In article <4145A5BB.4FF01B3B@yahoo.co.jp>,
 Eric Takabayashi <etakajp@yahoo.co.jp> wrote:

> My apologies if a double post:
> 
> Rodney Webster wrote:
> 
> > A few years after that the movie "The Dam Busters" was made in England.
> > It was the true story of a bombing squadron in WWII that used a newly
> > invented "bouncing bomb" to destroy dams in Germany.
> >
> > One of the pilots had a black dog whose name was "Nigger".
> 
> Was this also deliberately meant to shock, or was it simply that
> character's pronunciation of some word that meant black in color?

No, it was not meant to shock.  I guess it was just considered an 
obvious choice as a name for a black dog at the time, as the word 
originally meant 'black'.  Wikipedia even has a paragraph on this usage 
in the film:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nigger_%28word%29#Revisionist_usage

See also the paragraph further up the page on place names, and a modern 
usage of the word "Nigger" in Australia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nigger_%28word%29#Place_names

I find the comment about the civil rights activist in Australia trying 
to change the name of the "Coon" brand of cheese amusing.

As I think was also mentioned in another thread, you'll also find a much 
more lenient attitude towards the word "Jap" in Australia and Britain.  
In fact, I was in Australia last month for my Summer holiday and the 
Australian husband of a Japanese friend kept on letting slip - he'd 
catch himself using the word and then wonder to himself why he couldn't 
use it.  He said he was just abbreviating the word "Japanese", just like 
Australians call the British Poms, and Americans Yanks.

-- 
Rodney Webster
http://knot.mine.nu/