Entry · catalog no. 7002
monkey chaser
/ /ˈmʌŋki ˌtʃeɪsər/ /MUHNG-kee-CHAY-ser
noun · Harlem, New York · 1920s
✓ Verified
1.
A West Indian immigrant, especially a Caribbean newcomer to Harlem. Used by native-born Black Americans, often with an edge.
“The old Harlem tensions were right there in the word — they would call a Barbadian a monkey chaser and mean every bit of the distance in it.”
Origin & Attribution
Harlem, 1920s. With roughly one in five Harlem residents born in the West Indies by 1920, native-born Black Americans and Caribbean immigrants lived close and competed closer — over jobs, businesses, and standing. Monkey chaser was the slur that friction produced. Zora Neale Hurston recorded it plainly in her 1942 Glossary of Harlem Slang as "a West Indian." The archive documents it as it was used, without endorsing the contempt it carried.
1920s
Circulates in Harlem amid West Indian migration
1942
Recorded in Hurston's Glossary of Harlem Slang
Region of origin
West
Midwest
N.East
South
The Northeast
Harlem, New York · 1920s
Spoken by
Native-born Black Harlemites
$MONKEYThe Record · cultural traction
▲ Faded104 yrs
ahead of the mainstream
15/100
peak cultural energy
Introduced to English by the culture — logged here before the mainstream caught on.
Cultural usage — the recordMainstream search interest
First used
1922
in the culture
Cultural energy indexed from documented usage, search interest, and citation frequency. The recorded date is the archive’s permanent point of record.
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The Bronx, NY
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Philadelphia, PA
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Citations & Sources
■
Zora Neale Hurston, Glossary of Harlem Slang
1942
■
+ Cite a sourceIrma Watkins-Owens, Blood Relations: Caribbean Immigrants and the Harlem Community
1996
See also