Shotgun House

Infromant: Brian Flint, age 23, Metairie, LA, collected on May 22, 2016 and recorded on an iphone.

Verbal Lore: folk speach, slang- associated: urban legend, Material

English

United States of America

Context: a long narrow house with no hallway and interconnecting rooms found in many neighborhood in New Orleans.

Transcript:

“ The next is a ‘shotgun house.’ That means it is a very long, narrow, house in which there is no  hallway and all the rooms are connected by a doorway. It’s thought of that you could shot a- shoot a shotgun all the way through from one end to the other. There is a lot of myths surrounding the etymology of that one but, that story definitely is what most people will jump to.”

Infromant: Erin Fell, age 21, New Orleans, LA, collected on May 22, 2016 and recorded on an iphone.

Transcript: “Next is “Shotgun”, as in not the arm, not the fire weapon but a shotgun house. A shotgun house is a long, narrow house where there are generally no hallways, just a big line of rooms in the house. Shotgun houses are super common in certain neighborhoods in New Orleans.”

Collectors Commentary: This item is associated with material lore of the houses in certain N.O. neighborhoods being built a certain way. There is probably an interesting reason why these houses were designed this way that would be good to explore next.

Keywords: New Orleans, Shotgun House, long, narrow, house, no hallways