
From the early 1960s, an acronym for “White Anglo-Saxon Protestant,” applied most frequently on the East Coast and in the Midwest. The acronym was popularized by sociologist E. Digby Baltzell in the 1960s and was initially used primarily in social and statistical studies of ethnic groups in the United States.
A WASP is technically a person of English ancestry, although the term has been applied to Scots and Welsh and to others of northern European descent. WASPs are less likely to be identified in terms of race or ethnicity (attributes that tend to carry some stigma) than other groups are.
Irving Lewis Allen (1990, 109) suggests that WASP originated as a code word for "Protestant" (the church affiliation would be mainline Protestant), used when a reference to religion might be considered intolerant or impolite; however, the term has taken on connotations beyond this. In the climate of political correctness of the 1980s and 1990s, WASP has been used derogatorily in identifying someone as a part of oppressive, white, Eurocentric society. It suggests people who are influential or patrician and connotes the privileges, social conformity, standard setting (in practices and language), smugness, and bigotry perceived by their critics to characterize members of the group. They may be viewed as congratulating themselves for being more American than anyone else. "In the United States, they [the Irish] have faced the hostility of Yankees, WASPs, and other so-called Americans" (Leonard W. Doob, in From Paddy to Studs, ed. Timothy J. Meagher, 1986). The acronym has been taken up by self-identified WASPs themselves and is often seen in print without apology.
Of the various spellings, Brookhiser (1991,20) notes, "'Wasp,' with only the ‘W' upper-cased, has the sanction of Norman Mailer to recommend it. It is less ugly."