The symbols.

In 1974 the Legislature adopted a regional flag whose symbols stand for French ancestry, Spanish rule and the Acadian exiles. Nothing on it stands for African or Indigenous people. The same year, a state-linked "Tribute to Cajun Music" at Blackham Coliseum grew into Festivals Acadiens.

In 1982 an Un-Cajun Committee formed in Lafayette to protest the Cajun naming of the university’s venues. That year the Creole community held the first Southwest Louisiana Zydeco Music Festival in a field in Plaisance. Clifton Chenier won a Grammy in 1984. The Cajundome opened in 1985.