ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. -- An online thesaurus struck a listing Monday for
the word "Arab" after Arab-American groups complained the entry listed
derogatory synonyms.
The entry, which appeared on thesaurus.com, listed the word as a noun
meaning "beggar," and gave 16 pejorative synonyms including "homeless
person" and "welfare bum."
The American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee contacted the synonym
book's online publisher Friday to complain about the entry; the American
Arab Forum also criticized the listing on Monday.
"I looked it up and I couldn't believe what I was seeing," said Aref
Assaf, president of the American Arab Forum, which is based in Paterson.
Several hours after Roget's Thesaurus was called by The Associated
Press, all entries for "Arab" had been pulled from the site.
Barbara Ann Kipfer, editor of the third edition of Roget's 21st Century
Thesaurus, said the entry had likely been on the site for years, but
never made it into printed versions of the thesaurus.
"We're simply going to take it out," she said on Monday. "The last thing
you want with a thesaurus is to offend anyone."
Kipfer said an 18th-century term "street arab" had appeared in other
thesauruses, referring to a homeless child who has been abandoned and
roams through the streets.
The Internet publishing group that produces the thesaurus.com Web site
also said it was surprised to learn of the entry.
"We got together and tried to resolve it as soon as possible," said
Jasper Chou, director for marketing for Lexico Group.
Assaf said he was satisfied that the listing had been removed.
"We look forward to working with them, should they need a proper
definition of the word. The easier definition is 'anyone who is Arabic,'
which would have been more than sufficient," he said.
