Glossary of Terms Casually Defined, Page Two: U to Z

University of Louisiana, was the University of Southwestern Louisiana when I graduated. It was and still is the Universite des Acadiens. I was Outstanding Graduate of my class. One of a few universities with a Francophone studies program, there are centers for Louisiana and Acadian studies, programs in wetlands management and eco-tourism and some solid advanced technology programs. I and one brother and one sister graduated from there with Latin honors — I the lowest of these purely academic honors among my siblings.  I have another brother who attended there with graduating just below the Latin honors. Justice Frank Wynerth Summers and Dudley Leblanc of this glossary were also alumni. My mother also earned her bachelor’s degree here starting before me and finishing after me

University of Santo Tomas The University of Santo Tomas UST is the oldest existing university in Asia. I spent some time working with the outreach in the Catholic Charismatic Renewal ministries of Ang Ligaya Ng Panginoon covenant community based in Manila. While I spent about the same amount of time at La Salle and UPI in Manila this place meant more to me because of its history. I only assisted on half a dozen occasions in the student outreach there. I spent vastly more time at the Ateneo de Manila, San Isidro College, Bukidnon State College and Central Mindanao University. I was also more independent inmy activity in these other places just listed. But UST is pecial,  it is the largest Catholic university in the world In terms of student population in a single campus. The institution was established  On July 24, 1605 mostly through the initiative of Bishop Miguel de Benavides, O.P. the third Archbishop of Manila.. On that date he bequeathed the amount of one thousand five hundred pesos and his personal library for the establishment of a “seminary-college” to prepare young men for the priesthood. The official founding which converted that money and those books into the University of Santo Tomas followed on April 28, 1611. With the original campus located in Intramuros, the Walled City of Manila, UST was first called Colegio de Nuestra Señora del Santisimo Rosario, and later renamed Colegio de Santo Tomas, in honor of  Dominican Theologian, St. Thomas Aquinas. On July 29, 1619 the Colegio began to confer degrees and by November 20, 1645, Pope Innocent X elevated the college to a university. In 1680, it was subsequently placed under the royal patronage of the Spanish monarchy. I often compare UST with ideas people have of the Philippines.

Vermilion meaning red is the name of the Vermilion River or Bayou Vermilion which joins Lafayette and Abbeville to each other and to Vermilion Bay. The Vermilion is the name of the student newspaper at USL and now at UL for which I wrote when I matriculated there. My maternal Grandfather was president of Vermilion Savings and Loan which became Vermilion Savings Bank and then became part of another institution. Abbeville is the parish seat of Vermilion Parish.

Vieux Lois Des Familles Meaning “The Old Law (or Laws) of the Families” This is the highest ranking and most enduring and most flexible of all the Lois in the Tribe. It is not a Droit because of its nature more than its prestige.

1. Each Basileus can add a family name to the roll of Acadian Families. When a dynasty ends if there was a Basileus of an unenrolled name his name enters as the lowest High Chiefly Name. Any Tribal name becomes either High High Chiefly or Princely.

2.Each Comite de Renaissance can with the Basileus add three names to the roll. A Comite de Renaisssance can also nominate one Princely family to be degraded to High Chiefly and so with each category and to elevate another from each category to the next.

3.Anyone born into the Tribe must be born into a family association or the special association of La Maison de le Roi.

4. During regular times (not now) no man among the Acadians may have more consorts than the Basileus. Nor should any Prince Chef de Grand Famille nor Basileus ever in regular times not have a high wife and two mistresses in the course of his life.

5. Names are passed on through men to legitimate children and to the children of women not in legitimate unions only but retrospective errors tolerated are allowed in future generations. However, women in legitimate marriages to men without a tribal family association pass on second class membership for three generations to all descendants. Those in legitimate marriages to men with a tribal family association pass on second class membership to all descendants for two generations. Second Class members have one vote each in the Assemblee des Familles and First Class members have two votes each. In the Assemblee itself this is the only distinction in votes despite distinctions outside the Assemblee.

