What do you call people who are not white?

[Pansy0926]

Completely unsure of what category this should come under, so apologies!

What do you call people who are not white, but you don’t know what ethnicity they are?

For instance, describing a stranger. You could say ‘black’ but to me that implies very dark skin, not slightly less dark ie lighter than Indian/Pakistani etc...

I don’t want to be offensive and now that ‘coloured’ is considered racist, I’m a bit stuck. My manager at work recently informed us that we should use ‘black’ as a catch all phrase. To me this is innaccurate and confusing. My friend is Pakistani, and that’s how I would describe him, but only because I know he is from Pakistan, which I couldn’t know just by looking. I could have easily made the mistake of thinking he is Indian or Arabic, so I guess I would have to call anyone who has his skin colour ‘asian’, even though to me that makes me think of Chinese/Japanese.

What is the appropriate term now? ‘Mixed parentage ‘ and ‘dual heritage’ don’t exaxtly roll of the tongue and I imagine using those terms would get me a few odd looks. The only thing I can think to say are ‘not white’ and ‘dark/darker skinned’

Why do you need to refer to people using their "ethnic origin" at all?

Surely using their name is better?

how often is this a problem in your life?

I spend 0 time describing strangers to be honest

Well the OP said when describing a stranger, so not sure how she could use their name? [

I would say “looks like he might be South Asian” if i thought it possible he was Pakistani/Indian/Bangladeshi. Or “looks like she might be East Asian” if I thought maybe Chinese/Japanese/Korean.

I’m not sure I come up against this problem very often though - I would usually have other ways to describe someone - eg “the man who works in Accounts”.

It's rather disingenuous to pretend you never need to refer to someone's appearance which might include skin colour. I find it easiest, because I'm a terribly naice middle-class coward, to say totally non skin colour descriptions (that man in the red coat) but I am permanently in a state of white mc confusion about the politest way to describe skins. Brown is ok, or black if relevant.
I think if you don't know someone's ethnicity it is not polite to guess at it, because they are quite likely to be English or whatever no matter what colour.

If I were describing a person and I couldn’t say they were a “white” person, I would describe the ethnicity they resembled most. For instance, an Asian looking man, or she had darker skin than us, or as black or olive skinned. Same as some people may have REALLY white skin and freckles.
I’m not racist so I’m pretty sure that’s ok, it’s just a description afterall.
If I want to know the person I ask their name and if they have an accent I can’t work out I ask where they’re from.
It’s not offensive. I wouldn’t be offended if I were asked.

Isn't it supposed to be "people of colour"?

Well for instance a new lady started at work, and we now know her name, but some of the ladies were awkwardly saying ‘the girl with the black hair in a ponytail’ when someone asked us who had done something. We couldn’t even say ‘the new girl’ as there are always loads of new people. She didn’t have any distinguishing features, was average height, weight, wearing staff uniform...if someone had just said coloured we would all know, as it would have narrowed it down to the one person. If she had been black, we could have said that, but she wasn’t even obviously asian, just darker skinned.

People of colour is more American I’m not sure why but it’s not said in UK so I wouldn’t want to chance it if ‘coloured ‘ isn’t ok. I think I might just go with ‘darker skinned’ or ‘___ looking’ as TuTru suggests

I think you can usually tell by looking. I would describe your Pakistani friend as ‘south asian’, someone who looked Chinese as ‘East Asian’.

I really don't spend much time describing strangers though. I've been a witness to a crime and had to describe someone to the police.

I just really cant think were I need to say much about a strangers skin tone that would add much. As you say clothes, job roles, height, weight hair styles and what they were doing is normally sufficient.

I think general globe areas are probably ok 'African decent, norther European, souther European, native American, south east asia, far east, middle east

my indian friends seem to say brown

My mixed race 5 year old DS (definitely not yet conforming to what society expects) is very comfortable with the word brown to describe him... you can call him light brown even, if you call him black he will correct you to "it's actually brown that I am if you look"

He says exactly what he sees. Who am I to disagree?

I find it's us white folk who tie ourselves in knots over what we can and can't say as we're so desperate to not be seen as racist we probably come off ten times more offensive by the end of us clearly beating around the bush trying to be PC

You need to learn the cop codes . It’s very clear as long as you understand that IC4 means South Asian (what used to be called “Indian subcontinent”) not SE Asian.

What do you call people who are not white, but you don’t know what ethnicity they are? Their name. Never felt need to say what colour or ethnicity they are.

Well for instance a new lady started at work, and we now know her name, but some of the ladies were awkwardly saying ‘the girl with the black hair in a ponytail’ when someone asked us who had done something. Why couldn't you just say the new girl in X department/desk.

