Dictionary

miscegenation en · NOUN

Pronunciation

• /mɪˌsɛd͡ʒ.əˈneɪ.ʃən/
• (US) audio

Etymology

Blend of Latin miscēre (“mix”) + Latin genus (“race”) + -ation. Coined by American journalist David Goodman Croly in 1864 and first used in an anonymous pamphlet he coauthored, which claimed to be written by a person who believed in the inherent unity of all racial groups, that marriage between blacks and whites would create a better race, and that the American Civil War was a fight for the latter idea. Later, it was exposed that the pretext of the pamphlet was false and that it had actually been written by a group which hoped to inflame anger, particularly against then-US President Abraham Lincoln who was up for reelection. Replaced previous amalgamation, from metallurgy.

Meanings

1. (US, countable, uncountable) The mixing or blending of race in marriage or breeding, interracial marriage.
   • Anissimov took to posting paranoid white supremacist rants on Twitter. Why, he asked, do “blacks get your own continent”? “European whites are being replaced and destroyed by ‘diversity,’” he cried. He denounced miscegenation and declared that women should be confined to the home. 2018, Corey Pein, Live Work Work Work Die, Metropolitan Books, →ISBN, unnumbered page:
2. (countable, figuratively, uncountable) A mixing or blending, especially one which is considered to be inappropriate.
   • as is clear in the works of Nathaniel Hawthorne, it has a horror of any spiritual miscegenation between the human and the natural. 1991, Frederick Turner, Rebirth of Value: Meditations on Beauty, Ecology, Religion, and Education, page 57:
   • ... if a miscegenation of Latin and Sanskrit may be permitted. 1981, Dale Maurice Riepe, Asian Philosophy Today, page 22:
   • ...'true English' before it was bastardised in its miscegenation with the Norman French. 2001, Ken Hirschkop, David Shepherd, Bakhtin and Cultural Theory, page 180:

Forms

Deriveds

miscegenetic · antimiscegenation · miscegenational · miscegenist · miscegenous · miscegenic · miscegenationist · miscegenistic · miscegenative

Relateds

miscellaneous · mestee · one-drop rule · miscegenate

Synonyms

race mixer · race mixing · miscegeny

Translations (17)

it miscegenazione (the mixing or blending of race) · fi rodunsekoitus (the mixing or blending of race) · ar تَمَازُج الأَجْنَاسِ (the mixing or blending of race) · sv rasblandning (the mixing or blending of race) · ru смеше́ние n рас (the mixing or blending of race) · cmn 種族混合 /种族混合 (the mixing or blending of race) · no raseblanding (the mixing or blending of race) · ru метиса́ция (the mixing or blending of race) · nl verbastering (the mixing or blending of race) · nl rassenvermening (the mixing or blending of race) · is kynþáttablöndun (the mixing or blending of race) · bg кръстосване на раси (the mixing or blending of race) · es mestizaje (the mixing or blending of race) · pt miscigenação (the mixing or blending of race) · ta இடையினத் திருமணம் (the mixing or blending of race) · it mescolanza etnica (the mixing or blending of race) · fr métissage (the mixing or blending of race)