Talk:Cajuns

Mardi Gras as a" traditional Catholic religious observance"?
To the best of my knowledge, Mardi Gras isn't a traditional Catholic religious observance. It is a popular festival that precedes and culminates on the Tuesday (Mardi) before Ash Wednesday, which is a Catholic liturgical observance Oavaldezi (talk) 12:31, 11 August 2020 (UTC)


 * It is absolutely traditionally Catholic. It may not be part of Catholic liturgy, but it is derived from traditions around Ash Wednesday and Lent. For comparison, all the neighboring regions are traditionally Protestant and traditionally do not observe Mardi Gras. On the other hand, Brazil's Carnival is quite similar to Mardi Gras. 67.250.75.102 (talk) 20:03, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

Ethnic Group
There seems to be some conflict with Acadians vs. Creole and Louisiana Creole. I would be no more inclined to reference any as an ethnic group as I would Gaul, seeing as it was a Roman state with multiple ethnic enclaves that originally seeded Acadia. It would be like calling Texans a distinct ethnic group.

Even within my own family, I have a grandmother who identifies as Aquitani/Acadian to mark purity and status, and the majority who identify as Cajun with various mixed Indo-European roots.

Nebail (talk) 14:47, 7 August 2021 (UTC)

Re: Cajuns as Louisiana Creoles
I absolutely agree that Cajuns are a type of Creole, but this section seems disingenuous in presenting only historical quotes that support this view -- when one can find historical quotes saying Cajuns are not Creoles. (One contrary example, for instance: "a large element of the French population of the State [of Louisiana] are not creoles, but Acadians, or, as they call themselves and are generally called, 'Cajuns.'" Source: No author, "The 'Cajuns' of Louisiana," The Indianapolis Journal, January 28, 1898, page 7.)

My qualm, therefore, is not the assertion that Cajuns are Creoles, but rather that the article makes it seem as if there were in the past more of a consensus on this issue than actually existed. I would suggest tempering this section so that it doesn't oversimplify the matter. Skb8721 (talk) 20:19, 8 February 2023 (UTC)
 * I more than agree. North8000 (talk) 20:27, 8 February 2023 (UTC)
 * I don't agree at all that it's disengenous, and I think that you're being rather pedantic. The raison d'être of that section was originally to discuss the treatment of Acadians as Creoles, which there has been ample evidence to show that Acadians were indeed treated as Creoles. The idea that Cajuns were different to Creoles only began after the American Civil War, and there were many different reasons for this: one being the invading Federal Union soldiers' descriptions of Cajuns as "half-savage creatures" during the Civil War (read Yankee Autumn in Acadiana), the evolution of the usage of Cajun in Creole culture to do with class and status in the late 1800s, George Washington Cable's book where he made claims that Cajuns were completely separate from Creoles, and finally Henry Wadsworth Longfellow who made a romantic impression on the Acadian name through his book Evangeline: A Tale of Acadie; you'll find different nuanced understandings both from people who understood Creole culture then, and also from Anglo-Americans who spoke on it as an alien culture without much deeper investigation. Confusion was created after the Civil War about this term due to its multiple interpretations. What I want you to do for you to prove your "qualm" is to find quotes from before the American Civil War that specifically state that the Acadians born and natively raised in Louisiana were not indeed Creoles and not use just a quote from a random northern 1898 Indianapolis Newspaper. Aearthrise (talk) 21:51, 8 February 2023 (UTC)