I am Kyle's self-indulgence

In summer school today I played for one of my students this story from NPR on the Dictionary of American Regional English, which inspired us to look for some examples of regional slang in Missouri. In the process I came across a regional definition for Hoosier, which enlightened me to the cause of an old argument between me and Erika.

It was in the early years of our relationship, and I don't remember the exact context now. It could have been a car up on blocks in someone's front yard or a nasty couch sitting out on their front porch, to which Erika commented, "That's so hoosier."

I was surprised and a little bit offended to hear her use the term this way. Growing up in Nebraska I had learned from the movie Hoosiers and from Kurt Vonnegut that "hoosier" is a term proudly self-applied by residents of Indiana, and I thought that to use it as a pejorative is insulting.

Erika was surprised at my offendedness and that as far as she knew "hoosier" is just another word for "redneck." I asked her not to use it that way for my sake, and she agreed, even though she seemed to think it an odd request.

Anyway, when I started reading about Missouri variations of "hoosier," I found out that in St. Louis (Erika's hometown) it has a very specific meaning that is different from just about ever other region in America:

Thomas E. Murray carefully analyzed the use of "hoosier" in St. Louis, Missouri, where it is the favorite epithet of abuse. "When asked what a Hoosier is," Murray writes, "St. Louisans readily list a number of defining characteristics, among which are 'lazy,' 'slow-moving,' 'derelict,' and 'irresponsible.'" He continues, "Few epithets in St. Louis carry the pejorative connotations or the potential for eliciting negative responses that hoosier does." He conducted tests and interviews across lines of age and race and tabulated the results. He found the term ecumenically applied. He also noted the word was often used with a modifier, almost redundantly, as in "some damn Hoosier."

I've read a couple of different explanations for the pejorative use in St. Louis. From Wikipedia:

One need only look to the St. Louis suburb of Fenton, which, in the mid-1950s, was at the then-rural southwest rim of the county. At the time, Chrysler Corporation built a large automobile assembly plant in the city of Fenton and closed a plant it had been operating in Indiana. Many former employees of the closed Indiana plant moved to Fenton for employment; so many, in fact, that entire subdivisions of new homes (with streets named after Chrysler models such as "Fury" and "Belvidere") sprang up south of the plant, near what was then US Route 66.

It became something of a local joke to refer to the new arrivals from Indiana as "hoosiers", and before long, anyone from the rural edges of St. Louis County was considered such.

The Urban dictionary has a different (and to me, more compelling) explanation:

Dates back to a strike that occurred in St. Louis in the 30's. During this strike, scab workers from Indiana were brought in to fill in for strikers. The perjorative (sic) hoosier stems from the St. Louis workers' lack of appreciation for this.

There isn't a source cited for either one, so there's no way to know which is true.

It's a cool bit of trivia and it helps me to understand where Erika was coming from. Her use of hoosier really is a well-documented regional variation of the term.