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Posted on 09/25/2004 2:56:46 AM PDT by snippy_about_it
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 are acknowledged, affirmed and commemorated.
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 American Civil War's Linguistic Heritage The American Civil War has been called the first modern war because of the appearance of numerous innovations. The war was also responsibe for introducing a number of words to our vocabulary that extend to today. The Civil War was, among other things, a war of firsts. It was the first war in which there was a draft. It was the first war in which an American was given the rank of admiral, the first in which ironclad vessels definitively replaced wooden ones, and the source of the first federal income tax.  Many of these firsts also gave us new vocabulary. Although "draft" had been used for conscription since the eighteenth century, draftee was invented during the Civil War, soon after the Confederacy (1862) and then the Union (1863) established a draft. And today we also use the verb more loosely, as in "He drafted two new players for the team." The need for fighting men was great but perhaps not as great as the need for money. In 1861 Congress established the first federal income tax, and not long afterward the Confederacy set up a similar tax. The federal government also authorized the use of greenbacks, legal-tender notes used as currency in place of gold or silver and so called because one side of each bill was printed with green ink. The color persists in American currency, and greenback today is widely used as a synonym for "dollar."  Also dating from the Civil War is the motto on our current coins, In God We Trust. It was first authorized by Congress in 1864 for use on the two-cent coin.  God was invoked in another sense by Union troops. When fighting in the heat and humidity of mosquito-infested Southern swamps, they referred to the North as God's country, a term still used for any especially beautiful area or for one's home locale.  Almost from the beginning of the war, the term antebellum came into use. Coming straight from two Latin words meaning "before the war," it still is used specifically in America to mean "before the Civil War." In the South the term is often attached to styles dating from before the war, such as antebellum architecture.  The South itself acquired the name Dixie, which actually originated shortly before the outbreak of hostilities. Its earliest recorded use was in a play of 1850 that featured a black character named Dixie, but it was popularized mainly through northern minstrel-showman Daniel Decatur Emmett's 1859 song, "Dixie's Land." According to historian Darryl Lyman, Dixie was a common name for black characters in minstrel shows, and Emmett said he often used the term "Dixie's land" to mean "the black (slave's) land," that is, the South. It has survived and also appears in such terms as Dixiecrat, coined for Southern Democrats who left the national party in 1948 because they opposed President Harry Truman's civil rights platform.  Once the South seceded, Southerners were known as "Rebels" and the Confederate soldier as "Johnny Reb." On going into battle Confederate troops often shouted a Rebel yell. This blood-curdling, high-pitched sound was said to be based on the cries uttered by Southern fox hunters. Another theory is that it imitated the war cry of one or another tribe of American Indians. The name was later applied to similar shouts in sports and other peacetime pursuits.  A name attached to the Civil War infantryman was doughboy. It was first recorded in 1865, but its precise origin has been lost. The name may have alluded to the large buttons on their uniforms, which resembled a pastry called "doughboy." Or, theorized H.L. Mencken, it alluded to pipe clay that became soggy and doughlike in rain and was used by Confederate troops to whiten the piping on their uniforms. In any event, the term survived, becoming very widely known during World War I. A similar term that has died out, however, was doughface, which meant a Northerner who sympathized with the Southern cause. Before 1861 it had meant a Northern congressman, usually a Democrat, who did not oppose slavery, but then it acquired a broader meaning. Presumably the "dough" here simply meant that a person was easily molded by others. Another name for Northern opponents of the war was Copperhead. Their fellow Northerners considered them traitors and therefore nicknamed them after the poisonous snake of the eastern and southern United States that gives no warning before it strikes.  Ironclad vessels were developed early in the 1800s but did not come into wide use until the midcentury. On March 9, 1862, two ironclads, the Union Monitor and the Confederate Merrimac, fought to a draw, and this battle marked the death knell of wooden battleships. The previous year President Abraham Lincoln had announced a blockade of the entire Confederate coast, and though Southerners at first laughed at it, the blockade became increasingly effective.  It not only cut off the Confederacy from needed goods from abroad but also prevented it from shipping its valuable cotton crop to overseas markets. Blockades were not new, but this blockade gave rise to the term blockade runner, for a vessel or person that evades or tries to evade a blockade and enter or leave a blockaded port.  The ironclads' resistance to gunfire enabled Union Flag Officer David Farragut to capture New Orleans and two years later to sail into Mobile Bay, heedless of danger from shore batteries and mines called torpedoes. When warned, Farragut allegedly uttered his famous words, "Damn the torpedoes! Full speed ahead!" Soon afterward he was promoted to full admiral, the first American so honored. And we still use ironclad in the sense of "unbreakable" or "firm," as in "an ironclad alibi," "ironclad contract," and so on.  Incidentally, flag officer was the only naval rank above captain from 1850 to 1862, when the ranks of commodore and rear admiral were created, followed in 1864 by vice admiral. Although full admiral was not adopted until after the war, it was often applied to Farragut before he was officially promoted. Christine Ammer's new, expanded edition of Fighting Words From War, Rebellion, and Other Combative Capers (NTC/Contemporary Books) is now available in paperback. This article originally appeared in the Summer '99 issue of MHQ. For more great articles be sure to pick up your copy of Military History Quarterly. by Christine Ammer      |
'Dixie'
http://www.npr.org/programs/morning/features/patc/dixie/
Nov. 11, 2002 -- "Dixie" -- a song strongly identified with the South -- stirs emotion and exposes timeworn rifts across American society.
