Redneck

In modern usage, redneck predominantly refers to a particular stereotype of whites from the Southern United States. The word can be used either as a pejorative or as a matter of pride, depending on context. See also: Hick and Hillbilly.

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The cast of "The Dukes of Hazzard", representing a diverse assortment of Rednecks

Modern usage

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The Stars of Blue Collar TV. From left to right : Larry the Cable Guy , Bill Engvall , and Jeff Foxworthy. Also pictured is frequent guest star Ron White.

"Redneck" like the word, Yankee, has generally two uses: one for outsiders, and then within that group, used to connote a subgroup. To outsiders, generally, it is a term for those of Scots-Irish descent (some members of which settled outside the South), or more loosely, rural poor to middle-class Southerners, Scots-Irish or not. Within that group, however, it is used to describe the more downscale members. The "country" person is the upscale kin to the "redneck". Rednecks span from the working poor to the working class.

Generally, there is a continuum from the "dirty" redneck, a derisive term for the lowest class redneck, to the country person, however, there are differences. Rednecks typically are more libertine, especially in their personal lives, than their country brethren who tend towards social conservatism. Also, the lowest class rednecks, especially, have a penchant for the obscene (see "stereotype" below).

In contrast to country people, they tend not to attend church, or do so infrequently. Further, "politically apathetic" better describes this group. The younger ones generally don't vote. If they do vote, while they tend towards the Republican Party, they are less homogenous than the country people and other Southern whites. Many Southern celebrities like Jerry Clower and Jeff Foxworthy embrace the redneck label. It is used both as a term of pride and as a derogatory epithet; sometimes to paint country people and/or their politics as being low class. In one of his stand-up routines, Foxworthy sums up the condition as "a glorious absence of sophistication".

Etymology

The popular etymology says that the term derives from such individuals having a red neck caused by working outdoors in the sunlight over the course of their lifetime. The effect of decades of direct sunlight on the exposed skin of the back of the neck not only reddens fair skin, but renders it leathery and tough, and typically very wrinkled by late middle age. Another popular theory stems from the use of red bandanas tied around the neck to signify union affiliation during the violent clashes between United Mine Workers and owners between 1910 and 1920.

Some historians claim that the term redneck originated in 17th century Virginia, when indentured servants were sunburnt while tending plantation crops.

An alternative origin of the term comes from Scotland. In Scotland, the National Covenant and The Solemn League and Covenant (a.k.a. Covenanters) signed documents stating that Scotland desired a Presbyterian Church Government, and rejected the Church of England as their official church.

Many of the Covenanters Signed these documents using their own blood, and many in the movement began wearing red pieces of cloth around their neck to signify their position to the public. They were referred to as Rednecks. Many of the early inhabitants of the US South were of Scottish Descent, and according to this theory, this term was applied to many of the southern Scottish immigrants early on, eventually changing into the term we know today.

Stereotype

Catherine Bach as Daisy Duke.

A redneck is assumed to consume mass produced American beer such as Budweiser or Miller by the case. Other beverages might include Moonshine, Pabst Blue Ribbon (in more traditional settings), as well as Jack Daniel's whiskey. The stereotypical redneck lives in a trailer, and drives an old, large, beat-up pickup truck, possibly adorned with the Confederate flag, with a gun rack in the rear window. He may wear a white sleeveless, and/or obscene t-shirt. He also wears blue jeans, a baseball or trucker hat. Rednecks like acid-washed jeans, and the jeans of redneck men often have a permanent circle on the back-pocket from carrying a can of chewing tobacco. Their hair is worn in the mullet style, or in a military style haircut. He is also prone to swearing, perhaps not as much as the stereotypical Yankee, but more than other Southerners.

Stereotypical hobbies include hunting, fishing, riding 4-wheelers and snowmobiles, and watching professional wrestling, NASCAR, and monster truck rallies. Rednecks are characteristically fond of car engine repair, and collecting junked cars on their lawns.

Country and Southern Rock bands such as Lynyrd Skynyrd figure in as their preferred genre of music. Redneck men also listen to other Southern Rock and Metal such as the Allman Brothers, Ted Nugent, ZZ Top, Pantera, AC/DC, Led Zeppelin, and Guns n' Roses.

Redneck females are generally portrayed as highly sexual. "Daisy dukes" are a name for the extremely small shorts worn by Daisy Duke, on the wildly popular television program "The Dukes of Hazzard". However, most redneck females look nothing like actress Catherine Bach in her role as Daisy Duke. Stereotypical redneck females have long, unkempt, ragged or "scraggly" hair that is rarely or never cut. A high percentage of both redneck women and men are obese, due to poor diet and lack of exercise.

Rednecks are often portrayed as lacking education or being ignorant.

Popular culture

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Hank Williams Sr.

