#18 Caucasia
A passage I thought was relevant is on pages 10-11.
“She sleeps wit these wihte boys, then acts surprisd when they don’t take he home for diner. I told her, these ofays just want their thirty minutes of difference.” I was pretty sure “ofay” meant white, and without really thinking, I piped from the backseat, “Isn’t Mum ofay?” My father threw me a sharp look. “Yeah, but that’s different.”
Dictionary.com defines the word ofay as a disparaging term for a white person, but I’m sure over time the meaning has evolved to represent different things pertaining to white culture.
In this scene Birdie questions her father asking the question “Isn’t mom ofay?”
Birdie sees her father poking fun at white people calling the “ofays” realizing that her own mother would be considered an “ofay.” Though Birdie’s father doesn’t see his wife as just another white person, but something different all together. He has a sort of double standard that makes his wife immune from the “ofay stereotype. Birdies father sees his wife and his marraige as “different.” somehow. This passage offers insight into Birdies fathers understanding of how he feels about his interracial marraige.
