I have heard different explanations why white people are referred to as "crackers", but does anyone know the true reason that reference was made and where did it come from?
2007-05-23 15:02:54 · 5 answers · asked by Maurice P 1 in Society & Culture ➔ Cultures & Groups ➔ Other - Cultures & Groups
There's several theories, among them that it refers to the crack of a whip (i.e. of slave owners); or that it refers to the cracked corn that southerners ate.
If specifically referring to poor and rural, as plantations expanded in the old south, former landowners were moved to more sterile soil, and were referred to as "corncrackers" or "crackers."
2007-05-23 15:09:21 · answer #1 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 3⤋
It comes from soda crackers being white.
Soda crackers, or saltines as they are usually called, were the most common type of cracker before Ritz came along and changed everything. So when talking about a cracker, then this is what almost everybody thought of. Since soda crackers are white (whitish), then it wasn't much of a leap to reference white people to them.
Oh, and soda crackers were/are rather bland, which was another reason they were used to refer to white people.
That cracking of the whip stuff is garbage, an old wives's tale. The idiom "cracker" didn't even make its appearance until the 1950's, around the time black people were being called "spook".
Saying that it came from the cracking of the whip came later, from people trying to rewrite its origin so that it didn't sound as racist as it was. Using "the cracking of the whip" origin, then, made it sound as though calling white people "crackers" was almost justified, unlike the "soda cracker" origin that it actually came from. It's like people trying to rewrite history to make it seem like the Holocaust never happened so that the Germans don't look so bad. While we're at it, let's rewrite history to say that the slaves came over here willingly, so that the slave owners don't look so bad.
2007-05-23 15:05:37 · answer #2 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 2⤋
Sybil is close, but no cigar.
The term does come from whip terminology. The single ply end of a whip is called the cracker. And the term cracker as applied to people, especially white people came from the practice of cracking the whip to encourage livestock, horses, mules, oxen, and slaves to greater and more lively effort.
When I was a kid, the term was widely used to describe folks from Georgia, or the Florida Panhandle.
Doc
2007-05-23 15:10:16 · answer #3 · answered by Doc Hudson 7 · 1⤊ 2⤋
Poorer whites worked small farms with a mule and carried little whips to urge the mule along. 'Cracker' of the whip...
2007-05-23 15:06:23 · answer #4 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 2⤋
Its a name that comes from the slave owners who were always cracking their whips @ the slaves.
2007-05-23 15:06:53 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 2⤊ 3⤋