“New Light” on “Old Zion”: A Study of the Names of White and Negro Baptist Churches in New Orleans

THE LEAST EXPLORED REGIONS which lie open to students of American names is that of organized religion. Research in the names of American churches has been limited to one anonymous pamphlet published in the nineteenth century and a few remarks in Mencken's monumental study of American English. 1 This paper makes no claim to cover any great extent of this onomastic terra incognita. It is an examination of the names of congregations belonging to a single Protestant group and located in a small geographical area. Yet within this restricted compass may be found some interesting indications of the part which ethnic factors play in the naming of churches, as well as a picture, in miniature and with local variations, of trends in church naming which operate throughout American Protestantism. New Orleans was selected as the locale for this study because it is the largest American city to. list white and Negro churches under separate headings in its telephone directory.