Janie, with regards to your 19 Mar 09 - 11:08 PM post about brogans, I stand (actually sit) corrected.

Within mainstream American culture and African American culture "brogan" shoes are considered insult worthy not because that brand of shoes are inexpensive or "cheap", but because they are considered to be ugly & "country"

In this context "being country" means that the person either lives in a rural area, or they used to live in a rural area and still retains "country ways" or the person supposedly acts and dresses like he or she is from "the country". "Dressing like you are country" means that you dress with no regard for the latest fashions, including shoes. In the United States (and in other countries?)"being from the country" also has long been a short cut way of saying that a person is "stupid". Putdowns of people with "big feet" is a core element of the general putdown of people who are said to be "country", because "country people" supposedly don't wear shoes as much as people who live in the city.

It's easy to find "brogan jokes" by using an Internet search engine like Google. And what becomes readily apparent is that these brogans are jokes in mainstream American culture (meaning Anglo-American culture) and in African American culture. For an example of this insult in African American culture, see this excerpt of Otis Reddings & Carla Thomas' March 1967 song insult song "Tramp":

You know what, Otis?
What?
You're country.
That's all right.
You straight from the Georgia woods.
That's good.
You know what? You wear overalls, and big old brogan shoes, and you need a haircut, Tramp.

http://www.lyricstime.com/otis-redding-tramp-lyrics.html

For an example of a putdown reference to brogan shoes in Anglo-American culture see this sentence in Loyal Jones' book about Country Music Humorists and Comedians :

"He wore large brogan shoes, each on the wrong foot"...
-snip-

The core implication in insults about women wearing "brogans" is that these women are not feminine. "Combat boots" are often substituted for "brogans" in these insults as in this ubiquitous example that was recently posted on best shoe insults "Your momma wears combat boots."

People might laugh at these taunts, but for a powerful reminder that putdowns can hurt a lot , click Cootie Girl by Beatrice Hogg for a very well written article by a woman who was the victim of taunts throughout her all her school years. Ms. Hogg includes this reference to brogans in that essay:

"At ten, I wore the same shoe size as my mother, seven and a half. My mother thought that a sturdy, brown brogan would be the best shoe for school. The big, heavy shoes made me look like a cartoon character."

-snip-

Ms. Hogg ends her short essay by writing:

"I wish I could say that Cecil Junior High was better, but it was more of the same. I started wearing glasses at twelve and my mother died the summer after seventh grade, when I was thirteen. And don't get me started about puberty. But I survived.

I am now over fifty and I still don't fit in. But what was once weird is now just eccentric. I have friends who are just as unique as I am, and I don't have to ever kick a ball if I don't want to. I shop at thrift stores, buying the discarded clothes of strangers, but I get to pick them. And now, I like my unusual name. Growing up as a Cootie Girl has made me more sensitive, a quality I use in my writing. They may have been laughing at me then, but as a writer, I can have the last word — in print. Cootie Girls Rule! (Stick tongue out here.)"

-snip-

Some may feel that this discussion about "brogans" and about taunting people who are viewed as different is only tangential to the topic of this thread. But I believe it all fits together.