The Cajuns (; French: les Cadjins or les Cadiens ; ), also known as Louisiana Acadians (French: les Acadiens), are an American ethnic group mainly found in the US state of Louisiana and the surrounding Gulf Coast states.
Historically, Cajuns are the descendants of the Acadian exiles who went to Louisiana (especially to Acadiana) in the decades after le grand dérangement.Wolfgang Binder (ed.): Creoles and Cajuns. French Louisiana – La Louisiane Française. Peter Lang: Frankfurt am Main, 1998.Marcia Gaudet und James C. McDonald: Mardi Gras, Gumbo, and Zydeco: Readings in Louisiana Culture. University Press of Mississippi, Jackson: 2003, p. viii: "Cajuns and Creoles, while maintaining strong cultural and ethnic identities, are also part of mainstream American and Southern culture. {...} Louisiana Cajuns are a diverse group (including the Prairie Cajuns, the Wetland Cajuns, and the River Cajuns) who share common bonds of traditions and language. They are descendants of the Acadians, colonists from France who first settled Acadie (now Nova Scotia) {...}" Cajuns make up a significant portion of South Louisiana's population and have had an enormous impact on the state's culture.
While Lower Louisiana had been settled by French colonists since the late 17th century, many Cajuns trace their roots to the influx of Acadian settlers after the Great Expulsion from their homeland during the French and British hostilities prior to the French and Indian War (1756 to 1763). Most Acadians can trace their ancestry to approximately 50 families who were living in Port Royal, Acadia, now Annapolis Royal, Nova Scotia, in 1671. The Acadia region to which many modern Cajuns trace their origin consisted largely of what are now Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island plus parts of eastern Quebec and northern Maine.
Since their establishment in Louisiana, the Cajuns have become famous for their French dialect, Louisiana French, and have developed a rich culture including folkways, music, and cuisine. Acadiana is heavily associated with them.Cecyle Trepanier, "The Cajunization of French Louisiana: forging a regional identity". Geographical Journal (1991): 161-171.
The contention that Cajuns are a subgroup of Creoles is contested by members of the community, as is understandable given their diverse history and culture. The terms Cajun and Creole are to be seen as separate identities, although not everyone who is culturally Cajun must be descended from Acadian refugees. The two groups, which share a strong French heritage (though acquired in different places), have interacted intensely throughout their common history in Louisiana. They can thus be jointly addressed as Louisianais, implying the "people of French heritage of Louisiana", or French Louisianians.
Etymology and historical usage of the term The English term Cajun derives from the Louisiana French Cadien, also written Cadjin (pronounced /kadjɛ̃/ or /kadʒɛ̃/), in turn a shortening or aphetic form of French Acadien (Acadian). This derives from the name of the Canadian region Acadia, i.e., Acadie or La Cadie in French. The first form of the name, given to the region by explorer Giovanni da Verrazzano in 1524, was Arcadie, referring to the Greek region of the same name, Arcadia.
Civil War usage The first usage of the term "Cajun" came about during the American Civil War, during the Union's invasion of French Louisiana.
After conquering Vermilionville—the modern city of Lafayette, the hub of Cajun country—in 1863, Lieutenant George C. Harding of the 21st Indiana Infantry used the term "Cajun" to describe the region's inhabitants:
I will try and tell what a Cajun is. He is a half-savage creature, of mixed French and Indian blood, lives in swamps and subsists by cultivating small patches of corn and sweet potatoes. The wants of the Cajun are few, and his habits are simple ... I can not say that we were abused by the Cajuns.
A correspondent for the New York Herald reported: "Our forces captured some prisoners. Many deserters and refugees came within our lines. The rebel deserters are principally French Creoles, or Arcadians ..."
In 1863, war correspondent Theophilus Noel reported for his newspaper: "You must not use the word Cagin, implying thereby that there is any nigger blood in the party to whom you are talking."
Cajun Country/Creole City usage
After the Civil War, urban Creoles began referring to the peasant class (petits habitants) as "Cajuns". Cajuns inhabited the "Cajun Countries" of Mississippi and Louisiana.
At the same time, "Creole" increasingly referred to Creoles of the middle class (bourgeoisie) or aristocratic class (grands habitants), and served as a designation for inhabitants of the "Creole Cities": Mobile, Alabama and New Orleans, Louisiana.Rice Journal, Volume 21. Page 21. 1918.
Carl Brasseaux notes in Acadian to Cajun, Transformation of a People, that:
Cajun was used by Anglos to refer to all persons of French descent and low economic standing, regardless of their ethnic affiliation. Hence poor Creoles of the bayou and prairie regions came to be permanently identified as Cajun. The term Cajun thus became a socioeconomic classification for the multicultural amalgam of several culturally and linguistically distinct groups.
Americanized usage
After the Americanization of Acadiana between the 1950s and 1970s, the term "Cajun" became synonymous with "white French Louisianian", due in part to CODOFIL's decision to promote Louisiana's link to Acadia in the "Cajun Renaissance".
