# honky

> English word · Noun · frequency rank #37,494

## Definitions
1. A white (Caucasian) person.
2. A factory hand or general unskilled worker.

## Etymology
Sense of “factory hand” attested from 1946. Compare hunky, bohunk.
Most likely from hunky (“Hungarian, Slav, eastern European; any white person”), an African-American vernacular shortening of Hungarian. Another possible etymon is Wolof xonq (“red, pink”), a term frequently used in African languages to describe white men.
As a term of racial abuse it was popularized by the Black Panther Party starting from 1967, who sought a rebuttal to nigger.

## Easily confused with
- **hoy** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/honky-vs-hoy)
- **hook** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/honky-vs-hook)
- **hunk** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/honky-vs-hunk)
- **honor** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/honky-vs-honor)
- **horny** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/honky-vs-horny)
- **hooks** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/honky-vs-hooks)
- **husky** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/honky-vs-husky)
- **howdy** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/honky-vs-howdy)
- **hotly** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/honky-vs-hotly)
- **hunky** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/honky-vs-hunky)
- **hoppy** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/honky-vs-hoppy)
- **Hornby** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/honky-vs-hornby)
- **hon** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/hon-vs-honky)
- **holy** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/holy-vs-honky)
- **hong** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/hong-vs-honky)
- **Hank** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/hank-vs-honky)
- **hone** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/hone-vs-honky)
- **honk** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/honk-vs-honky)
- **hock** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/hock-vs-honky)
- **hoke** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/hoke-vs-honky)

## Common misspellings (8)
`hhonky`, `hnoky`, `hokny`, `honkky`, `honkyy`, `honnky`, `honyk`, `ohnky`

## Source
Compiled from Wiktionary via kaikki.org (CC BY-SA). Data vintage: 2026-05-06.
Canonical page: https://plainspell.com/en/word/honky