Comments on: Can you speak American?

By: Dictionary Of Regional American English — A Fun Distraction | Gadaboutblogalot's Blog

Sat, 25 Feb 2012 17:09:20 +0000

[...] Can you speak American? (oup.com) [...]

By: Alice

Alice — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 14:08:13 +0000

Just a note for those following the comments to refer to the two trackbacks above for follow-up on the question of the origin of “buckaroo.”

- Blog Editor Alice

By: OUPblog » Blog Archive » Debate: What is the origin of “buckaroo”? OED Editor responds

Fri, 24 Feb 2012 13:31:08 +0000

[...] started a debate about the origin of the word “buckaroo” with our quiz Can you speak American? last week. Richard Bailey, author of Speaking American, argues that it comes from the West African [...]

By: OUPblog » Blog Archive » Debate: What is the origin of “buckaroo”? Richard Bailey writes

Fri, 24 Feb 2012 11:31:32 +0000

[...] We (unintentionally) started a debate about the origin of the word “buckaroo” with our quiz Can you speak American? last week. In an excerpt from Richard Bailey’s Speaking American, he argues that it comes [...]

By: Marcel Kincaid

Marcel Kincaid — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 05:27:51 +0000

‘The Bantu word “buckra” appears to be the origin of buckaroo, a word meaning cowboy.’

No, it most certainly does not appear so.

‘sound more like’

Totally bogus basis for etymology.

‘I put my money on’

Meaningless nonsense.

By: Tom Wylie

Tom Wylie — Mon, 20 Feb 2012 04:49:22 +0000

I agree with Richard Bailey that buckaroo came from the African buckra, and indeed arrived with the first Africans in Virginia in 1619.

The Bantu word “buckra” appears to be the origin of buckaroo, a word meaning cowboy. Some think that buckaroo comes from the Spanish vaquero, which in turn was derived from the Arabic languages. Buckra and buckaroo however, sound more like the Arabic equivalent “bakara” or “bakhara” than like the word vaquero. I put my money on buckra, rather than vaquero. Arabic influence was as great and perhaps greater in Africa than it was in Spain and Portugal. Buckra, I believe, came directly out of Africa, or through Portugal to Africa, and was Americanized as buckaroo.

By: Marcel Kincaid

Marcel Kincaid — Sun, 19 Feb 2012 22:06:00 +0000

Indeed, buckaroo came from vaquero, via forms such as bakhara, bocarro, buckhara, and buckayro. The claim that it came from the West African “buckra” is nonsense with no basis in fact.

In “Speaking American”, Richard Bailey writes “In the 1970s two investigators examined nicknames of people in the region and noted that the given names were often of English origin and the nicknames of African. The person bearing the nickname buckaroo was, they reported, especially skilled in the management of farm animals, and they asserted that the name was derived from vaquero ‘cow hand’ (< Spanish vaca 'cow'). More likely, however, is the explanation that it was the special skill rather than the animals that accounted for the nickname (Baird and Twining 1991)." Sorry, no, that is not more likely, and in any case that is no way to do etymological analysis.

By: Ken

Ken — Sat, 18 Feb 2012 20:22:36 +0000

I’m pretty sure “Buckaroo” is a word evolved from the Spanish word Vaquero.

By: John Falotico

John Falotico — Sat, 18 Feb 2012 19:03:58 +0000

Disagree with the etymology of “buckaroo”. This is undoubtedly an anglo corruption of the the Spanish word for cowboy, “vaquero”. Since the letter “v” is pronounced as a “b” in the Spanish language, English speakers heard the term as “baquero” which evolved into “buckaroo”. The cowboy culture in the US started in Texas borrowing from Mexican traditions. Another example of an anglicism adopted from Texas Spanish is “hoosegow” meaning “jail”. This is derived from the Spanish past participle of the verb to judge, “juzgado” in which the “j” is pronounced as an “h” in Spanish.