“CRACKER CULTURE”: A PRELIMINARY DEFINITION

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IN THE STUDY of modern societies it is of value to the social scientist to distinguish and describe the regional variations which occur within a larger society. It is important to understand the various regional specializations in which man has established in order to conceptualize the nature of the contemporary modern world. Alfred Kroeber1 has correctly suggested that the culture is a subject matter for the social scientist; he defines culture as the natural region within which several communities have similar cultural and social norms. The variations from community to community within the area serve to distinguish the communities of the area from each other and from those in surrounding regions. It is the purpose of this paper to describe in broad terms the general cultural configuration of such a cultural area in Southeast Georgia and North Central Florida. The inhabitants refer to themselves and are referred to by others as Crackers, and we have used this name as a general term to denote the particular of these people. In describing this we attempt to develop a device for understanding the nature of contemporary modern society by placing it in the proper area context. Cracker Culture is a sub-type within the larger regional denoted as Southern. It is distinguished by three factors: the geographic features (topography, flora, fauna, and weather); the logic of its social order (social organization); and the sacred logic (rationale) which supports and gives meaning to the culture. The outstanding geographic features of the area are its mild waters, hot, humid summers, and the red clay upland soils; they are the sedimentary soils of the terraces that resulted from the progressive up-lift of the Atlantic littoral. They are the sand and sandy clay loams, whose primary drainage system consists of the east-west rivers such as the Savannah, Satilla, Altamaha and the Ogeechee, originating above the fall line in the uplands. The rivers serve as channels of migration from the sea-island region of the coast into the fertile areas of the uplands and Piedmont. The relatively infertile soils between these rivers discouraged settlers in search of the wealth that came from cotton production. A typical plant of the area is the Long-Leaf Pine which occurred in such profusion that the early settlers termed the area the