[Ads-l] Dixie Land: a Provisional, Incomplete, Annotated Chronology

Fri Jul 3 00:26:32 UTC 2020

The rhyme of /h ^ m/  and /k ^ m/ could indicate a New England origin, but
I may be over-interpreting the data.

JL

On Thu, Jul 2, 2020 at 12:49 PM Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>
wrote:

> Still more old stuff?  (Stop me, if you've heard this one.)  It's very
> late, but it asserts that the game was associated with a song/chant:
>
> 1914 _Austin American_ (Sept. 27) 13: "An old resident of New York [n.b. -
> JL] tells of a game called "Dixie's Land" which he used to play many years
> before the Civil War. The game was to run upon your opponent's section and
> then taunt the catcher with a song womewhat as follows:
>
>               I'm on Dixie's Land!  Dixie aint' [sic] at home;
>               Dixie's gone fishing. Dixie can't come."
>
> If Emmett had heard something similar, may have wondered about the origin
> of "Dixie's land," and decided that it could only refer to "Mason and
> Dixon's Line," Dixon being incorrectly assumed as a representative of the
> South  (Mason : Dixon:: North : South).
>
> I could go for that.  Less persuasive is the tangential possibility that
> the tale of slaves being eager to head back to "Dixie's Land" is a
> rationalization of the origin of the game, again based on the belief (which
> could be true!) that "Dixie's" was originally "Dixon's."
>
> Since the M-D Line was surveyed in the 1760s, there would have been plenty
> of time for the name of game to have developed from that by 1850 (or even
> 1800).
>
> JL
>
>
>
> JL
>
> On Thu, Jul 2, 2020 at 11:22 AM Stephen Goranson <goranson at duke.edu>
> wrote:
>
>> Of course this 1844 "Dixey's Land" is not the 1859 song, nor did I mean
>> that it was. "Playing" here indicated dance, movement.
>>
>> Whether this * "Original Sketch: sequel to 'The Christmas Carol." was
>> properly listed as "(fiction?)," (was Dickens' piece non-fiction?) , I
>> naturally leave to each reader.
>>
>> Stephen Goranson
>> <
>> https://search.proquest.com/americanperiodicals/docview/136773498/F5791B20C0EE4EC2PQ/8?accountid=10598
>> >
>>
>>
>>
>>   *
>> *Proquest, American Periodicals, as reported by JL on ads-l long ago
>>   *
>> Original Sketches.: SEQUEL TO "THE CHRISTMAS CAROL."
>>
>> LINCOLN RAMBLE<
>> https://search.proquest.com/americanperiodicals/indexinglinkhandler/sng/au/LINCOLN+RAMBLE/$N?accountid=10598>.
>> The New World; a Weekly Family Journal of Popular Literature, Science, Art
>> and News (1840-1845)<
>> https://search.proquest.com/americanperiodicals/pubidlinkhandler/sng/pubtitle/The+New+World$3b+a+Weekly+Family+Journal+of+Popular+Literature,+Science,+Art+and+News+$281840-1845$29/$N/35386/PagePdf/136773498/fulltextPDF/F5791B20C0EE4EC2PQ/8?accountid=10598>;
>> New York Vol. 9, Iss. 26, <
>> https://search.proquest.com/americanperiodicals/indexingvolumeissuelinkhandler/35386/The+New+World$3b+a+Weekly+Family+Journal+of+Popular+Literature,+Science,+Art+and+News+$281840-1845$29/01844Y12Y28$23Dec+28,+1844$3b++Vol.+9+$2826$29/9/26?accountid=10598>
>> (Dec 28, 1844): 803
>>
>>
>>
>> SG
>> ________________________________
>> From: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU> on behalf of
>> dave at WILTON.NET <dave at WILTON.NET>
>> Sent: Thursday, July 2, 2020 10:57 AM
>> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Subject: Re: Dixie Land: a Provisional, Incomplete, Annotated Chronology
>>
>> I don't interpret the 1844 reference to the dance this way. The dance and
>> music being played aren't "Dixey's Land," the writer is comparing the
>> dancers crossing imaginary boundaries with the children playing the game
>> of
>> "Dixey's Land," which the writer had written about a few months before and
>> was obviously familiar with. Both the 1844 references are to the game.
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU> On Behalf Of
>> Stephen
>> Goranson
>> Sent: Thursday, July 2, 2020 8:34 AM
>> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>> Subject: [ADS-L] Dixie Land: a Provisional, Incomplete, Annotated
>> Chronology
>>
>> Dixie Land: a Provisional, Incomplete, Annotated Chronology
>>
>> [Details are in American Dialect Society -list archive, J. Lighter's
>> Historical Dic. American Slang, and J. Green's Dic. Of Slang; additions
>> and
>> corrections welcome.]
>>
>> [Variant Dix+-spellings, some informalisms and/or (black or white) slang
>> or
>> maybe kid-speech (Dickie) for Dixon, he of the exceedingly well-known
>> Line,
>> and eventually, land. Searches for a kind-hearted NY D. slaveholder or a
>> particular D. minstrel role or individual--other than Dixon--may have been
>> over-rated. Old-timers who recalled such related pre-1859 games, perhaps
>> similar to Tag and, maybe, to Red Rover, vindicated.]
>>
>> 1763-7 the Mason and Dixon Line survey
>>
>> 1835 US South [apparently imo called] Mason and Dixon's *Land*
>>
>> 1844 a (fiction?) dance, with playing "Dixey's Land"; also 1844, same
>> author, play at Dixie's land on newly-washed pavement
>>
>> 1849 Mason & Dixon Line re-surveyed and largely confirmed
>>
>> 1852 kids in NY play games "I Spy," and "Tag," and "Dicky's land"
>>
>> [1854 Dorothea Dix's Land Bill, not enacted-in 1861 belittled in NY
>> publication]
>>
>> 1855 .this game.the game cannot be played without the State.those who go
>> to
>> Dixey's land must be Dixey's men
>>
>> 1856 boys on skates [in Buffalo] played "Dickie's Land" and "Tag"
>>
>> 1859 D.D. Emmett [who spent time in NY] songs Jonny Roach and Dixie's Land
>> make Dixie (land) famous [On Emmett see Hans Nathan, Dan Emmett and the
>> rise
>> of Negro minstrelsy, second edition, 1977]
>>
>> 1861 H.  Hotze writes Dixie is an abbreviation for Mason and Dixon's Line
>> and claims he previously heard northern negroes use it as such
>>
>> 1861 John Bell of TN, from Dixie's Land
>>
>> 1861 WH Russell [160 or 60?-river vs crow-fly?)] miles north of Memphis
>> reports Dixie's Land is a synonym for heaven
>>
>> 1861 Old Game of Dixie's Land, sport, in NY, decades past, with lines,
>> boundaries North and South
>>
>> 1861 Mason and Dixon line, or on Dixon's, or Dixey's Line itself [PA
>> newspaper]
>>
>> 1863 Artemis Ward crosses Dixie's line [several newspapers]
>>
>> 1869 "sout' in Tixey" [see Green]
>>
>> 1872 Dixie's land, a recalled game NY boys played, also "Tag"
>>
>> 1872 Emmett, whose story changed later, claimed northern negroes said "I
>> wish I was in Dixie's land" when he was about to travel south
>>
>>
>> Stephen Goranson
>>
>>
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>
>
> --
> "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."
>

-- 
"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."

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