Following a discussion on another list, I'd like to hear, from Americans in particular, an answer to the following: How acceptable, or not, do you find the phrase 'eeny meeny miney mo' on its own, with no reference to the following line as a method of random selection? Is it so culturally tainted by the N word that used, at least, to appear in the second line that you now find it totally unacceptable in any context, or would you still use it? Or is it going out of use anyway? I don't think that Brits by and large would have a problem with it, but I can imagine that US history over the last century could mean it would have different implications to Americans. (An indication of your approximate age and location would be helpful - if it doesn't already appear in your profile - in case it's either an age-related or geographical issue) Apologies if the subject has been brought up before, but the search function isn't working for me today.

• Eenie Meenie Miney Mo Lyrics
• Eanie Meanie Minie Mo

I learned 'catch a tiger' as a child, and we used the rhyme frequently. I never knew there was an another offensive version until I was 39 years old (last year.) I'm certain that my parents (who born in the early 1940's) never knew the offensive version either, or they would never have allowed us to use it. I wouldn't use the rhyme now.not because it's politically incorrect, but because I wouldn't want to be unkind.

Losing Count. By Adrienne Raphel April 16, 2015 On Language “Eeny, meeny, miny, mo” and the ambiguous history of counting-out rhymes. A Works Progress Administration poster for the Cedar Central Apartments in Cleveland, Ohio, ca. Eeny, meeny, miny, mo. Of all of the phrases and idioms in the English language 'eeny, meenie, miny, mo' must be the one with the widest variety of spellings. I've opted for 'Eeny, meeny, miny, mo' but there are many others - 'Eenie, meenie, miney, moe', 'Eany, meany, miney, mo' and so on.

Erroneously or not, many black people have learned that it first contained the word nigger. On the other hand, if I were black, I would like to think that I would be mature enough to 'let it go' if I heard somebody use it-at least if they used it without nigger. Until I had viewed this post, I also had no idea that there were other versions than the one that I had learned.

Especially not any racial ones. However, I don't see why that line wouldn't be acceptable on its own. I mean it would have no racist ties, or anything else to it, so therefore it should be fine.

Eenie Meenie Miney Mo Lyrics

The version I learned is not very different than most peoples. Eeny meeny miney mo Catch a tiger by his toe If he hollars let him go, My mother said to pick the very best one and you are not it! Depending on how fast you wanted to pick, and what the strategy was, the person you pointed at on the word IT! Was it or out, or they were not IT and won the game.Whatever you wanted. Growing up in the northeast U.S. In the late 1940s and early 1950s, I heard, learned, and used it with 'tiger' and 'monkey.' Didn't know it had a racist version until a decade or two later.

(That is still well before I came upon this thread, of course) To me, using 'piggy' makes little sense. In my childhood, as well as those of my children and grandchildren, a 'piggy' was a toe - as in 'This little piggy went to market, this little piggy.' How can you catch a toe by the toe? Do toes have their own toes? If they do, do those toes have toes too? It boggles the mind.

Click to expand.I'm only a year older than you, but the nigger version was the only one I ever heard - and with typical childish innocence, we saw it simply as a rhyme. Given how few people are aware that that version ever existed, I think it would be safe to assume that the words 'eeny meeny miney mo' on their own or with one of the more recent follow-on versions should be safe to use. Alisonp, you are right to be interested in people's age in relation to this question.

In fact, I think it is a great pity that more of us don't include our age in our profile, because it is a very important factor where our language/vocabulary is concerned. This discussion is fascinating. Growing up in the 1950s, we said 'Crack a nigger on his toe,' and even though we knew better than to use that word in other circumstances, we thought nothing of it. In the 1970's my son came home with 'Touch a tiger on his toe.' The line also appears in a song: Eenie meenie meenie, miney moe Miney moe, catch a whippersnapper by the toe And if he, if he hollers hollers, let him go Singing eenie meenie meenie, miney moe. There's a second verse, but I don't know it.

Silly song, but my point is that the phrase seems to appear in other places as well as the rhyme. I grew up in Southern California saying the 'tiger' version. I think my mother, who was born in the South, was the one who told me about the n-word version after I got a little older, NOT because she approved of it, because she most definitely did not - I'm not sure what she would have done had she ever heard me use that word, but I would not have enjoyed it - but because she thought it was important for me to know about the rampant racism she grew up around. (They had separate water fountains and everything when she was a kid.) 'Nigger' was never an innocent word in the South, or if it ever was, it had been several generations since this was so even when my mother was growing up. I'm quite sure that people in other parts of the country and the world could have used it quite innocently, though. And anyway, I don't think anybody could possibly object to 'eeny meeny miny mo.' You hear it alllllll the time.

I learned the N-version in 1950, during the first days of the first grade in a small town near Indianapolis. When I recited it outdoors with playmates at home, my mother and my father suddenly both appeared at my right and left elbows and ordered me to STOP! And to NEVER! Use that word again.

My mother suggested, incomprehensibly, that I say 'monkey' instead. 'But Mother,' I insisted, 'that's not the way the poem goes.' I don't remember when I eventually learned what the N-word signified, but I do know that every part of that rhyme now, for me, is anathema. Grew up in US-Pennsylvania in the 1940s-50s. I heard the n version from classmates, but was not allowed to use it. We said tiger.

But my grandmother, born in 1884, daughter of missionaries and grown up on a Blackfeet reservation in Fort Hall, Idaho and later in California, taught me two other versions, completely different, which I liked simply because they were different and fun to say: Eeny, meeny, miney, mo, Crack a feeny finey foe. Ippa nuja poppa tuja, ick, bick, ban, dao. Or: One-ree, orey, ickery ann, Philisy, pholisy, Nicholas John. Queevy, quavy, English Navy, Stickolum, stackolum, John Buck. The spelling in both is pure guesswork, of course.

Her father claimed English ancestry. Could he have taught her the second one, perhaps? Youtube etv daily serials. Could the first one include some counting in the Blackfeet language, or are those nonsense syllables?

Eanie Meanie Minie Mo

I suppose I'll never know. When I was a kid we used the 'nigger' version - this was small-town southern Michigan in the early '60s, and at that point I don't believe I'd ever actually seen a black person except on telly. It's been years since I last used it, but I see no reason not to do so when the situation calls for it, though I would say 'tiger' or 'penguin' now. (As in the song Sparky quoted, we said 'Eeny meeny miney mo' again after 'let him go.' ) As for Rch's alternates, ZUI The Outdoor Handy Book, by Daniel Carter Beard (1896).