider sallow skin, by which I mean sort of the yellow side of olive! I don't think of "sallow" as a complimentary word.

Yet recently I've come across it being used in a flattering sense, eg "beautiful sallow skin". How do you interpret it?

I think it means yellow and a bit anaemic looking. I think, anyway.
So relieved you aren't asking if it would be a good baby name!

A bit sickly.

Sallow - pale slightly yellowish and a sign of illness and/or confinement.
Never heard it as a compliment. It isn’t a compliment. Think this using it mean something else.

I'm English and agree with the unhealthy and sickly looking interpretation.

I had no idea that having a sallow skin was seen as a good thing in a Scotland and Ireland!

My first thought was Petrova in Ballet Shoes was described as sallow. It wasn’t a compliment.

N. Irish here - definitely a compliment, especially to my blue / white complexion and corned beef legs!

My skin is sallow. I never thought of it as positive, yet I quite like my skin tone. I look better in Summer with some colour (not sallow), and sallow in winter.

@Corolla

That's interesting then - most of you see it the same way as I do, not complimentary. Yet I've definitely seen it used as a compliment in books.

My mother would certainly use it as a compliment — to her it would mean ‘not ruddy-looking’, olive, liable to tan easily.

@TableDesk

N. Irish here - definitely a compliment, especially to my blue / white complexion and corned beef legs!

I’m Irish, too — I think it’s certainly used in more complimentary ways here! And yes ‘not like a side of corned beef’ is implied.

@GrumpyHoonMain I’m interested in your belief that this adjective is a racist insult.

I’m interested in the history of language and have never heard anyone say this, but I think it’s interesting that it’s used to describe the complexion of both Mary in The Secret Garden and Sara Crewe in A Little Princess. Both are girls who have been born in India and are deprived of sunlight. I’ve often wondered whether it’s Frances Hodgson Burnett covertly suggesting the girls are Anglo-Indian, ie biracial, at a time that would have been taboo.

I’ve always thought it was used with racist coded meaning in 19the and early 20th century novels. Often to mean mixed race and often pejorative? Trying to think of concrete examples.

Irish and Scottish usage of the word may well be different, because these countries were not colonialists, but subjects, like India. Language reflects culture and their cultural outlook would presumably have been more tolerant of intermarriage. Kipling’s Kim is Irish-Indian, and it’s clearly stated and seen as being a benefit to him IIRC.

I'm Anglo Indian, and have had my skin described as sallow a fair few times. Mostly by my mother it has to be said so don't think there were racist undertones. Although, knowing my mother ...

Definitely a compliment in Ireland.

[quote Drumkilbo]@GrumpyHoonMain I’m interested in your belief that this adjective is a racist insult.

I’m interested in the history of language and have never heard anyone say this, but I think it’s interesting that it’s used to describe the complexion of both Mary in The Secret Garden and Sara Crewe in A Little Princess. Both are girls who have been born in India and are deprived of sunlight. I’ve often wondered whether it’s Frances Hodgson Burnett covertly suggesting the girls are Anglo-Indian, ie biracial, at a time that would have been taboo.[/quote]
Yes. They are probably biracial. Heathcliffe was too - ‘swarthy’ was another way of saying black or mixed race (darker than a white person).

Irish here too- have always dreamed of having sallow skin!!! Means an even lightly tanned smooth skin tone to me- all the good looking girls growing up had sallow skin etc (rest of us had pale, freckled, bumpy skin!)

In Edwardian Britain women avoided the sun, no? Whereas Mary and Sara have sickened for lack of it. I really need to re-read these. IIRC they’re roughly contemporaneous with A Passage to India too.

@Corolla

I'm Anglo Indian, and have had my skin described as sallow a fair few times. Mostly by my mother it has to be said so don't think there were racist undertones. Although, knowing my mother ...

Depending on how old you are it could be. Sallow was used a lot to insult lighter skinned Indians in the 70s. In India it was used to described jaundiced people a lot too. So it wouldn’t have had a good meaning.

I imagine where it’s used in literature it’s to described a biracial or lighter skinned non-white person.

[quote Drumkilbo]@GrumpyHoonMain I’m interested in your belief that this adjective is a racist insult.

I’m interested in the history of language and have never heard anyone say this, but I think it’s interesting that it’s used to describe the complexion of both Mary in The Secret Garden and Sara Crewe in A Little Princess. Both are girls who have been born in India and are deprived of sunlight. I’ve often wondered whether it’s Frances Hodgson Burnett covertly suggesting the girls are Anglo-Indian, ie biracial, at a time that would have been taboo.[/quote]
I don’t think so in specific either case you mentioned — more part of the belief that European children couldn’t grow up healthily in Indian climates, so both girls are sallow-complexioned from heat, rather than ‘healthily’ rosy-cheeked.

But I think elsewhere it implicitly signalled ‘not quite white’ in a way that could include gypsies, light-skinned mixed race complexions, or olive “Mediterranean’. And you certainly saw pastes etc to ‘improve’ and ‘lighten’ a sallow complexion in old beauty books.

sallow (comparative sallower, superlative sallowest) (of skin) Yellowish. (most regions, of light skin) Of a sickly pale colour. (Ireland) Of a tan colour, associated with people from southern Europe or East Asia.

Fascinating. Apols
All Irish and scottish (also?) posters. I’ve never heard this usage ever and it’s really interesting to have such massive divergence.

It's never been complimentary as far as I'm aware. Usually used if a person is off colour or a big jaundiced.

A while ago, when the DNA Ancestry testing thing was very popular I remember reading that as many as 10% of Irish and Scots had some Indian genes. Not really very surprising when the East India Company and then its descendant companies were once such big global employers.

My skin can be sallow. I’m not unhealthy! It’s just my skin tone: what some would call Spanish Irish. I tan really well, brunette, green eyes - just has a yellow undertone.

I would use the word for darker skins (olive and darker) looking paler, washed out and looking tired

Never heard it used as a racist term I often look sallow rather than pale

This is enlightening! I vividly remember buying a new foundation at a couple of years ago and an Irish woman at Mac said I had sallow skin which made me feel a bit One of my parents is Middle Eastern so I have light olive skin. Ever since then I thought she meant I look a bit sickly and yellow - not in a good way.