cracker

1400–50; late Middle English craker. See crack, -er¹; (defs 4, 5) perhaps originally in sense “braggart,” applied to frontiersmen of the southern American colonies in the 1760s, though subsequently given other interpretations (cf. corn-cracker); for crackers “crazy,” cf. cracked, -ers

The term cracker is used as a neutral nickname by inhabitants of Georgia and Florida; it is a positive term of self-reference. But when the nickname is used by outsiders, it is usually with disparaging intent and perceived as insulting by Georgians and Floridians. Cracker is always disparaging and offensive when used to refer to a poor white person in the South; the word in this sense often implies that the person is regarded as ignorant or uneducated. When used by black people, cracker can refer to a Southern white racist, not necessarily poor or rural. See also Cracker State.