man Fridays

Noun

man Friday (plural man Fridays or men Friday or men Fridays)

1. A trusted man whose job is to assist and organize someone else's day-to-day business or personal tasks; a personal assistant, a right-hand man; also, a trusted male companion.
   • This man—our lackey, our servant, our unquestioning slave though he was, was still a gentleman— […] We asked our man Friday’s name.1869, Mark Twain [pseudonym; Samuel Langhorne Clemens], chapter XIII, in The Innocents Abroad, or The New Pilgrims’ Progress; […], Hartford, Conn.: American Publishing Company. […], →OCLC, page 119
2. (derogatory, ethnic, offensive, slur) An aborigine or native, especially one who inhabits an island.
   • Unfortunately along with the Birds go some few Tarzans or Men Fridays whose origins are obscure, and who are being hopefully wished on to Mauritius etc.1966 August 24, D[enis] A[rthur] Greenhill, British Indian Ocean Territory [handwritten note on a confidential diplomatic cable relating to the depopulation of the Chagos Archipelago]