White

See also: white

English

Pronunciation

• Audio:

  (file)

Etymology 1

• As an English surname, from Middle English White, as a nickname for someone with white hair or pale complexion; in some cases from a personal name of the same meaning. See the modern adjective white.
• Also as an English surname, from Old English *wiht (“bend”), found only in placenames, a derivative of the verb wican (“to yield, bend”); compare Wight.
• As a Scottish Gaelic and Irish surname, used as a translation of several Gaelic names containing the element bán and geal, including Mac Giolla bháin (McElwain, Kilbane), Ó Gealagáin (Galligan), Bán (Bane), and Ó Banáin (Bannon).
• Also as a Scottish and Irish surname, an Anglicization of Irish de Faoite, itself from Anglo-Norman le White, le Whyte, from the same source as the English surname.

Proper noun

White (countable and uncountable, plural Whites)

1. A common British and Irish surname transferred from the nickname.
2. A locale in the United States:
   1. A minor city in Bartow County, Georgia; named for its first postmaster.
   2. A city in South Dakota; named for its first European settler.
   3. An unincorporated community in Washington; named for a Washington state judge.
   4. A ghost town in Missouri; named for a local mining official.

Alternative forms

• (surname): Whyte, Wight

Derived terms

• Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome

Statistics

• According to the 2010 United States Census, White is the 24^th most common surname in the United States, belonging to 660,491 individuals. White is most common among White (65.5%) and Black/African American (28.2%) individuals.

Etymology 2

Adjective

White (not comparable)

1. (chiefly US, sometimes Canada and UK) Alternative letter-case form of white (“of or relating to white complexion or Europeans”)

Noun

White (plural Whites)

1. Alternative letter-case form of white (“European”).
   • 1988, Tsitsi Dangarembga, Nervous Conditions, Faber & Faber Limited (2021), page 155:

     The Whites on the mission were a special kind of white person, special in the way that my grandmother had explained to me, for they were holy.

2. (historical, politics) An anticommunist who fought against the Reds during the Russian Civil War; the term is mostly associated with monarchist forces.

   Hypernym: anticommunist

Anagrams

• withe

Middle English

Alternative forms

• Whyte

Proper noun

White

1. a surname

Descendants

• English: White
• Yola: Whit, Whitthe

References

• “le_White”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007.