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cosmolinguistA "Hoosier" is a person who lives in Indiana.
Why is that?
"Hoosier" was originally used as a term of derision in the South, roughly equivalent to "cracker" or "redneck"—an uncouth country person. The word moved north and westward with the people of the Ohio Valley, where it was first applied to the residents of Indiana. The word lost its derogatory meaning and gained its current one.
People are more or less agreed on this. The craziness comes in when trying to explain the etymology of the word.
(While the name "Indiana" obviously comes from "Indian" (and reminds me that even parts of the country that far east used to be wild territory), the name "Hoosier" is definitely for white people.)
Several origins have been theorized. They include
"Who's here?" (or its variants "Who's yer?" or "Who's yere" or "Who's 'ere?" or "Who's heyer" or "Who's there?") is the most popular theory explaining Indiana's nickname. It seems travelers in Indiana hailed rustic cabins with "Who's here?" Or the residents of the cabins called out to voyagers, sometimes arriving at night, "Who's here?" Most reference sources record this theory.
As far as I know, none explain why asking who is there is a trait unique to Indiana, to the point that it'd be associated with the state.
Samuel Hoosier is said to have built the canal on the Ohio River, near Louisville. It is said that he preferred workers from the Indiana side of the river because they were harder workers than those on the Kentucky side. These men became known as "Hoosier's men" or "Hoosier men" and the term became generalized to all the residents of Indiana.
No record of a canal builder named Hoosier exists, but this is still a popular theory. It's simple, and it praises the people of Indiana. "We'd like to think it's synonymous with good workers," said Governor Evan Bayh.
Colonel John Jacob Lehmanowky, a veteran of the Napoleonic wars, lectured on his wartime experiences and he pronounced the word "Hussar" as "Hoosier." A variant proposes that those repeating the word "Hussar," while boasting of their prowess as fighters, mispronounced the word as "Hoosier."
But Lehmanowsky did not settle in Indiana until 1833, and that the term "hoosier" had been in common use well before his arrival.
"Huzzah" might come from Ohio River boatmen who liked to "jump up and crack their heels together and shout 'huzza!' " on levees in Southern cities. Or it might originate with a settler's exclaiming "Huzza!" upon gaining victory over a marauding party from a neighboring state.
Jacob Piatt Dunn, the writer of a book (Indiana and Indianans) of great authority on this Hoosier subject, dismisses all this as "moonshine." It does sound lame, you know it.
The western slang term "husher", a ruffian whose deeds or violence could silence his foes, is also offered as a possible origin. This at least seems to imply the sort of person that a "hoosier" was: a big, tough, dumb bully, and would've been originally attributed to Ohio River boatmen getting in fights in New Orleans.
Most accounts of the "Hoosa" theory merely mention it as "an Indian word for corn." That precise phrase. They never mention what Indians or bother with any authority.
"Hoose" was an English slang word for roundworm, a parasite that can infect cattle and give them a peculiar look. Dunn explains, "The symptoms of this disease include staring eyes, rough coat with hair turned backward, and hoarse wheezing. So forlorn an aspect might readily suggest giving the name 'hooser' or 'hoosier' to an uncouth, rough-looking person." Dunn doesn't buy it for a second, though, and goes on to other things.
Dunn quotes the poet James Whitcomb Riley as saying in a conversation, "These stories commonly told about the origin of the word 'Hoosier' are all nonsense. The real origin is found in the pugnacious habits of the early settlers. They were vicious fighters, and not only gouged and scratched, but frequently bit off noses and ears. This was so ordinary an affair that a settler coming into a bar room on a morning after a fight, and seeing an ear on the floor, would merely push it aside with his foot and carelessly ask, 'Whose ear?'"
Many sources credit Riley with making up the story himself, because he had tired of explaining the origin of "Hoosier" to the curious. Dunn merely reports the tale and adds, bemused, that "this theory is quite as plausible, and almost as well sustained by historical evidence, as any of the others."
In later years the story transferred to football. When asked about the origin of "Hoosier," Knute Rockne, the legendary football coach of Notre Dame, replied: "After every game, the coach goes over the field, picks up what he finds, and asks his team, 'Whose ear is this?' "
"Hoosier" actually has a rather unusual ending for an English word. Why, I'd almost say that "-ier" looks like French! And indeed, there is a French word rather close to it. "Houssière" is a French word that means either "holly plantation" or "bushy places." There probably aren't many holly plantations in Indiana (I don't think there are many anywhere, actually ... but one would think some must exist or there wouldn't be a word for it). But there might be bushy places in Indiana.
