A black sheep stands out from the herd

The Black Sheep, from a 1901 edition of Mother Goose by William Wallace Denslow.

In the English language, Black sheep is an idiom used to describe an odd or disreputable member of a group, especially within one's family. The term has typically been given negative implications, implying waywardness.^[1] It derived from the atypical and unwanted presence of black individuals in herds of white sheep. The idiom is also found in other languages, e.g., Serbian, Bulgarian, Portuguese, Turkish, Czech and Polish.

[edit] Idiomatic usage

The term originated from the occasional black sheep which are born into a herd of white sheep due to a genetic process of recessive traits. Black wool was considered commercially undesirable because it could not be dyed.^[1] In 18th and 19th century England, the black color of the sheep was seen as the mark of the devil.^[2] In modern usage, the expression has lost some of its negative connotations, and the term is usually given to the member of a group who has certain characteristics or lack thereof deemed undesirable by that group.^[3]

[edit] Biological origin

In sheep, whiteness is not albinism but a dominant gene that actively switches color production off. As a result, sheep blackness is recessive, and if a white ram and a white ewe are parents of a black lamb, both must be heterozygous for black, and then there is a 25% chance that the lamb will be black. A recent study done by the Agricultural University of Norway, and the Vollum Institute of the Oregon Health Sciences University believe the black color is created by an allele E D at the extension locus.^[4]

[edit] Other uses

In psychology, the "black sheep effect" refers to the tendency of an in-group to treat or evaluate a member of its own more harshly than a similarly negative behavior or deed of an out-group member.^[5]

[edit] See also

Look up black sheep in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

• The Ugly Duckling
• Scapegoat
• Red headed stepchild

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• [1] Exploration of the etymology of the phrase "black sheep of the family."
• "The black sheep effect: Judgmental extremity towards ingroup members in inter-and intra-group situations". European Journal of Social Psychology (Science Direct) 18 (3): 287–292. doi:10.1002/ejsp.2420180308. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/00221031. Retrieved 2008-01-04.