In the English language, black sheep is an idiom used to describe an odd or disreputable member of a group, especially within a family. The term stems from the genetic effect in sheep whereby a recessive gene occasionally manifests in the birth of a sheep with black rather than white coloring; these sheep stand out in the flock.
The term has typically been given negative implications, implying waywardness. It derived from the atypical and unwanted presence of other black individuals in flocks of white sheep.
In psychology, the black sheep effect refers to the tendency of group members to judge likeable ingroup members more positively and deviant ingroup member more negatively than comparable outgroup members.
Read more about Black Sheep: Origin, Idiomatic Usage, In Psychology
Famous quotes containing the words black and/or sheep:
“Racism is when you have laws set up, systematically put in a way to keep people from advancing, to stop the advancement of a people. Black people have never had the power to enforce racism, and so this is something that white America is going to have to work out themselves. If they decide they want to stop it, curtail it, or to do the right thing ... then it will be done, but not until then.”
—Spike Lee (b. 1956)
“You make yourselves out to be shepherds of the flock and yet you allow your sheep to live in filth and poverty. And if they try and raise their voices against it, you calm them by telling them their suffering is the will of God. Sheep, indeed. Are we sheep to be herded and sheared by a handful of owners? I was taught man was made in the image of God, not a sheep.”
—Philip Dunne (1908–1992)