Wer hat Angst vorm Schwarzen Mann?

The children's game "Who's Afraid of the Black Man" is known at least in Germany, Finland and Slovenia. Depending on the region and time, it was understood to mean different beings: a dark shadowy figure or a man with black clothing.

The game starts with one "Black Man" standing on one side of the playground, and the other players stand on the other side. The Black man asks: "Who’s afraid of the Black man?", replied with "Nobody!", "And what if he comes?", "Then we’ll run away!". Then all runs to the other side of the playground, and the Black man runs to the opposite direction, and while he runs, he tries to catch others. Whoever is caught becomes his assistant and helps him to catch others on the next round.

All the players, including the Black man, can run only towards the other side of the playground. They’re not allowed to return to the start line. If they do, they have to join the Black man and become his assistants. The person, who is caught last, becomes the Black man in the next game.

Name of the game has nothing to do with ethnic background or skin color. Franz Magnus Böhme (1897) claimed the term can be traced back to the "Black Death" (the plague around 1348). This would also explain the playing principle logically: Everyone who is attacked by the plague (touched in the game) becomes the bearer of the "Black Death" and belongs to the army of the "Black Man" who spreads the plague. But to avoid racist connotations, today the game is sometimes called differently, e.g. "Who is afraid of the evil/wild/dumb/ice man/creature/being?" (e.g. bogeyman; Big Bad Wolf).

Based on German Wer hat Angst vorm Schwarzen Mann? and Finnish Kuka pelkää mustaa miestä Wikipedia articles, and ABCWellBeing Who's Afraid of the Black Man? school project blog post.

Franz Magnus Böhme (1897), Deutsches Kinderlied und Kinderspiel, available at Internet Archive: archive.org/details/DeutschesKinderliedUndKinderspiel

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John FitzGerald ^club

In Canada it's called British Bulldog, though how either the British or bulldogs come into it I don't know.

5 years ago.

PhLB - Luc Boonen ^club

black man is a forbidden word in Dutch nowadays

5 years ago.

Boarischa Krautmo ^club

I remember that game.....

5 years ago.

Clickity Click

It sounds very much like a game that children used to play here but for the life of me I can't remember what it was called. Your effects give off a somewhat eerie feeling. :)

5 years ago.

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Wer hat Angst vorm Schwarzen Mann?

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