The term Mat Salleh is often used by Malay-languagespeakers as a colloquial, expression to refer to a white Caucasian. How this expression came about is difficult to completely determine. This is because there exists several versions of its origins passed down by word, with little official documentation to ascertain this. The different versions are:
The word might have been derived from the expression "mad sailor". The native's first encounters with Westerners were typically drunk sailors. Their intoxicated behavior led to the non-English speaking locals learning the expression "Mad Sailors" from other Sailors. The expression however, was articulated as "Mat Salleh" instead and the term has stuck till now, regardless of the subject's involvement with either seafaring or alcoholism.
Another version is also derived from the expression "Mat Salleh". In this version, shipwrecked and marooned in a foreign land, many sailors panicked and ran away at their first sights of a native inhabitants whom they assumed were cannibals. As mentioned above, the expression "Mad Sailors" that the natives learnt to explain their eccentric behaviorgot mispronounced as "Mat Salleh" due to their unfamiliarity with the English language and its pronunciation protocols.
It could also have been derived from the meaning of the word "Mat Salleh" which means preacher or one who preaches referring to early colonials who came with the secondary agenda of preaching Christianity.
The word salleh is the outdated spelling for the word salih in Malay meaning albino or white due lack of skin pigmentation. The term Mat is a slang word for Mohammad which in turn refers to a man. Hence, the term Mat Salleh refers to an albino man. The current spelling is Mat Salih according to the official dictionary by the Dewan Bahasa and Pustaka Malaysia. White Caucasians have fair, almost albino like skin, hence the term Mat Salleh. In Indonesia, white Caucasians are referred as orang bule or just "bule" in Indonesian. Orang means person and bule means albino because an Indonesian synonym of bule is bulai.
Given the label's inherent connection to European colonialism, and therefore the atrocitiescommitted, it may be considered inappropriate for modern-day use. Nonetheless, in present-day circumstances, the term may also be used and accepted on a friendly and humorous basis.