It has been that way almost since "Dixie" was born in the days just before the Civil War. Adopted as a Confederate anthem, it was offered up by President Abraham Lincoln as a gesture of reconciliation after the war. It's accepted with affection by many whites and scorned by many blacks. And yet it's been recorded by everyone from Elvis Presley to the Robert Shaw chorale.
A search for the origins of the song prompts a gentler debate, but one that touches many of the same themes. NPR's Cynthia Johnston sought to sort out the story of "Dixie" for NPR's ongoing Present at the Creation series on Morning Edition.
The song that provokes such contrasting responses also has more than one version of its creation.
Authorship is credited to Daniel Decatur Emmett, a native of Mount Vernon, Ohio, who was a member of a group called Bryant's Minstrels. But some believe "Dixie" was really a tune passed on to Emmett by a pair of African-American brothers born to parents who were slaves.
Emmett wrote such early American standards as "Turkey in the Straw" and "Blue-Tail Fly." Johnston reports that in 1859, while Emmett was living and performing in New York City, he was asked to write a new song. "Dixie" was the result. A hit in New York, it caught on across the country within a year.
"Dixie" wasn't meant to be serious. It was a minstrel tune, performed in blackface. But as war divided the nation, a song initially embraced by all sorts of Americans -- including the man trying to preserve the union -- became more and more identified with the South.
By 1862, the region had become popularly known as "Dixie," though a variety of elements apart from the song may have influenced the nickname.
Despite its prompt association with the southern cause, "Dixie" remained one of President Lincoln's favorite tunes. Historian Cheryl Thurber says the very day the South surrendered, Lincoln asked a band to play "Dixie" for crowds gathered outside the White House.
To many African-Americans, "Dixie" is a symbol of racism and slavery. Thomasina Neely-Chandler, an ethnomusicologist and music professor at Spelman College in Atlanta, says the important thing to remember is that "Dixie" is a harmful misrepresentation of blacks.
"It's not the song or the text," Neely-Chandler says, "So much as how it's used in a distorted way to present a particular people with an image that really doesn't represent them."
In the years after the Civil War, "Dixie" was embraced by whites, but increasingly rejected by blacks. The divide over the song deepened during the early days of the civil rights movement.
"[Blacks] would sing a song like "We Shall Overcome" or "The Battle Hymn of the Republic," University of Mississippi historian Charles Reagan Wilson says. "But then opponents of integration and black rights would sing 'Dixie' as a kind of counter-song asserting white privilege and white supremacy."
So the possibility that Emmett learned "Dixie" from Ben and Lew Snowden -- a pair of black musicians he knew from his hometown -- carries its own irony. The Snowdens' parents had been slaves in Maryland, but by the 1820s were living outside Mount Vernon, Ohio, not far from where Dan Emmett's family lived.
Judith Sacks and her husband Howard, a professor of sociology at Kenyon College in nearby Gambier, Ohio, wrote a book on the song's history called Way Up North In Dixie. They say the Snowdens were well-known musicians who gave concerts from a converted gable on the side of their house. The Sackses advance the theory that the song "Dixie" is a childhood recollection from Mrs. Ellen Snowden, the mother of Ben and Lew.
Judith and Howard Sacks acknowledge they have no explicit proof for their assertion, and many scholars are skeptical, including Cheryl Thurber.
