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"Go back to where you came from" is a racist or xenophobic epithet which is used in many countries, and it is mainly used to target immigrants and/or ethnic groups whose members are falsely considered to be immigrants.[1]
In contemporary United States, it is frequently directed at Asian Americans and Hispanic Americans, and it is sometimes also directed towards African Americans, Jewish Americans and Slavic Americans.[2][3] While often less frequently discussed, it has even been directed towards Indigenous Americans in the US.[4] There is also a common variant of the phrase that has been popularized by the Ku Klux Klan: "Go back to your country." The phrase has a long history which goes back at least as far as 1798. It was originally used in the US by White Anglo-Saxon Protestants and targeted at other European immigrants, such as Irish, Italians, Poles, and Jews.[5][6]
The phrase was popularized during World War I and World War II in relation to German Americans, who were subject to suspicion, discrimination, and violence.[7] The term is often accompanied with an erroneous assumption of the target's origin, as Hispanic and Latino Americans are often told to "Go back to Mexico!", Slavic and other Eastern European Americans are told to "go back to Russia", Asian Americans often told to "go back to China", Desi Americans are told to "go back to India", Arab Americans are told to "go back to Arabia", Jewish Americans are often told to "go back to Israel", and African Americans told to "go back to Africa."[8] The message conveys a sense that the person is "not supposed to be there, or that it isn't their place." The speaker is presumed to be a "real" American, but the target of the remark is not.[9]
Such phrases are deemed by the United States federal government and the court system to be discriminatory in the workplace. Their use has been accepted as evidence of workplace discrimination in cases brought before the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), a federal government agency that "enforces federal law to make sure employees are not discriminated against for their gender, sex, national origin or age."[10] EEOC documents specifically cite the use of the comment "Go back to where you came from," as the example of unlawful workplace conduct by co-workers and supervisors, along with the use of "insults, taunting, or ethnic epithets, such as making fun of a person's accent," deemed to be "harassment based on national origin."[10][11]
- ^ Dwyer, Colin; Limbong, Andrew (July 15, 2019). "'Go Back Where You Came From': The Long Rhetorical Roots Of Trump's Racist Tweets". NPR. Retrieved July 21, 2019.
- ^ Ancheta, Angelo N. (2006). Race, rights, and the Asian American experience (2nd ed.). New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press. p. 72. ISBN 978-0-8135-3978-2. Retrieved February 22, 2021.
- ^ Lien, Pei-te; Mary Margaret Conway; Janelle Wong (2004). The politics of Asian Americans: diversity and community. Psychology Press. p. 7. ISBN 978-0-415-93465-7. Retrieved February 9, 2012.
- ^ Estes, Nick (November 4, 2019). "Go Back to Where You Came From". San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA). Retrieved September 24, 2023.
- ^ "With Latest Nativist Rhetoric, Trump Takes America Back To Where It Came From". NPR.org. Retrieved July 7, 2021.
- ^ Dwyer, Colin; Limbong, Andrew (July 15, 2019). "'Go Back Where You Came From': The Long Rhetorical Roots Of Trump's Racist Tweets". NPR. Retrieved July 21, 2019.
- ^ Hughes, Everett C. (March 1942). "The Tragedy of German-America: The Germans in the United States of America During the Nineteenth-Century-and After.John A. Hawgood". American Journal of Sociology. 47 (5): 778–779. doi:10.1086/219016. ISSN 0002-9602.
- ^ Hines, Bea L. (July 19, 2019). "I was told to 'Go Back to Africa.' Here's why I'm not going anywhere, Mr. Trump". Miami Herald. Retrieved July 21, 2019.
- ^ Rogers, Katie (July 16, 2019). "The Painful Roots of Trump's 'Go Back' Comment". The New York Times. Retrieved July 17, 2019.
- ^ a b Marsh, Rene; Kaufman, Ellie (July 20, 2019). "Federal government found 'go back to your country' phrase to be considered discriminatory in cases". CNN. Retrieved July 20, 2019.
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
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