![]() ![]() This possibility is given in the 1911 edition of Encyclopædia Britannica, but the Oxford English Dictionary says a derivation of the 18th-century simplex cracker from the 19th-century compound corn-cracker is doubtful. The compound corn-cracker was used of poor white farmers (by 1808), especially from Georgia, but also extended to residents of northern Florida, from the cracked kernels of corn which formed a staple food of this class of people. 'We don't know what to do with these crackers - we tell them to settle this area and they don't we tell them not to settle this area and they do'īy the early 1800s, those immigrants "started to refer to themselves that way as a badge of honor" as is the case with other events of linguistical reappropriation. The label followed the Scotch-Irish American immigrants, who were often seen by officials as "unruly and ill-mannered" The use of the word is further demonstrated in official documents, where the Governor of Florida said, I should explain to your Lordship what is meant by Crackers a name they have got from being great boasters they are a lawless set of rascalls on the frontiers of Virginia, Maryland, the Carolinas, and Georgia, who often change their places of abode. This usage is illustrated in a 1766 letter to the Earl of Dartmouth which reads: The word was later documented describing a group of "Celtic immigrants, Scotch-Irish people who came to America running from political circumstances in the old world". 1595) "What cracker is this same that deafs our ears with this abundance of superfluous breath?" The historical derivative of the word craic and its meaning can be seen as far back as the Elizabethan era (1558-1603) where the term crack could be used to refer to "entertaining conversation" (one may be said to "crack" a joke or to be " cracking wise") The word cracker could be used to describe loud braggarts An example of this can be seen in William Shakespeare's King John (c. ![]() The word crā̆k was later adopted into Gaelic as the word craic meaning a "loud conversation, bragging talk" where this interpretation of the word is still in use in Ireland, Scotland, and Northern England today. The term is "probably an agent noun" from the word crack. The exact history and etymology of the word is debated. Although commonly a pejorative, it is also used in a neutral context, particularly in reference to a native of Florida or Georgia (see Florida cracker and Georgia cracker). "A pair of Georgia crackers" as depicted by illustrator James Wells Champney in the memoir The Great South by Edward King, 1873Ĭracker, sometimes white cracker or cracka, is a racial slur directed towards white people, used especially with regard to poor rural whites in the Southern United States. ![]()
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