It’s been a long time since I worked on this blog, so I decided to choose a fun word to get back into writing. This post is about the word goober. A funny word used to describe a funny person. I called my dog a goober and then wondered where the word came from. A quick Google search informed me that goober is another word for peanut. This immediately brought back childhood memories of the bright purple jar of Smucker’s Goober Grape that my parents always made sure was stocked in our pantry. If you are unfamiliar with this product, Goober is a jar with alternating stripes of peanut butter and jelly: the lazy man’s PBJ. I never made the connection between calling someone a goober and Goober the food (or should I say “food”?) because goober does not mean peanut in my vocabulary. The word is most commonly used in the southern United States and is derived from an African word for peanut.
Peanuts and Goober
Peanuts are native to South America and were domesticated across the continent long before European arrival. You would think, then, that our word for peanut would come from a Mesoamerican language. For example, many English food words are borrowed directly from the Aztec language, such as avocado, tomato, and chocolate. But the word goober comes from the African languages Kongo and Kimbundu, illustrating a roundabout introduction of peanuts to the United States.
Portuguese traders brought peanuts to Africa, Asian, and other parts of the world by the 1500s. It became incorporated into many cuisines and became a staple crop in West and Central Africa. When the people of this region were enslaved and taken to what is today the United States they brought the peanut crop with them. The word goober comes from the Kongo and Kimbundu words for peanut, nguba.
Kongo and Kimbundu are both Bantu languages, a group of languages spoken by the Bantu people throughout sub-Saharan Africa. Bantu languages are the largest group of languages in the Niger-Congo language family. Many slaves in the southern United States and Central and South America were speakers of Bantu languages. Some creolized forms of these languages are still used today. The influence of Bantu languages on American English is found in words such as banjo (from mbanza, a banjo-like instrument) and gumbo (from ngombo, the Bantu word for okra). The word zombie is believed to originate from zumbi, the Kikongo word for “fetish”, and nzambi, the Kimbundu word for “god.” However, it is also believed to come from the Spanish word sombra, meaning “shade or ghost”. With so much mixing of Indigenous, European, and African cultures, I imagine it is difficult to pinpoint exact origins of such words.
Pea + Nut
It is difficult to talk about goober without using the word peanut. You may be wondering where this word comes from too. Peanut is a combination of pea and nut, so I will explain these words independently. Nut comes from the Proto-Indo-European (PIE) root *kneu- meaning “nut.” Simple enough. As you may know, peanuts are not true nuts but are actually legumes, related to beans, lentils, and peas. The word pea has a peculiar history. Pea is what is called a false singular, meaning that a singular word that sounded like a plural was mistaken for a plural and so a singular version began to be used incorrectly. Pea is derived from the Middle English word pease. Pease is both plural (the dish) and singular (one individual). But pease sounds like a plural because of the “s” sound at the end, and people in the early- to mid-17th century started calling an individual pease pea. And, well, if pea is singular, then the plural must be peas. And it’s been that way ever since. Oh, and pease comes from Greek pison, in case you were wondering.
You may have heard peanuts referred to as goober peas. There is even a folk song about them. Other names for peanuts are ground nuts and ground peas. This is because unlike other culinary nuts that typically grow on trees, peanuts grow underground. I admit I never wondered what a peanut plant looked like, so I found this piece of trivia interesting.
Final Note
When I say that goober comes from the African word nguba, the etymological history doesn’t end there. There may be a whole story about how the Kongo and Kimbundu languages arrived as nguba to mean “peanut”. Unfortunately, this information is not readily available online.
Sources
https://www.etymonline.com/word/peanut#etymonline_v_10217
https://www.etymonline.com/word/goober#etymonline_v_9042
https://www.etymonline.com/word/pea#etymonline_v_10207
https://www.etymonline.com/word/nut#etymonline_v_9888
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peanut
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bantu_languages
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_English_words_of_Niger-Congo_origin
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