What is a Cajun?
This is a rather simple question with an all-too complicated answer...
You can ask any number of people in and out of Louisiana and you will probably get any number of answers. There are those who will claim that a Cajun is simply anyone descended from those who were deported by the British from Nova Scotia in the 1700's because of a number of political and religious reasons who eventually settled in Louisiana and by the present day had become Cajuns....
NOT!!!!
Culture and location had and still has a very important role in determining who is and who isn't a Cajun.
There are those who live in New Orleans ,for instance,that may be descended from those who were part of La Grande Derangement ( the expulsion from Canada ) but can hardly lay claim to being Cajun because their ancestors did not share the cultural "melange" that eventually resulted in the Cajun experience. Although they can claim Acadian descent, most if not all who live in Acadiana will smile bemusedly at these people if they attempt to assert a claim to being Cajun.
Though there is no "Daughters of Acadiana" to decree who is and isn't Cajun, basically it boils down to this...
If you can go to Lafayette, Thibodaux, Marksville, St. Martinville, Mermentau, Gueydan, Abbeville, or any other community in Acadiana , and more than half of ANY group of people you meet on the street agree you're Cajun, then you may have what it takes.
BUT...
If you're from outside the generally recognized parishes of the Acadiana region, don't be surprised if you fail the test.
And if you don't like this definiton... go write your own.
Because I don't even pretend to think that mine is the only opinion and I certainly don't claim it to be a royal decree... But I can almost promise you that it IS a widely held belief where I grew up, which is in the coastal parish of Vermilion, which has one of the highest count of those who ARE Cajun by any definition.
