"Rastus" (was: Re: [ADS-L] "Jazz Means Happy and Loose Like" (1917))

[Wilson Gray]

Thanks, Jesse!

FWIW: a Google ad triggered by this thread: "NEW! Colored labels"

-Wilson

On Dec 3, 2007 1:18 PM, Jesse Sheidlower <jester at panix.com> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Jesse Sheidlower <jester at PANIX.COM>
> Subject:      "Rastus" (was: Re: [ADS-L] "Jazz Means Happy and Loose Like"
>               (1917))
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> On Mon, Dec 03, 2007 at 01:05:15PM -0500, Benjamin Zimmer wrote:
> > On Dec 3, 2007 12:41 PM, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > OT. "Rastus" and "Zek'l" were still being used as generic personal
> > > names for a darky, like "darky" was used as a generic term for a black
> > > male, into the early 'Sixties. I wonder how far back they go.
> > >
> > > To give the white devil <har! har!> his due, these names were quite
> > > often also attached to poor whites of the caricatured "hillbilly"
> > > type.
> >
> > In his 1944 _American Speech_ article "Designations for Colored Folk,"
> > H.L. Mencken writes that "in my boyhood _Cuffy_ had disappeared and
> > _Sambo_ was being supplanted by _Rastus_." He also notes the popular
> > song, "Rastus on Parade" by Kerry Mills (1895), which is also the
> > first cite given by the OED.
>
> We now have an 1886 example, found on NPA, as our earliest.
>
> Jesse Sheidlower
> OED
>
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