The Grand Ole Opry, and Hee Haw are popular entertainments from years past, and they, as well as the entertainers Hank Williams, Grandpa Jones and Jerry Clower, have seen lasting popularity within the redneck community, as well as forging opinions in the minds of those without.

In recent years the Comedic stylings of Jeff Foxworthy, Ron White, Bill Engvall, Larry the Cable Guy and Roy D. Mercer have become intensely popular, with the first four forming first a "Blue Collar Comedy Tour", and now a Blue Collar TV television show and film.

King of the Hill is an American animated sit-com showing a modern country family from Texas. In the show they are sometimes derisively called "redneck" by an Asian neighbor.

Country music singer Gretchen Wilson titled one of her songs Redneck Woman on her 2004 album Here for the Party. She was born and raised in the state of Illinois.

Redneck Rampage, a mid-90s video game, placed the player in the role of a redneck, killing and maiming various animal and human enemies.

Author Jim Goad wrote a book titled The Redneck Manifesto that explores some of the socioeconomic history of this word and the people it is leveled at.

Claims

Many celebrities have claimed to be rednecks when they don't fit the public's description of a redneck such as Kid Rock, Fred Durst, Uncle Kracker, Vanilla Ice, Rob Zombie, Britney Spears and Everlast.

Historical usages

Scotland

The word redneck is first cited in Scotland, where it referred to supporters of the National Covenant and The Solemn League and Covenant, otherwise known as Covenanters - largely lowland Presbyterians.

The Covenanters in the mid-17th Century signed documents that stated Scotland desired the Presbyterian form of church government and would not accept the Church of England as its official state church. To signify their desire, many Covenanters signed the documents in their own blood, would spill their blood to keep this from happening and wore red pieces of cloth around their necks as distinctive insignia - hence the term Redneck.

These Scottish Presbyterians migrated from their lowland Scottish home to Ulster (the northern province of Ireland) during the 17th Century and soon settled in considerable numbers in North America across the 18th Century. One etymological theory holds that since many Scots-Irish Americans who settled in what would become the South were Presbyterian, the term was bestowed upon them and their descendants.

United States

It is clear that by the post-Reconstruction era (after the departure of Federal troops in the American South in 1874-1878), the term had worked its way into popular usage. Several 'black-face' minstrel shows used the word in a derrogatory manner, comparing slave life over that of the poor rural whites. This may have much to do with the social, political and economic struggle between Populism and the Redeemers of the post-Civil War South, where the new middle class of the South (professionals, bankers, industrialists) displaced the antebellum planter class as the leaders of the Southern states. The Populist movement, with its pseudo-socialist message of economic equality, represented a threat to the status quo. The use of a derrogative term, such as 'redneck' to belittle the working class, would have assisted in the gradual disenfranchisement of most of the Southern lower class, both black and white, which occurred by 1910.

Related terms

North America

The term farmer tan is sometimes used to refer to a sunburn, particularly when the sunburned area covers the neck and arms of the person only.

South Africa

In South Africa, the Afrikaans term rooinek (meaning "redneck") was derisively applied by Afrikaners to the British soldiers who fought during the Boer Wars, because their skin was sensitive to the harsh African sun. The phrase is still used by Afrikaners to describe English-speaking white people.

Ironically, the term "redneck" is also used by the English to describe very conservative Afrikaners because of that group's historic support of apartheid, a system of white, minority power and privilege and black and "coloured" exploitation and disenfranchisement, possibly by analogy to the American usage described above.

Barbados

"Poor whites" in Barbados (descendants largely of seventeenth century English, Scottish, and Irish indentured servants and deportees) were called Red Legs. Many of these families moved to Virginia and the Carolinas as large sugar plantations replaced small tobacco farming.

Brazil

The term Caipira is used to define inhabitants from the countryside of São Paulo State (chiefly rural, and descendents of Japanese, Portuguese and Italian immigrants), which are considered the brazilian counterparts of american rednecks. Depending of how the word is applied, it can acquire pejorative conotation. However, the most pejorative ways to call a Caipira are "capial" (kha-pee-aw), intentionally mispronounced "capiar" (kha-pee-arr), as a Caipira supposedely would do, and Jeca (zhe-kah). Although the correct definition of Caipira is applied only to inhabitants from the countryside of São Paulo State, Caipira is used by many to tag anyone who comes from the countryside of any southeastern brazilian state.

See also

• Good ol' boy network
• List of ethnic slurs
• Hillbilly
• White trash
• Trailer park trash
• Ned (Scottish)
• Chav (the UK version of a "wigger.")
• Hick
• Redneck Rampage
• Deliverance

External links

• You Might be a Redneck If... (humorous pictures)
• Redneck-bonics; Southern Talk to English (humorous)
• Canadian Redneck Hunting and Fishing (informative)
• Blue Collar Comedy (comedic)