Brendan: I appreciate the fact that you took the time to comment on your use of ‘coolie’ and that you were humble enough to concede that it might have been imprudent. You are right that the primary sense is non-pejorative (in terms of how a dictionary would define ‘primary’), and it is also true, as others have mentioned, that it is etymologically related to the Hindi ‘quli’ and the Tamil ‘kuli’ which have ‘everday’ uses. However, in an unfortunate coincidence, the American theme in the puzzle acted to draw attention to the term’s more undesirable aspect, seeing that in the States the word has a long-standing connection with the stereotyping and racial abuse of Asian immigrants. Thank you for your puzzles and your willingness to interact.

When I was a young boy I have often heard my grandfather or father talk (in the ‘vernacular’, again a word from the Raj) about the coolie that needs to be paid to the worker hired for some casual work at home.

The pejorative sense of the word comes from its use in olden days for native labourers who were taken abroad for work and their being treated contemptuously by their masters.

Some years ago a Hindi film titled ‘Coolie’ starring Amitabh Bachchan was screened nationwide.

Finally, I don’t hear this word much nowadays even among Tamilians and even in its non-offensive sense.

English language papers in India would not use the word.

I can get about half of the clues (the easier ones), but i can see it will take me a long while yet to get used to the trickier ones.

I seem to remember reading somewhere that words like when and why were originally spelled hwen and hwy; does any one know about this and the reason for the change?

Eileen: I didn’t read it as a complaint (and I like the pseudohomophonophobic coinage!) – I’ll listen out for that. (Thanks, Muck, for the explanation.)

The point about “winy” is that it sounds like an Englishman whining. This is fair because Scots never whine.

Very enjoyable crossword.

Mhl & Eileen, the difference between pronunciations of wh- words: the usual English for ‘when’ is WEN, and for Scots ‘when’ is HWEN. Sorry, I can’t do proper phonetic script on my keyboard.