Uncle Tom is the title character of Harriet Beecher Stowe's 1852 novel, Uncle Tom's Cabin.
The phrase "Uncle Tom" has also become an epithet for a person who is slavish and excessively subservient to perceived authority figures, particularly a black person who behaves in a subservient manner to white people; or any person perceived to be a participant in the oppression of their own group. The negative epithet is the result of later works derived from the original novel.
Read more about Uncle Tom: Original Characterization and Critical Evaluations, Inspiration, Epithet
Famous quotes containing the word uncle:
“my Uncle Sol’s farm
failed because the chickens
ate the vegetables so
my Uncle Sol had a
chicken farm till the
skunks ate the chickens when”
—E.E. (Edward Estlin)