| ���The American Heritage� Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition.��2000. |
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| goober |
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| SYLLABICATION: | goo�ber |
| PRONUNCIATION: | � �g  b r |
| NOUN: | Chiefly Southern U.S. See peanut (sense 2). | | ETYMOLOGY: | Of Bantu origin; akin to Kongo or Kimbundu n-guba. | | REGIONAL NOTE: | Most Southerners recognize the terms goober and goober pea as other names for the peanut. Goober is related to Kongo or Kimbundu n-guba, �peanut.� The word is especially interesting as one of a small stock of African language borrowings brought over by slaves. Most of these words have to do with the food items imported from Africa for the slaves to eat. In this category are gumbo, �okra,� which is of Bantu origin, and yam, which is of West African origin. The noun cooter is related to the Mandingo word kuta and the Tshiluba word nkudu, both meaning �turtle.� Cooter is still used in South Carolina, Georgia, and the Gulf states to denote the edible freshwater turtle of the genus Chrysemys and, by extension, other turtles and tortoises.
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| The American Heritage� Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition. Copyright � 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by the Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. |
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