"Big-Foot/Bigfoot Land"

[Wilson Gray]

On Nov 5, 2004, at 7:06 PM, George Thompson wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       George Thompson <george.thompson at NYU.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: "Big-Foot/Bigfoot Land"
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>
> Wilson Gray posts:
>
>> I didn't find these in HDAS or in DARE.
>>
>> Big-Foot Land : the South; the point is that, since Southern
>> blacks go
>> barefooted, they have bigger feet than their shoe-wearing Northern
>> relatives.
>>
> This may explain a stereotype of black people that I have encountered
> in several places in 1820s newspapers: the idea that black people are
> notable for having a longer heel than white people.  Actually, I can
> find only one citation in my notes, though I think there should be at
> least one other, somewhere.

I don't think so. I'm pretty sure that "Big-Foot Land" is an example of
black-on-black violence. But, yes, long-heeled-ness is one of those
stereotypes partially based on fact that goes way back. All that I have
to do is to look at my own bare foot and then to look at the bare foot
of any random white person to see that my heel does indeed appear to be
longer by comparison. Back in the bad old days, when anthropology still
provided the primary underpinning of "scientific" racism, I came
across, to my great surprise, what might be termed a "liberal"
anthropology text which proposed to debunk various stereotypes
regarding black people. One chapter compared and contrasted both blacks
and whites to apes. It pointed out that apes have straight hair/fur,
not curly or wooly; that they have thick brow ridges; that under their
hair/fur, the skin of many apes lacks pigmentation; that apes have
extremely thin lips; that apes have no buttocks to speak of; and that
the feet of apes have little or no heel. Similar features are more
typical of whites than blacks. The accompanying text went on to address
the apparent long-heeled-ness, stating that, if one had only the
skeleton of a foot to go by, it wouldn't be possible to tell the foot
of a black person from the foot of a white person. However, in life,
black people have a thick, extra layer of flesh around the heel that
causes said heel to appear longer.

This book was published some time in the late '50's or the early '60's.
I haven't read another anthropological text. I once glanced through one
that, on one page, featured what purported to be a chart of all
possible Jewish nasal profiles for the discerning anti-Semite and, on
another page, stated that the Japanese agreed with the author's
contention that blacks have the foulest body odor on earth. This book
was published by OUP and had a 1977 imprint. So, I've given up on
anthro.

-Wilson Gray

>
> This is from a strange parody of a soliloquy purportedly delivered by
> a black actor at The African Theatre:
> If our heel’s long, and our feet splay are found
> We take a firmer grip of parent ground;
> Large are our bladders — copious are our brains;
> And we can dream — O yes! — of Afric’s plains!
> St. Tammany’s Magazine, # 4, December 4, 1821, p. 52.
>
> I have no idea about the bladder notion, which I haven't encountered
> elsewhere.
>
> GAT
>
>
> George A. Thompson
> Author of A Documentary History of "The African
> Theatre", Northwestern Univ. Pr., 1998.
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Wilson Gray <wilson.gray at RCN.COM>
> Date: Thursday, November 4, 2004 11:27 pm
> Subject: "Big-Foot/Bigfoot Land"
>> The Cotton Curtain : the Mason-Dixon Line in its extended meaning.
>>
>> Behind the sun : down South; over 60,000 Google hits (this is also the
>> title of an R&B instrumental recorded before 1957 by at least two
>> different bands, the name of a vocal by the Red-Hot Chili Peppers, the
>> English title of a Brazilian movie, etc., etc.) reduced to one AMG
>> cite. However, the earliest AMG cite, 1959, is too recent to be the
>> record used as a themesong by a local St. Louis DJ ca.1953.
>>
>> Above the magnolias : up North.
>>
>> I know that this info may be worthless without any dates, except for
>> AMG's too-recent date of 1959. But, "what the hell, eh?" as a Canadian
>> friend says.
>>
>