Hillbilly Epithet: A Comment on Prejudices and Caricatures

John David Duke Jr

David was begotten and conceived in the ordinary way in the middle of 1972, possibly on his father's birthday. Since then, it's been an unremarkable go, except for the time his dad took him to help disarm a Cherokee woman who was shooting at her mother with a rifle.

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5 Responses

  1. Philip H says:

    I almost forgot the okra, fried in a large iron skillet, in cornmeal batter, as God intended.

    I believe wars have been started over less noble causes.

    Being a Louisiana boy myself, I had the “pleasure” as a senior at a small four year liberal arts college of dispelling the myth that all Louisiana people went to school in boats and had pet alligators. That Baton Rouge has multiple large refineries, two state universities, paved roads and stop lights (to say nothing of fabulous music and food) was simply not on their radar.Report

    • Michael Cain in reply to Philip H says:

      My honors calculus professor and academic advisor when I started at the University of Nebraska was a Louisiana native with his shiny new PhD from LSU. It never occurred to me that this ran against some stereotype. Perhaps because I was living in a state where one of the running gags was that the N on the football helmets stands for knowledge.

      The only unusual thing about his class was the formality. He was Prof. Lewis; I was Mr. Cain; the woman in the second row was Ms. Miller. He had a habit of stopping midway through a proof, turning to the class, and settling on a victim. Frequently that victim was me. “Mr. Cain,” he would drawl, “What comes next?” Some people’s college nightmare is the class that they forgot to go to all semester, but now have to take the final. My nightmare for a decade was “Mr. Cain, what comes next?”Report

      • I lived in Nebraska for a year, in Crete. Yes, it is difficult for Nebraskans to put on airs. I feel like the thing I miss most about the Southeast is the formality. Its design seemed to me an acknowledgment of poverty and humility, but that one could straighten one’s tie and use the higher forms of address because we are of the divine, all of us. It’s a shame it was abused to accomplish the opposite, but that’s a different post, now.

        When we were in-person classes, my Indian students would rise from their seats when I entered the room. That delighted me to no end.Report

    • I will gladly give my life over in the Great Okra Wars, in defense of the right and proper way to skillet fry it.

      I think the prejudices and caricatures aren’t out of general unkindness, but more out of a shorthand for “The South,” a way to oversimplify a very complicated people. When we moved to the Gulf Coast, I was stunned by how different this “The South” was from the Appalachian “The South.” Love Baton Rouge, too. Glorious city.Report