But Etienne and Simone Deak in their Grand Dictionnaire d'Americanismes define "Hoosier" as "a poor worker (or an incompetent worker); someone who works very badly; a prison guard; a prison visitor; a rustic, a hick." (Except they say this in French, of course.) Since the French don't mention their own word as an influence, that's probably not it.
Last one, I promise. Most interesting to Jacob Dunn was "hoozer." He writes, ""Although I had long been convinced that 'hoosier' or some word closely resembling it, must be an old English dialect or slang word, I had never found any trace of a similar substantive ... " Until he came across A Glossary of the Words and Phrases Pertaining to the Dialect of Cumberland (oh, naturally! how could he have overlooked that?). That's Cumberland, England, by the way. The book said the people from Cumberland County use "hoozer" to mean "anything unusually large."
Dunn said that "In my opinion, this word 'hoozer' is the original form of our 'hoosier.' It evidently harks back to the Anglo-Saxon "hoo" for its derivation [like Sutton Hoo!, the geek in my brain says]. It might naturally signify a hill-dweller or highlander as well as something large, but either would easily give rise to the derivative idea of uncouthness or rusticity."
He pointed out that a number of geographical features in the area south and east of Indiana are named "Cumberland": there's a Gap, a River, Mountains, a Plateau ...) and many of the settlers of Cumberland Plateau came from Cumberland County, England.
A cool thing about this is that it allows, as a possible explanation for the "sier" part, the Old Enjglish word "scir" (recall that "sc" was pronounced /sh/), making the phrase "hoo scir": hill shire, hill country. I like that.
Nobody really knows the "real" answer, of course. It's not the first etymological riddle to be missing the solution thats supposed to be written upside-doown in the bottom corner. And many people who study these things consider that half the fun of researching this stuff. Another governor of Indiana, Robert Orr, said that he prefers that the term "remain a mystery," because "that is far more exciting."
Why is that?
"Hoosier" was originally used as a term of derision in the South, roughly equivalent to "cracker" or "redneck"—an uncouth country person. The word moved north and westward with the people of the Ohio Valley, where it was first applied to the residents of Indiana. The word lost its derogatory meaning and gained its current one.
People are more or less agreed on this. The craziness comes in when trying to explain the etymology of the word.
(While the name "Indiana" obviously comes from "Indian" (and reminds me that even parts of the country that far east used to be wild territory), the name "Hoosier" is definitely for white people.)
Several origins have been theorized. They include
- settlers or visitors asking "who's there?",
- a guy called Samuel Hoosier,
- the name for Hungarian and later generally European cavalrymen,
- a cry of victory,
- a slang term for a big man capable of stilling his opponents,
- a supposed Indian word for "corn",
- a dialectical English name for a cattle disease,
- a question asked while toeing a torn-off ear lying on the bar room floor the morning after a brawl,
- a French word, and
- a suggestionthat seems almost believable.
"Who's here?" (or its variants "Who's yer?" or "Who's yere" or "Who's 'ere?" or "Who's heyer" or "Who's there?") is the most popular theory explaining Indiana's nickname. It seems travelers in Indiana hailed rustic cabins with "Who's here?" Or the residents of the cabins called out to voyagers, sometimes arriving at night, "Who's here?" Most reference sources record this theory.
As far as I know, none explain why asking who is there is a trait unique to Indiana, to the point that it'd be associated with the state.
Samuel Hoosier is said to have built the canal on the Ohio River, near Louisville. It is said that he preferred workers from the Indiana side of the river because they were harder workers than those on the Kentucky side. These men became known as "Hoosier's men" or "Hoosier men" and the term became generalized to all the residents of Indiana.
No record of a canal builder named Hoosier exists, but this is still a popular theory. It's simple, and it praises the people of Indiana. "We'd like to think it's synonymous with good workers," said Governor Evan Bayh.
Colonel John Jacob Lehmanowky, a veteran of the Napoleonic wars, lectured on his wartime experiences and he pronounced the word "Hussar" as "Hoosier." A variant proposes that those repeating the word "Hussar," while boasting of their prowess as fighters, mispronounced the word as "Hoosier."
But Lehmanowsky did not settle in Indiana until 1833, and that the term "hoosier" had been in common use well before his arrival.
"Huzzah" might come from Ohio River boatmen who liked to "jump up and crack their heels together and shout 'huzza!' " on levees in Southern cities. Or it might originate with a settler's exclaiming "Huzza!" upon gaining victory over a marauding party from a neighboring state.