6. Every Family Association must have several classes of membership. White men born to the name and not adopted into legitimate marriages who are married themselves and speak French and certain key words of Arcadian Greek and have borne some recognized arms of war and are Catholic or Greek Orthodox form the most sacred council and must approve by majority serious changes to the charter once a royal charter is established as Lois. There must also be a council of Men, of Married Men, of Women, of Married Couples, of Filles des Basilei, of the Assemblee de  Famille and of the auxiliaries. Each and all having at least one recognized officer and election unique to itself.  Jews and Pagans of ancient connection may enter all but the most inner council and may form the majority of a given family’s assemblee. Racial variation is complicated   as is Arcadian Appearance and rules as well as composition can affect a family’s status.

7. Seeking sanctions outside the Tribe against Princes or the Basileus for sexual offenses is considered an offense against the tribe. Nor shall any family fail to care for any woman and child who are mother and offspring to such a Prince or Basileus even if redress is also sought. The Basileus is also to be received according to titles and addresses due to the relations and station when received by the Chief.

8. Every family association must have a Chief from the qualified inner circle. He must list his wife, sisters and mother as principal deputies. In times of absence or incapacity it must be one of these females who primarily fulfill his leadership duties.

9. Every family must have at least one and not more than three chaplains but so long as the chaplain is a bona fides cleric there are no requirements of race, religion, relatedness, sex or even moral character. Procedural regularity is most essential however.  Families in whom the majority are neither Roman Catholic nor Greek Orthodox must declare this and may seat two observers  in the inner council who are of the largest religion. However, the rules of the Inner Council still apply to remain Acadian some must convert to one of these religions or both.

10.In regular times (not now) all must pay at least one percent tax to a family treasury. Each family must pay one percent of its income to the Maison de Le Roi. The payment is over an above the cost of the rituals of attendance and fealty.

Voodoo a religion combining African paganism, influences from European witchcraft and popular piety absorbed by slaves and free people of color in the colonial Caribbean and Louisiana and also connecting to some perceptions of Catholic Christianity. The form practiced in Louisiana sometimes connects to the practices of Traiteurisme among the Acadian population and is less openly polytheist in many instances than Haitian practice. The spectrum is broad and open practice has always been limited.

Wang Guang-rong My senior Assistant in Yantai and chief correspondent as well as holder of other titles after my departure. A dear friend with whom I have long ago fallen out of regular touch. Unlike my second assistant Lu Ting-ting she was also my regular student and also played the Wizard of Oz in the workshop play of that name.

wetlands A  set of phenomena and or land types which occur all over the world in some places and not others. However, Louisiana has large and small river basins, bayou floodplains, river swamps, marshes, sand barrier islands, mangrove barrier islands and several other types of wetlands which play an enormous role in all sorts of development, conservation and economic output of regional, national and world significance.

William Charles Summers My uncle and a close friend and sometimes not so close friend who married late and had no children but fostered his wife’s children whose father had died. He was many things including a sailor, farmer, adventure and spiritual practitioner of Christian and indigenous traditions. Will had many secret burdens to bear which if not mentioned would make his life a lie but which are not mine to disclose. He saw a certain gulf between himself and his older siblings. But in his personal life was very close to them all.

Xu Aina A friend today whom I have always called Anna. She helped me negotiate the many paperwork and transaction challenges that lay between me and going to teach at the Shandong Institute. We also recreated, toured and visited together on many occasions an worked on various projects together. I got to know her sister, son, husband and nephew which also enhanced my understanding of the place I was living. Anna is a native of Yantai.

Xavier University A name used for several colleges and universities around the world which have been founded by the Jesuits and so have been named for the great Jesuit missionary St. Francis Xavier. For me Xavier university in Cagayan De Oro on the Island of Mindanao in the Philippines is the one that springs to mind. It was one of many universities and colleges where I supported and participated in the ministry of other who supported and participated in my ministries. It was also one of four Filipino universities where I seriously considered remaining to study after doing a year of credits in one semester at USL and before going to live and study on my own at the Franciscan University of Steubenville.

Yantai The city in Shandong Province in China where I lived while teaching at the Shandong Institute of Business and Technology. The name means Smoke Terrace. The ancient smoke terrace was a place where Chinese vigilantes and imperial guardsmen  set wolf dung fires to send smoke signals when pirate fleets approached the town.  I made quite a few dear friends and some large number of acquaintances  there. I have a long interest in China which is complex. Sino-Acadian historic ties are very slight but significant across history and Acadian interest in China has grown in the last century.

