Lesbian, Poly leader of a church gives Cajuns some victim status

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Brown says there’s always been a racial element to the way Cajuns were treated by other whites in Louisiana.

“They lived in these very rural areas and the Klan didn’t like them because they were Catholic or they were mixed [race] and so there were narratives around Southern prejudice. My grandmother talked about that.… It’s a difference between the ‘high yellow’ in New Orleans — or the passing white — versus the people [of color]. Since we’re on this topic, even a phrase that’s so fascinating to me, to this day, is I will meet people from Texas who will immediately just call me a coonass. I just look at them and say, ‘You’re not my people and I don’t know you that well. You can’t call me that.’ The linguistic legend behind that phrase is… that folks just couldn’t understand [Cajuns], these folks were a little dark skinned, they spoke with an accent. It’s a completely racist term … there’s an underlying racism that exists.”

Like other minorities, Cajuns faced a bureaucratic state indifferent to their desire to retain their culture. Bent on assimilation, the government insisted that their children be taught in English, not their native Cajun French. “They forced them to speak English at school but they would all speak Cajun French outside of school. My grandparents spoke Cajun French until their death. They spoke English for others.”

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