A Spotswood, Virginia, listener came across the phrase “steppin’ and fetchin'” used in a positive way to describe a speedy race run by the great horse Secretariat. But the phrase has an ugly past. To step and fetch is how many people once described the job of a slave or handyman, and Stepin Fetchit was a famous actor who often played the stereotype of the lazy black man. The documentary Ethnic Notions covers some of the history of this racially charged imagery. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Origin of Steppin’ and Fetchin'”
Hello, you have A Way with Words.
Hi, this is Bill Thomas. I’m calling from Spotswood, Virginia.
Great. Well, what would you like to talk with us about today, Bill?
I ran into a term that I thought was a Southern colloquialism. I thought it sort of resided with us here in the Blue Ridge Mountains, but I’ve run into it in West Texas and up on the New York State Canadian line, and it’s the term stepping and fetching. And I wondered about the genesis of that term and why it was so widespread. And what kind of context do you hear it in, and what does it mean?
Well, one of the most profound examples would be when we were watching Secretariat years and years ago run in the Kentucky Derby, and I heard this man say, man, that big horse is just stepping and fetching. I don’t know exactly how to apply the term other than just slang, but it’s always intrigued me.
That’s interesting. Stepping and fetching. I mean, literally, it means going and getting, right?
Right. Yeah. Going and doing. I would suppose, but it seems to pass beyond, you know, language definitions. It doesn’t seem to be a southern term. It doesn’t seem to be a West Texas term. I just thought maybe it had some profound genesis.
Very interesting. And so in the context you hear it, it’s very positive then.
Oh, yeah. That, you know, like one going to procure or one going to get something.
But I was very surprised to hear this little Hispanic lady use it at mass in Eagle Pass, Texas.
How did she do it?
She said it was in her prayer, and I offer this with every respect, but she said, Lord, please look after us in our stepping and fetching.
Wow.
Right, just the going and getting and doing, right?
Yeah, I would suppose.
But it was such a shock because the only places I’d heard it was either the aforementioned matter of secretariat or at our local stockyard.
So I was very surprised to hear that there.
That’s really fascinating.
I mean, both Grant and I are looking at each other with some surprise because we think of it in a different context.
Yeah, we’re sending secret signals here across the room because there’s another whole component to this.
Maybe you’ve heard of the actor Step and Fetch It, who’s an African-American fellow who was kind of his whole character was about being lazy.
And there’s huge racial undertones with that character.
And often step and fetch was used to refer to a handyman or a slave or a servant.
Like that’s what they did for you.
They stepped and fetch for you.
You’ll find it’s sometimes referred to Native Americans that were treated as indentured servants by the early arrivals, you know, the Spaniards and so forth.
So there’s this whole huge centuries of step and fetch being directly associated with a really unhappy part of American life.
It’s really surprising to me to find that it’s out there floating around in an ameliorated, a more positive context.
Yeah, that’s really interesting.
That is.
Well, thank you very much.
I very much enjoy listening to you.
I think you exemplify Mark Twain’s term that language is our basic art.
So practice on.
Perfect.
And we appreciate your contemplation of these complicated issues and bringing them to our attention.
You may be overestimating my intelligence.
Other than that, I do enjoy listening to you very much, and do keep on carrying on.
All right.
Thank you very much, Bill.
Take care now.
Thank you, Bill.
Thank you.
So good to talk to you.
Great talking with you.
Bye-bye.
Very interesting.
We’ll have to make a note of that.
Yeah, to keep an eye out for step and fetch, where you use it to describe yourself or something in a neutral or positive context.
Yeah, in a really positive way.
If you look back in books in the 1800s, Step and Fetch,
It even before the actor came along and made the movies in the 1900s,
Was used to refer to people of a lower class who were your servants or your slaves even.
And there’s a lot of baggage with that.
Yeah, yeah.
And the documentary that I keep recommending to people about that baggage is called Ethnic Notions.
And it’s something that you can watch online,
But it gives you a richer, more powerful sense of those kinds of racial stereotypes
And how deeply they’re ingrained in the American psyche.
You said that was Ethnic Notions, a documentary online.
Yeah, you can find it online.
Well, we’ll try to tackle the complicated questions or the simple ones.
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