Innie Minnie Miny Moe Lyrics
The one word in the classic nursery rhyme that has child care centres concerned.
Lyrics and song artists for lyrics of innie minnie miny moe. Search lyrics for your favorite songs and artists at URL.com. Read the lyrics to the children's song Eeny Meeny Miny Moe on BusSongs.com. The site contains over 3500 nursery rhymes, cartoons and kids' songs.
Nursery rhymes and songs, for centuries, been used to encourage children to talk and piece sounds together. You probably still have some familiar ones rattling around in your head from when you were a child yourself.
So if Baa, Baa, Black Sheep is one that you particularly favoured, I’m sorry, but I’m about to bring your world crashing down.
Recently some childcare centres in Melbourne have deemed the classic nursery rhyme to be racist. That’s right, racist. Lyrics to the song have even been changed because of the racial connotation associated with a “black” sheep.
So what do teachers do with the rhyme instead? “We try to introduce a variety of sheep,” says Celine Pieterse, co-ordinator of Malvern East’s Central Park Child Care. In other words, children are encouraged to pick any coloured sheep they like. Whether it be pink, blue or any other colour in the rainbow.
Think this is political correctness gone mad? Well so did lots of other parents, with one mother telling The Herald Sun, “What ignorance. The rhyme has nothing to do with race.”
But as far as history goes, Baa, Baa, Black Sheep isn’t the only kids’ rhyme that’s come under fire for being racist. Check out these other classics:
1. Eenie, Meenie, Miney, Moe.
Enee Menee Minee Moe Lyrics
The words go like this:
'Eeny, meeny, miny, moe,/Catch a nigger by the toe./If he hollers, let him go,/Eeny, meeny, miny, moe.'
Well at least, that’s the original, 'nigger' was later replaced by tiger.
2. Bowl of Cherries/Pick a Bale of Cotton.
The words go like this:
'Gonna jump down, turn around, pick a bale of cotton. Gotta jump down, turn around, Oh, Lordie, pick a bale a day.'
The song is known to make a joke of conditions for American slaves.
How did the original 'Eeny, meeny, miny, moe' (featuring the word n*gger) begin? What does it mean line by line?
Innie Minnie Miny Moe Lyrics
Taken from wikipedia:
Some older versions of this rhyme had the word nigger instead of tiger:
Eeny, meena, mina, mo, Catch a nigger by the toe; If he hollers let him go, Eena, meena, mina, mo.[3] This version was similar to that reported as the most common version among American schoolchildren in 1888.[10] It was used in the chorus of Bert Fitzgibbon's 1906 song 'Eeny, Meeny, Miny, Mo':
Eeny, Meeny, Miny, Mo, Catch a nigger by his toe, If he won't work then let him go; Skidum, skidee, skidoo. But when you get money, your little bride Will surely find out where you hide, So there's the door and when I count four, Then out goes you.[11]
It was also used by Rudyard Kipling in his 'A Counting-Out Song', from Land and Sea Tales for Scouts and Guides, published in 1935.[12] This may have helped popularise this version in the United Kingdom where it seems to have replaced all earlier versions until the late twentieth century.[3]
Iona and Peter Opie pointed out in The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes that the word 'nigger' was common in American folk-lore, but unknown in any English traditional rhyme or proverb.[3] This, combined with evidence of various other versions of the rhyme in the British Isles pre-dating this version, would seem to suggest that it originated in North America, although the apparently American word 'holler' was first recorded in written form in England in the fourteenth century, whereas according to the Oxford English Dictionary the words 'Niger' or 'nigger' were first recorded in England in the sixteenth century with their current disparaging meaning. The 'olla' and 'toe' are found as nonsense words in some nineteenth century versions of the rhyme, and it could possibly be that the original 'Where do all the Frenchmen Go?' (probably originating during one of the periods of Anglo-French warfare) was later on replaced by the earlier version in the United States, using some of the nonsense words
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eeny,_meeny,_miny,_moe
I have several questions:
Are words like 'Eeny' 'Miny' 'Skidum' and 'Skidoo' complete nonsense for the sake of creating a memorable delivery? What is the purpose of their usage?
How did the eeny, meeny, miny, moe rhyme begin? Was it a quick rhyme to tell small children, not unlike old pirate songs (ex; sing a song of sixpence, etc.)?
When the rhyme states 'If he won't work then let him go' ... ' is this implying a slave should be murdered, if deemed unproductive? Released to hunt the slave? Is there historical significance here?
When the rhyme states 'But when you get money, your little bride will surely find out where you hide,' What is this in reference to?
Why would anyone ever catch another human being by the toe? Or is this also to create a silly rhyme?
In addition to the now better known substitution of 'tiger' for 'nigger' I can tell you as a small child I definitely heard both iterations which is fascinating to me because I'm only in my 20's - so I'm curious about how the split began. I'd also be curious to hear how common each iteration is and what the origin is?