Wypipology

Wypipology (pronounced wahy-pee-pol-uh-jee)

A (usually darkly) humorous slang term for the (uncredentialed) branch of cultural anthropology in which a “researcher”, usually a person of color, “observes or studies” the behavior of wypipo (white people).

2017: The construct being wypipo (African-American slang for “white people” generally, especially those perceived to be racist, unaware of their own privilege, or engaging in cultural appropriation) based on African-American colloquial pronunciation of the phrase “white people”) + -ology (formed from -o- (as an interconsonantal vowel) +‎ -logy).  The origin in English of the -logy suffix lies with loanwords from the Ancient Greek, usually via Latin and French, where the suffix (-λογία) is an integral part of the word loaned (eg astrology from astrologia) since the sixteenth century.  French picked up -logie from the Latin -logia, from the Ancient Greek -λογία (-logía).  Within Greek, the suffix is an -ία (-ía) abstract from λόγος (lógos) (account, explanation, narrative), and that a verbal noun from λέγω (légō) (I say, speak, converse, tell a story).  In English the suffix became extraordinarily productive, used notably to form names of sciences or disciplines of study, analogous to the names traditionally borrowed from the Latin (eg astrology from astrologia; geology from geologia) and by the late eighteenth century, the practice (despite the disapproval of the pedants) extended to terms with no connection to Greek or Latin such as those building on French or German bases (eg insectology (1766) after the French insectologie; terminology (1801) after the German Terminologie).  Within a few decades of the intrusion of modern languages, combinations emerged using English terms (eg undergroundology (1820); hatology (1837)).  In this evolution, the development may be though similar to the latter-day proliferation of “-isms” (fascism; feminism et al).  The alternative spelling is wipipology, a practitioner in the discipline is thus a wypipologist or wipipologist.

Michael Harriot, world-renowned wypipologist.

Technically, wypipology is a back-formation from wypipologist, the term coined by journalist Michael Harriot (b 1972), formerly a contributor to the Black-focused website theroot.com and still writing for certain mainstream publications such as the Guardian.  Mr Harriot appears first to have used the word on-line in 2017 although there are unattested references to instances of use in 2016; in his self-edited biographical note on the Root website, Mr Harriot describes himself as a “world-renowned wypipologist.”  The core of wypipology lies in creating something of a parody of (what to some extent may itself be a caricature) the manner in which generations of white cultural anthropologists and sociologists used a language of “otherness” to describe Black societies, contrasting the civilized (white) cultures with those of the Blacks which were characterized variously as uncivilized, primitive, backward, savage etc.

Due for publication in January 2023, Michael Harriot says his Black AF History: The Un-Whitewashed Story of America (HarperCollins, 288 pp, ISBN:0358439167) will be a comprehensive appraisal of American history in which the dominant narrative is directly confronted and corrected to showcase the perspectives and experiences of Black Americans.

The point was not that white sub-cultures weren’t studied or observed; indeed, in the era of massive growth in sociology during the post-war years, many sub-sets of white society, divided across many lines, were the subject of many studies.  However, just as Edward Said (1935-2003) in Orientalism (1978) created a critique of the (Western) field of Oriental Studies in which he deconstructed the distorted cultural representations which he claimed were the product of centuries of Eurocentric prejudice against what lies east and south of Suez, Hariott identified the prevalent white attitude as one of cultural insularity which, combined with a feeling of superiority to non-whites, meant the prevailing attitude could be only inherently racist and oblivious to their multi-layered privileges of whiteness.  One advantage of Hariott’s wypipology was that it was couched in the style of darkly absurdist humor, not something that could be said of Said’s inch-thick polemic and the instances cited by an observant wypipologist might range from the ridiculous to the deadly.  In recent years, theroot has given awards to the white folks thought to have committed the most egregious offences but there were none in 2021, perhaps because Mr Hariott ceased his association.  

Variations on the idea of subverting the constructs of white civilization and their comparison with Black backwardness have often used the language of cultural anthropology and sociology to make the point: 

The fictitious tribe Nacirema ("American" spelled backwards) was first described in a satire of academic anthropology in the June 1956 edition of American Anthropologist and is still used in universities to demonstrate to students the extent to which they are racially pre-conditioned.  In a passage describing seemingly ritualistic practices involving cleaning the mouth, because it's written in a style usually associated with that detailing the practices of pre-modern people, most students when asked, associate it with Black people gathered in a clearing in the jungle.  It's actually a description of 1950s middle-class white Americans brushing their teeth.

Babakiueria (1986) (released on VHS Tape & DVD as Babakiueria (Barbeque Area)) was a satire in which the history of a white invasion of an indigenous nation was reversed.  The events stayed much the same, only the colors were changed.

The 1992 Austrian film Das Fest des Huhnes (The festival of the chicken) was a presentation of the customs and lifestyles of the "native peoples" of Upper Austria, described by a team of Black African anthropologists, using the language and style of white anthropologists.