I don't understand why you would need to describe some one in that much detail, unless you making a police report.

Clutterbugsmum well for a start I had no idea where this person worked just that she worked for the same company. Tbh I’m not sure why, but you seem to be quite defensive/taking this personally. I assure you I am just curious about what is appropriate. Clearly your opinion is that it’s better to avoid mentioning race completely, and you could have just said that instead of your accusatory tone.

Surely it’s better to educate myself? I didn’t have any luck with a google search as none of it sounded quite right. I’m merely asking people’s opinions, not trying to be offensive. Don’t we all try to avoid being socially awkward? And accidental racism is quite cringey when it happens to you I imagine. I’d like to be informed.

Perhaps I am quite backwards as far as things like this are concerned as where I live it’s a small town and there are not many non white people.

I rarely have to describe someone by race and of course I use their name if I know it! I was only asking what’s normal for others to say in the case of strangers. Almost all the customers are strangers and I frequently have to describe people I don’t know. I’m sure most people won’t be offended if I do my best and am polite and respectful but there are people like you who clearly do take offence if I say the wrong thing, even if that thing is not a racial slur but mentioning colour at all.

If the person you were trying to describe was white, would you say, "that white guy over there"? Probably not. And if they turned out to be White Irish, they might take offence that you didn't realise.

No, you'd likely use some other physical characteristic, if you needed to pick them out from a bunch. But ultimately, words don't have intrinsic meaning, they have usage which we assign to them, so use whatever word you feel most accurately describes them for the purpose you need. Someone will always take offense if they really want to.

I would use non-white even though I know some people don't like this as it defines other people based on white being the norm. I also sometimes use ethnic minority because even though white people can be included as an ethnic minority (Irish travellers for example) it is used to mean non-white. BAME is also used as is people of colour.

I don't think saying 'just describe other things about the person' is a suitable solution. Sometimes you need to talk about the presence of entire groups e.g. 'we need to encourage more ethnic minorities to attend the conference for it to be representative'.

"If the person you were trying to describe was white, would you say, "that white guy over there"? "

It would be natural to say that in a place where white people weren't a majority. In OP's small town, it probably wouldn't help narrow it down.
Irish people are white too so I don't see a problem with calling a white Irish person white any more than calling a white French person white.

Please not “people of colour” I can’t stand that phrase.

I actually do have to do this a lot - it’s an ethnically diverse area, and I run a playgroup that has health visitors, speech therapists etc visiting. Very often a mum will tell me they need to speak to one of the specialists, so I need to point her out in a crowd to the relevant specialist.

I could avoid descriptions of their skin tone but it gets ridiculous- “the lady in the blue top, with a ponytail, and quite tall....no, not that one, the one with big earrings, no, yes! That one!”.

I’m white (and riddled with white middle class doubt/guilt about not wanting to sound racist), but I noticed that the other playgroup workers and the specialists, none of whom are white, all cheerfully and factually refer to skin tone if it’s helpful to describe somebody.

So I don’t try to guess ethnic background, because mostly I have no idea, but I will now say “the lady in the blue top, olive skin” or whatever and it’s much easier as skin tone is one of the first things people spot.

So - very pale, white, tan, Olive, light brown, mid brown, dark brown. Try to keep it like any other factual description.

People of colour doesn't sound right unless you're talking to a close friend I'd say who's likely not to take offense.

would it be rude to ask her where she's from? so if she said Sri Lanka for example.. then just say the new lady from Sri Lanka ?

Shen
Yes it would because she might be 100% British though of Sri Lankan descent.

I've thought about this in the past and have said "non-Caucasian"

I say bame or something clearer if I am able to. And try not to over think it.

You could say ‘black’ but to me that implies very dark skin, not slightly less dark ie lighter than Indian/Pakistani etc...

Not all black people are "very dark skinned".

OP, I think the issue is that it really isn't helpful to have a single catch-all "non-white" label when describing an individual. It lumps all Black and Minority Ethnic people together and sets them apart from white people, even when they might have very little in common with each other.

Non-white covers such a huge range of ethnicities that it isn't really helpful as a descriptor. If you really need to describe someone's ethnicity in order to identify them, then it would be better to be more specific about what they look like instead of merely noting that they are not white. Eg black, south Asian, East Asian etc. You can always hedge it a bit if the ethnic origin isn't clear.

The problem with defining people as not white (however that description might be phrased) is that it sets up "white" as being the normal default option, while not actually telling you much about the individual in question at all. It's a bit like saying we need a catch-all phrase to describe any hair colour other than red, or any eye colour other than blue.