whiteface

English

Chestnut-breasted whiteface (Aphelocephala pectoralis) (2)

Wikispecies

Etymology

From white +‎ face.

Pronunciation

• Audio (General Australian):

  (file)

Noun

whiteface (countable and uncountable, plural whitefaces)

1. (uncountable) Makeup that makes the face appear white.

   Whiteface is sometimes worn by clowns and mimes, or in the Gothic subculture.

2. (countable) Any bird of the genus Aphelocephala.
3. A Hereford cow.
4. (countable) Any dragonfly of the genus Leucorrhinia.
5. (countable, slang) A person of European descent. (See usage notes.)
   • 2007 December 10, Janet Maslin, “Cop's Wife Spiraling Out of Control in Chicago”, in New York Times‎^[1]:

     Craig has gotten himself entree into a dangerous Chinatown card game, where he is playing the role of the malleable whiteface, the unlucky Irishman known as Mickey in order to infiltrate the drug-dealing operations of Asian gang members.

6. (countable) A traditional clown who ranks above the auguste.

Usage notes

The "white person" sense is rarely used directly; instead, it is found chiefly in reported or fictional speech, where it is ascribed to non-white characters, often as a way of establishing them as primitives.

Synonyms

• (European): paleface

Related terms

• blackface
• brownface
• redface
• transface
• yellowface

Translations

makeup

bird of genus Aphelocephala

• Finnish: valkonaamamaluri (fi)

Hereford cattle

dragonfly of genus Leucorrhinia

• Dutch: witsnuitlibel f

person of European origin

• Finnish: valkonaama