It is common to see various demographic differences assigned to the Cajun/Creole binary. A typical example is cuisine: Many claim that "Cajun" gumbo does not include tomatoes whereas "Creole" gumbo does, but this distinction is better viewed as geographic rather than ethnic. Residents of Acadiana—a historically isolated and rural region—do not typically make gumbo with tomatoes, regardless of ancestry or self-proclaimed identity, whereas urban New Orleanians do. Technically, "Cajun" cuisine should properly fit under the umbrella of "Creole" cuisine, much like "Cajuns" themselves traditionally fit under the "Creole" umbrella.
In contrast to the 19th and early 20th centuries, today's Cajuns and Creoles are often presented as distinct groups, and some Cajuns disavow a Creole identity whereas others embrace it. Surnames and geographic location are not necessarily markers of either identity.
Cajun nationality Ethnic group of national origin
The Cajuns retain a unique dialect of the French language called Louisiana French, or, more commonly known as Cajun French, and hold numerous other cultural traits that distinguish them as an ethnic group. Cajuns were officially recognized by the U.S. government as a national ethnic group in 1980 per a discrimination lawsuit filed in federal district court. Presided over by Judge Edwin Hunter. The case, known as Roach v. Dresser Industries Valve and Instrument Division (494 F.Supp. 215, D.C. La., 1980), hinged on the issue of the Cajuns' ethnicity:
History of Acadian ancestors
The British conquest of Acadia happened in 1710. Over the next 45 years, the Acadians refused to sign an unconditional oath of allegiance to the Crown. During this period, Acadians participated in various military operations against the British and maintained vital supply lines to the French fortress of Louisbourg and Fort Beausejour. During the French and Indian War (part of the Seven Years' War and known by that name in Canada and Europe), the British sought to neutralize the Acadian military threat and to interrupt their vital supply lines to Louisbourg by deporting Acadians from Acadia.• The territory of Acadia was afterward divided and apportioned to various British colonies, now Canadian provinces: Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, the Gaspé Peninsula in the province of Quebec. The deportation of the Acadians from these areas beginning in 1755 has become known as the Great Upheaval or Le Grand Dérangement.
The Acadians' migration from Canada was spurred by the 1763 Treaty of Paris which ended the war. The treaty terms provided 18 months for unrestrained emigration. Many Acadians moved to the Attakapas region of present-day Louisiana, often travelling via the French colony of Saint-Domingue (now Haiti).
The first group of Acadians to arrive in Louisiana was the Cormier-Landry-Poirier-Richard party, 21 people who sailed on the Savannah Packet from Savannah to Mobile to New Orleans, arriving in February 1764. A year later, Joseph Broussard led the first large group, 200 Acadians, which arrived in New Orleans on February 27, 1765 aboard the Santo Domingo. On April 8, 1765, he was appointed militia captain and commander of the "Acadians of the Atakapas" region in St. Martinville. Some of the settlers wrote to their family scattered around the Atlantic to encourage them to join them at New Orleans. For example, Jean-Baptiste Semer wrote to his father in France:
The Acadians were scattered throughout the eastern seaboard. Families were split and boarded ships with different destinations.John Mack Faragher (2005). A Great and Noble Scheme: The Tragic Story of the Expulsion of the French Acadians from their American Homeland, New York: W. W. Norton, 562 pages Online excerpt Many ended up west of the Mississippi River in what was then French-colonized Louisiana, including territory as far north as Dakota territory. France had ceded the colony to Spain in 1762, prior to their defeat by Britain and two years before the first Acadians began settling in Louisiana. The interim French officials provided land and supplies to the new settlers. The Spanish governor, Bernardo de Gálvez, later proved to be hospitable, permitting the Acadians to continue to speak their language, practice their native religion (Roman Catholicism, which was also the official religion of Spain), and otherwise pursue their livelihoods with minimal interference. Some families and individuals did travel north through the Louisiana territory to set up homes as far north as Wisconsin. Acadians fought in the American Revolution. Although they fought for Spanish General Galvez, their contribution to the winning of the war has been recognized.
Galvez left New Orleans with an army of Spanish regulars and the Louisiana militia made up of 600 Acadian volunteers and captured the British strongholds of Fort Bute at Bayou Manchac, across from the Acadian settlement at St. Gabriel. On September 7, 1779, Galvez attacked Fort Bute and then on September 21, 1779, attacked and captured Baton Rouge.
A review of participating soldiers shows many common Acadian names among those who fought in the battles of Baton Rouge and West Florida. The Galvez Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution was formed in memory of those soldiers.
The Spanish colonial government settled the earliest group of Acadian exiles west of New Orleans, in what is now south-central Louisiana—an area known at the time as Attakapas, and later the center of the Acadiana region. As Brasseaux wrote, "The oldest of the pioneer communities ... Fausse Point, was established near present-day Loreauville by late June 1765." The Acadians shared the swamps, bayous, and prairies with the Attakapa and Chitimacha Native American tribes.