Alabaman

Part of speech: noun, adjective

Definitions

1. A person who was born in or lives in the southern United States state of Alabama
2. Someone native to or residing in Alabama, one of the states in the American South
3. A resident or native of the U.S. state bordered by Mississippi, Tennessee, Georgia and the Gulf of Mexico

Etymology: Alabaman is a straightforward formation: the name of the American state Alabama with the suffix "-n" added, the same ending found in words like "Mexican" or "Lutheran" that marks a person connected with a place. The state name itself comes from the Alabama people, a Muskogean-speaking nation whose name the English settlers and mapmakers adopted for the river and region in what is now the southern United States. Used as a noun, "Alabaman" names a native or resident of Alabama, while as an adjective it describes things from or relating to the state. Like other demonyms built this way, it follows the pattern of naming people by where they come from rather than by any special sense of its own, so the word's history is largely the history of the place name it is built on.