What is the difference between a creole and cajun person? (New Orleans: to move, rated)

[WestbankNOLA]

Originally Posted by annie_himself

Is cher some slang?

Don't Cajun people say that at the end of almost every sentence. Nah, I'm joking.

Am I wrong?
What sets Troy Landry apart from John Picklesmith?

I didn't say it was wrong.. It was funny...

[WestbankNOLA]

Originally Posted by GreyDay

Well, by definition a créole is a mixture of races. And yes there is no 'typical' mix, but there is definitely a look associated with it mon chere.

No it's not. Never has been. It has no look either. That's all stereotype. By definition a Louisiana Creole was anyone born in or descending from Spanish Louisiana. Been that way all through history, although there is a certain subgroup of modern day Creoles that try and perpetuate that stereotype. Another story for another thread.

[GreyDay]

Originally Posted by WestbankNOLA

No it's not. Never has been. It has no look either. That's all stereotype. By definition a Louisiana Creole was anyone born in or descending from Spanish Louisiana. Been that way all through history, although there is a certain subgroup of modern day Creoles that try and perpetuate that stereotype. Another story for another thread.

Wow. My dear old grand-mere was wrong with all the stories she used to tell me then.

But if you want to take it back that far to les gens de coleur libre (free people of color), then colored folks, then the (generally french and wealthy) whites.

In Acadiana, creoles don't include just anyone.

BTW- mon chere- literally means 'my expensive/precious'- colloquially translates to 'sweetie'.

[annie_himself]

Originally Posted by WestbankNOLA

Don't Cajun people say that at the end of almost every sentence. Nah, I'm joking.



I didn't say it was wrong.. It was funny...

The Cajun girl I was seeing used to say che' after alot of sentences. But I'm not keen on either languages or dialects. I'm from Baton Rouge, remember!

I think Picklesmith is funnier.

[20yrsinBranson]

Originally Posted by WestbankNOLA

Maybe back in 1718, I'll give you jambalaya though. Maybe it's from years of cultural assimilation, but gumbo with tomatoes is like rare over here. I actually see it in coastal Mississippi and Alabama way more often than I've ever seen it over here. Now the red vs brown jambalaya thing comes up every now and then, but it's probably fair to say that Cajun jambalaya reigns in LA. "Creole" gumbo is probably more distinguishible by something like okra and file than tomatoes.

I probably meant jambalaya.

20yrsinBranson

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by GreyDay

Wow. My dear old grand-mere was wrong with all the stories she used to tell me then.

But if you want to take it back that far to les gens de coleur libre (free people of color), then colored folks, then the (generally french and wealthy) whites.

In Acadiana, creoles don't include just anyone.

BTW- mon chere- literally means 'my expensive/precious'- colloquially translates to 'sweetie'.

"Cher" can also mean "dear" in French. The feminine for "my dear" is "ma chère", the masculine is "mon cher".

[Neworleansisprettygood]

Originally Posted by Acajack

"Cher" can also mean "dear" in French. The feminine for "my dear" is "ma chère", the masculine is "mon cher".

just thinking out loud, but it's probably from the French or Latin that "dear" and "expensive" mean the same thing.

[hdwell]

Originally Posted by Acajack

"Cher" can also mean "dear" in French. The feminine for "my dear" is "ma chère", the masculine is "mon cher".

I always thought that is what it meant

[WestbankNOLA]

Originally Posted by hdwell

I always thought that is what it meant

Same here. I always hear it attached to sentences when I'm talking to someone from west or south of Baton Rouge.

[Squeaky2012]

Interesting topic. I get kind of confused about the terminology of Creole, but I have always associated it as a person of Spanish/French descent whose ancestry can be traced back to the original French and Spanish settlers of New Orleans (and Louisiana, by extension).

My ex-GF would state that she was a Creole of Color (well, not in that terminology---she would just say Creole), and so began an interest in reading about their "culture" (I hate to generalize, since there are probably many subcultures under the larger Creole culture).

I read that Los Angeles has the 2nd largest Creole of Color population in the United States outside of New Orleans (it was in one of the Creole of Color websites...LouisianaCreoles?), and noticed that many black Angelenos have French and Spanish surnames (Augustine/Delacroix/Legaux/Ferreira), unlike most other areas of the nation. My ancestry is rooted in Mississippi, and we tend to have Anglo-Saxon slave surnames, much like the rest of Black America. There are also many Creoles of Color in the Bay Area of California, particularly in San Francisco, if I may recall.