"Emmett did know the family," Thurber says. "He performed with them. But that was in the 1890s" -- long after "Dixie" appeared.
Thurber does believe that the lyrics of "Dixie" embody a "slave idea of paradise."
"This was an imaginary paradise," Thurber says, perhaps associated with a community of runaway slaves. "Certainly the concept is one that Emmett did adopt from African-American slaves."
Musician Mike Petee helped this year's crowd at Mount Vernon's Dan Emmett festival imagine how Emmett might have been inspired to write the tune.
"It's New York City... It's rainy, it's cold," Petee said. "And what minstrels loved to do was tour the north during the summer and in the winter they want to go down south. So he's in the north, it's cold, it's dreary, his thoughts go to Dixie, where he wants to be."
Beyond the differing theories of its origin and the quarrels over its symbolism, it's clear to Vanderbilt University music historian Dale Cockrell why it became so popular and enduring.
"The song's music is of undeniable infectious quality," Cockrell says. "It's anthem-like. It's in 4/4 so it's a kind of propulsive march-like dance rhythm. One can hardly help but be affected just by the musical quality of it."
A lot of people still wish they could hear "Dixie." But it's rarely sung in public anymore.
One way latter-day performers try to make it acceptable is to combine it with other tunes that acknowledge its complex history. Jazz singer Rene Marie combined it with Billie Holliday's "Strange Fruit" -- a vivid depiction of a lynching. Elvis Presley's American trilogy mixes "Dixie" with "The Battle Hymn of the Republic" and the spiritual "All My Trials."
Howard Sacks believes "Dixie" retains a quintessential American quality:
"What it tells us is that black, white, male female, southern, northern, slave, free, urban rural -- these aren't separate realms," Sacks says. "The story of the American experience is the story of movement between these realms.
"Understanding the creation and re-creation of "Dixie" is that story encapsulated in the words and music of a single song."
Note
I also recall reading that Dixie comes from the French word Dix meaning ten. from the time France ruled the Louisiana territory.
Present!
Morning Glory Snip & Sam~
Most enjoyable read . . . we use words so often and never consider the richness of their origin.
When I was a freshman at LSU there was a guy on our football team recruited out of Maryland . . . a tough Baltimore kid that played Cornerback and threw some nasty hits. Coach "Mac" would always call him a "Plug-ugly". I thought it had to do with the way he plugged offensive holes. Then, I read Safire's "Freedom" wherein a whole chapter was dedicated to the Maryland Plug-uglies - a group of street thugs known for their plug hats as well as from the spikes studded in the front of their boots.
Anyway, I hope when you receive this you and Miss Snip had a safe and comfortable flight back from DC. I have some interesting intel to share from both my visit to Miami and the return flight. Later!
John Kerry told Bill O'Reilly in a 2001 interview he was present at the signing in Safwa.
The signing occurred March 3, 1991, in a highly restricted area open to select military only, no civilians.
Kerry was back in the 'States, yet in his adorable fashion, he claims to have ass-trally projected his aura and penumbra.
The latter of which he will catch November 2.
Excellent work!
*ugh*
Kerry IS a Damnyankee..
And I'm a Norther sayin' that!
You forgot the word "Damnyankee" which is the combination of the word damn and yankee, it is much easier to say and has much more meaning.
My understanding of "Dixie" came from the word of a 10 dollar gold piece in the New Orleans area that was common. It was called a dix which is of course the french word for 10. This made New Orleans the "Land of Dixie" and ended up refering to the entire South.
But I have been wrong before as far as Dixie is concerned, however I am certain about the "damnyankee" word.
Thanks EOD. I like your thoughts on dix. Makes sense. Damnyankee, good one. I'm sure there are more. :-)
Good evening EGC. We're back home and all is well.
LOL. Good to see your graphics back.
LOL. And;
how once upon a time there were discussions of what the word "is" was...and
the usage of hugh and series
flip-flop and bloggers
We're baaaaaaaaaack.
Thanks snopercod. Great cartoons. I usually take my width and height and use my calculator to shrink the size by about 30-50 percent. A page width is about 700 and can go 800 before it takes a scroll bar to see the whole thing.
Some things just look better bigger. :-) Someday everyone will have cable and it won't matter.
LOL.
Good evening Mayor.
Good evening feather. We're home. :-)
That's a memorable flag-o-gram isn't it? Thanks PE. We're home safe and sound.
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