Proof that chip collecting leads to bigger things. I had to go and do some research on the question of a T-Shirt. Surprising what one finds on the web. Most of the statements below ARE NOT MINE but excerpts from searching. The conclusion is mine.

In the case of fixed compounds that contain non-PC elements -- e.g., "Negro spiritual", "NAACP", "cigar-store Indian", "Indian summer", "Dago red", "Guinea T", or "Oriental food" -- such combinations are naturally difficult to change because any substitution diminishes or destroys their value as designators. In some instances no good alternative can be used without substantial explanation.

-=-=- Guinea

The usual story seems to be that "Guinea" originally meant "dark-skinned",
like the people of the Guinea Coast in West Africa.

I think probably "Guinea"/"Ghinny" = "Italian" "Ginzo" by the same suffixation giving "gonzo" from "gone" -- supposedly an Italian suffix '-zo'. I suppose "gonzo" was modeled on "Ginzo".

RHHDAS makes the origin of guinea=Italian fairly clear. In the 18th cent., imported African slaves, who were mainly brought from specific areas on
the West African coast, were often referred to as "Guinea Negroes" -- see the bracketed cites at the beginning of the RHHDAS entry for "guinea."
"Guinea" by itself naturally came to mean "of African descent."

After large-scale Italian immigration began late in the 19th cent., this term came to be applied disparagingly to Italian immigrants.(first cite 1890) Though no explicit theory of the semantic development is given, evidence indicates that many northern Europeans saw southern Europeans as dark and therefore similar to Africans.

Most Italian immigrants to the US were from southern Italy and had slightly darker skin tones than the English or German immigrants who'd
come to North America earlier. Given their initially weak language skills and largely rural backgrounds, first-generation Italian immigrants tended to do downscale work for downscale wages, and were held to have downscale manners and lifestyles. They were quite aware that this was the "rap" on them, and that this was all tied up somehow with their often darker skin tone.

My wife recalls her grandmother (who grew up on the Lower East Side of Manhattan in the first two decades of twentieth century) telling a story of her own mother (born Benevento, in far southern Italy) catching her washing her face back in the 1910s and saying, "Scrub all you want. It's not coming off."

-=-=- Hispanic

The super-PC crowd I know finds "Hispanic" totally offensive (not quite as bad as "Oriental" or "Negro" but getting there), preferring "Chicano" or "Latino" (& the rrrreally radical chicks go for "Xicana"!) but you don't have to go very far at all to find plenty of Mexican Americans who think of "Chicano" as quaint or retro, colloquial, downright
strange, or even offensive -- & lots of other folks who don't even know what you're talking about.

-=-=- Oriental

What to call Chinese and Japanse? The current PC term is Asian. Seems it was once Asiatic but that lost favor sometime after WWII. Then it was Oriental but that went out for some reason though my local supermarket sells Oriental food and there is a market that sells only Oriental food run by Asians who don't seem to object to the term. And as for "colored"

The NAACP has not seen fit to change its name....

The PC objection to "Oriental" is based on etymology (from Latin _oriens_ 'rising'; that is, in the direction of the rising sun) -- that it labels people from a Western perspective.

I contend that arguments for or against certain usages that are based on etymology are weak, as word origins are not generally in people's awareness as they use language. Etymology is a fascinating study, but has little to do with everyday usage decisions.

-=-=- South American

Most Chileans consider themselves to be Chilean or Latin American, although Chile is geographically in South America. Until fairly recently, most Latin
Americans also considered themselves to be "americanos," but the word americano is increasingly restricted to citizens of the United States.

-=-=- Preserving Native American Language.

These few words are the children's first steps toward what leaders of the Hannahville Indian Community hope will become a basic knowledge of their native language "Bo zho, Bodewadmi ndaw," they say, which translates as: "Hello, I am Potawatomi."

The greeting quoted contains an "Indianized" (i.e., nativized) French borrowing, "Bonjour"--not at all
unusual in Northern tribes with historical contact with French and French Canadian traders, explorers, etc. A similar process occurs intertribally too, of course, as in the spread of Algonquian words to non-Algonquian languages.

Some of these words are not "really" Potawatomie or Ojibwe or Lakota or whatever.

-=-=-

"...discussions about which terms, expressions, and ideas are appropriate and inappropriate tend to
manifest a strong interest in claiming intellectual and moral superiority." Greg Downing

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My Conclusion: Never use any racial designation, and avoid any mention of "race" in any context whatsoever, since one never knows who might be offended by what. What would I order if I wanted a glass of Dago Red?

Pete Porro - Southern Italian/ Transylvanian, dark skinned and proud of it!
(Honestly 100% American)