Youth With A Mission, Y-WAM Protestant missionary evangelist  organization with which my parents worked and with which we all lived in American Samoa. This was just after Tonga and before Navajoland. My long tenure as an only child ended there because my mother conceived Sarah there.

Zacatecas a city in the State of Zacatecas in Mexico which I visited with my Sister and her children, my two nieces and a nephew after I regained the ability to walk after my Hurricane Rita injuries. We saw street theater, mines, cable cars and markets . Zacatecas means “of the grasslands or pasture”. When I was a teenager in Mexico City I learned zacate as  a synonym for pasto or pasture as well as Spanish words meaning lawn. Only after I moved away did I realize that about 15% of the vocabulary my friends and I used on the streets of Mexico City was not really Spanish but was Nahuatl. Nahuatl is language of the Aztec Empire from which zacate derives.

Zeus King of the Olympian Greek Gods and the basis for the word Deus in Latin meaning God, Dios meaning God in Spanish, Dieu meaning God in French and Theo meaning God in Romanized Greek. This is true even though these terms translate references to Yahweh and Jehovah as varied forms of the Hebrew use name for God which included Yah. However, in English the word God the German  Gott probably come from the Latin God Jove who had many Zeusian Characteristics. The Arcadian formal royal line begins with Zeus although he was never Basileus Arkadios kai Arkadikoi.

Zouaves  Here this almost always will refer to the Louisiana Zouaves of the War Between the States although the French Zouaves do enter a bit into the historical interests of this blog as well.  Zoavisme was a movement brought to Louisiana from France by an odd hybrid of military drill instructors and actors who toured Anglophone, Acadian and Creole regions of the State before the war. Yankee or Union Zouaves played a role in that great struggle and there were a significant number of of other Confederate Zouave units. But the Louisiana units are the most famous even in a history which often ignores Louisiana and are often called Louisiana Tigers by a variety of people . Unlike most Federal Zouave units, most Confederate Zouaves were not autonomous “regiments”: Louisiana followed this trend  or started it and these men  were often companies within larger units. The cognomen “Louisiana Tiger” is a venerable term  which dates from the Mexican War although Acadian fighters were sometimes known as gamecocks, crocodiles, alligators, Les Loups, and other animals Louisiana’s fighting animal was mostly the Tiger  and  the term refers to any Louisiana state trooper LSU athletic teams but all this has little to do with Zouaves. None of the Mexican War Louisiana “Tigers” were Zouaves for example.  The earliest, and most famous Louisiana Zouave unit was Confederate officer  White’s Company B (the “Tiger Rifles”) of Major Chatham Roberdeau Wheat’s First Special Battalion, Louisiana Volunteers, aka “Louisiana Tigers”.

This can be confusing because Lee’s Tigers is a term correctly applied to all Louisiana soldiers that served in the Army of Northern Virginia. These are not to be confused with the Louisiana Zouaves  who were the “Louisiana Tigers” or “Coppen’s Zouaves.” These names have been confused with “Louisiana Tigers at Gettysburg.” Coppen’s Zouaves were at Gettysburg, but they were not then known as “Louisiana Tigers” in any way related to the unit although they may have been called Tigers in a broader sense.  Captain White’s Company B, “Louisiana Tigers”, of Major Wheats’s First Special Battalion, were not at Gettysburg, having been disbanded after Wheat’s death at Gaines Mill in 1862. There are two other Zouave units of company size for which I have little documentation but believe existed for a small part of the war.

Zydeco This the style of music most renowned and developed which is specific not to the larger community of Louisiana Creoles of Color but to the Creoles of Color most associated with Acadians. This style of music has spread throughout the Creole community and yet further however. The meaning of the name is uncertain. Some say it has a snap to it and that the name derives from the word or phrase les haricots meaning “snap beans”. The Acadian French pronuncation of these word is best shown in American English as “lay-Zah-ree-Co” if one adds the singular article to the music le zydeco is close indeed. There are other derivations proposed that don not bear repeating and explaining in this short definition.