Jacob Piatt Dunn, the writer of a book (Indiana and Indianans) of great authority on this Hoosier subject, dismisses all this as "moonshine." It does sound lame, you know it.
The western slang term "husher", a ruffian whose deeds or violence could silence his foes, is also offered as a possible origin. This at least seems to imply the sort of person that a "hoosier" was: a big, tough, dumb bully, and would've been originally attributed to Ohio River boatmen getting in fights in New Orleans.
Most accounts of the "Hoosa" theory merely mention it as "an Indian word for corn." That precise phrase. They never mention what Indians or bother with any authority.
"Hoose" was an English slang word for roundworm, a parasite that can infect cattle and give them a peculiar look. Dunn explains, "The symptoms of this disease include staring eyes, rough coat with hair turned backward, and hoarse wheezing. So forlorn an aspect might readily suggest giving the name 'hooser' or 'hoosier' to an uncouth, rough-looking person." Dunn doesn't buy it for a second, though, and goes on to other things.
Dunn quotes the poet James Whitcomb Riley as saying in a conversation, "These stories commonly told about the origin of the word 'Hoosier' are all nonsense. The real origin is found in the pugnacious habits of the early settlers. They were vicious fighters, and not only gouged and scratched, but frequently bit off noses and ears. This was so ordinary an affair that a settler coming into a bar room on a morning after a fight, and seeing an ear on the floor, would merely push it aside with his foot and carelessly ask, 'Whose ear?'"
Many sources credit Riley with making up the story himself, because he had tired of explaining the origin of "Hoosier" to the curious. Dunn merely reports the tale and adds, bemused, that "this theory is quite as plausible, and almost as well sustained by historical evidence, as any of the others."
In later years the story transferred to football. When asked about the origin of "Hoosier," Knute Rockne, the legendary football coach of Notre Dame, replied: "After every game, the coach goes over the field, picks up what he finds, and asks his team, 'Whose ear is this?' "
"Hoosier" actually has a rather unusual ending for an English word. Why, I'd almost say that "-ier" looks like French! And indeed, there is a French word rather close to it. "Houssière" is a French word that means either "holly plantation" or "bushy places." There probably aren't many holly plantations in Indiana (I don't think there are many anywhere, actually ... but one would think some must exist or there wouldn't be a word for it). But there might be bushy places in Indiana.
But Etienne and Simone Deak in their Grand Dictionnaire d'Americanismes define "Hoosier" as "a poor worker (or an incompetent worker); someone who works very badly; a prison guard; a prison visitor; a rustic, a hick." (Except they say this in French, of course.) Since the French don't mention their own word as an influence, that's probably not it.
Last one, I promise. Most interesting to Jacob Dunn was "hoozer." He writes, ""Although I had long been convinced that 'hoosier' or some word closely resembling it, must be an old English dialect or slang word, I had never found any trace of a similar substantive ... " Until he came across A Glossary of the Words and Phrases Pertaining to the Dialect of Cumberland (oh, naturally! how could he have overlooked that?). That's Cumberland, England, by the way. The book said the people from Cumberland County use "hoozer" to mean "anything unusually large."
Dunn said that "In my opinion, this word 'hoozer' is the original form of our 'hoosier.' It evidently harks back to the Anglo-Saxon "hoo" for its derivation [like Sutton Hoo!, the geek in my brain says]. It might naturally signify a hill-dweller or highlander as well as something large, but either would easily give rise to the derivative idea of uncouthness or rusticity."
He pointed out that a number of geographical features in the area south and east of Indiana are named "Cumberland": there's a Gap, a River, Mountains, a Plateau ...) and many of the settlers of Cumberland Plateau came from Cumberland County, England.
A cool thing about this is that it allows, as a possible explanation for the "sier" part, the Old Enjglish word "scir" (recall that "sc" was pronounced /sh/), making the phrase "hoo scir": hill shire, hill country. I like that.
Nobody really knows the "real" answer, of course. It's not the first etymological riddle to be missing the solution thats supposed to be written upside-doown in the bottom corner. And many people who study these things consider that half the fun of researching this stuff. Another governor of Indiana, Robert Orr, said that he prefers that the term "remain a mystery," because "that is far more exciting."
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(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-20 01:03 am (UTC)I is one! ;o)
(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-20 09:44 am (UTC)You mean I should change it to "something odd that
noone else cares about"?