Regional regionalisms ...

[Powderhorn]

I was reading something today about Texas that placed it in the Southwest, and it occurred to me that national wire services don't necessarily write for the nation. Having grown up in Arizona and lived on the West Coast for most of my life, the idea that Texas is anything other than the deep South is a novelty.

I've run into other cases of this -- try explaining to someone in Oregon how Ohio, on EST, can possibly be part of the Midwest. Having lived in Virginia, I've been assured by many residents of lower latitudes that the commonwealth is not part of the South.

Sure, it's convenient to lump a bunch of states into a category, but is that really a good thing to do with a far-flung audience that has wildly divergent ideas of how those regions are defined?

There also seems to be an extreme Eastern bias in how terms are used -- the AP (or any [other] reputable news organization) wouldn't let Maryland be referred to as part of New England, but for us Westerners, they're all in the same general area. Putting Texas in the Southwest is just as irritating.

[Dan Puckett]

Virginia, home of the capital of the Confederacy, is not part of the South, but Texas, on the border with Mexico and shaped to a great extent by its centuries under Spanish and Mexican rule, is part of the deep South?

Wow.

[Deadline Dame]

Think of the Civil war when you think of the traditional "South." Texas is definately NOT the "deep South." It's west, it's south, it's southwest. The deep south would be Louisanna, Mississippi, Alabama, etc. I live in Tennessee, and while it's south, it's certainly not deep!

And anything west of the Mississippi is the Midwest in my book, until you cross the Rockies, then you're all in the west.

Virginia IS the south as well! Good grief! Technically, Maryland was part of the south because of the Mason-Dixon line, but growing up in PA I don't think of it as southern, really. But how could you think Maryland is in any way part of New England! There's the northeast--Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey, Delaware, etc., but New England they are not.

I am curious as to you using the term "easter bias." I think it's simply basic geography!

[MFranco]

(OK I'm gonna ramble.) All I can add to this thread is that growing up in Albuquerque, we kids thought of "Texas" as more "South" than "West", despite the movies that made all of Texas one big cattle ranch. But, speaking as a guy who lived in Dallas, Texas, as is often the case, is actually a little bit of all things (or so it seems).

I've decided, after living there 12 years, that the "South" (not the Deep South, mind you), starts in Dallas, a place where the Starbucks closest to my home wouldn't serve me, residents would lock their car doors or call the cops when they saw me in an area where I "didn't belong", and I bought a house with a covenant deed that specifically said that no non-white person could live there (I'm Hispanic - I got around the deed), among many other incidents. As a Westerner, I sure didn't feel like I was anywhere near home anymore. Drive east from Dallas and that's where it realllllly turns "Southern." (I won't go into East Texas.)

But driving west, somewhere in that small space between Dallas and Fort Worth (good old Cowtown. I miss it), the West begins, or so I believe. The desolate landscape in West Texas reminds me of parts of home (which is no surprise) and so do the people (which was a surprise a little bit). Very different from Dallas.

Central Texas seems like it belongs in another state, almost Midwest-like (I know, weird). South Texas *should be* West, with so many Hispanics and so close to Mexico, but I pick up a Southern-like vibe, which may be just me being paranoid.

So how's that for a definitive answer? Texas is two, two, two regions in one (at least). Maybe you could define parts of Texas as being in one region or the other, but the state of Texas? ummmm. I'd hate to think of Dallas and everything east of that as Western or even Southwestern. (Dallas does have a hilarious - and very popular - cattle drive sculpture near City Hall, which is like Albuquerque putting up a Boston Tea Party monument and starting a DAR chapter.)

So all that yapping and no answer. How about try to define cities or regions of Texas as "South" or "West" and try not to categorize the entire state?

[Gerri Berendzen]

Wait until they start saying the Heartland. Where exactly is that? (I think I might live there, but who really knows.)

As a Midwesterner, I've often wondered about lumping Ohio in with us. But if you go by the "west of the Mississippi River rule," where does that put Illinois and Indiana?

[Jim Thomsen]

MFranco is on to something here.

The state in which I was raised and now live, Washington, is also really two states in two separate regions. Western Washington — green, lush, gloomy, surrounded by water — is truly "Pacific Northwest." East of the Cascade Mountains, Washington becomes more sparsely populated, with arid mountain ranges, scrubby desert and irrigated farmland. It is every bit as much the "West" as Wyoming or Nevada or Montana.

[Gerri Berendzen]

People in my hometown used to say that St. Louis is the last city of the East and Kansas City is the first city of the West. That puts Jefferson City and Columbia, Mo., in never-never land. (It's a vast waste land out there on I-70 ... just ask the people in central Kansas.)

Of course, we might have said that only because we felt culturally superior to K.C. But who can beat the barbecue?

[Paul Soucy]

I wouldn't necessarily blame the Easterners.

Growing up in Minnesota, I frequently heard my state referred to as being in the "Northwest":
--Schmidt Beer was the "Brew That Grew With the Great Northwest"
--WCCO-AM was the "Good Neighbor to the Northwest"
--The state's leading bank was Northwestern Bank (later Norwest)
--The state's homegrown airline was Northwest Orient(!)
etc., etc.

It's a term that goes back to the days when the Minnesota Territory (and, earlier, the Northwest Territory) was the northwestern corner of the USA, and we were damn proud of it. (I suspect that's why your part of the world is to this day called the "Pacific Northwest.") I'd bet that referring to Texas as "Southwest" has a similarly long and proud history, and that this is why we commonly hear points farther west referred to as the "desert Southwest."

Similarly, Ohio was once indeed the very heart of the Middle West and retains a link to that identity today. Virginia, though you can't necessarily tell it from Fairfax County, is definitely part of the South, though not the Deep South. And Illinois, as best I can tell, is about as Midwestern as you can get, despite being east of the Mississippi.

Remember, the country wasn't always this particular shape.

[VanderViking]

Speaking from the icy wastes to the north of the United States, I can claim we have problems of our own in locating regions.
Most Canadians lump Manitoba in with Saskatchewan and Alberta as the Prairie Provinces. Many Manitobans, on the other hand, prefer to think of themselves as belonging to Central Canada, along with Ontario and Quebec.
I suspect some of that is simply not wanting to be associated with cowboys and cow patties, but I could be wrong.
Meanwhile, in British Columbia (my corner of the country), the area I live in is frequently referred to as "Northern B.C.". Well, up until a few years ago, there was a cairn just east of Vanderhoof which marked the geographic centre of the province, so I'm not sure how we came to be called the North.
People refer to the Interior of the province as the area around Kamloops, which is definitely south of the middle of the province.
It's all too much for one poor brain to comprehend, so I will return to wondering about why England has an Essex, a Wessex and a Sussex, but no Nussex.

[Dan Puckett]

(Dallas does have a hilarious - and very popular - cattle drive sculpture near City Hall, which is like Albuquerque putting up a Boston Tea Party monument and starting a DAR chapter.)

Hm, I'm not exactly sure why the Texas Longhorn Cattle Drive sculpture in Dallas would be out of place; Dallas was on the route of the Shawnee Trail well before the Civil War, decades before Amon G. Carter Sr., owner of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, was fond of referring to Fort Worth as the city "where the West begins" and Dallas as the city "where the East peters out."

And actually, Albuquerque has not just one, but three chapters of the Daughters of the American Revolution.

[Chris Wienandt]

Amon G. Carter Sr., owner of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, was fond of referring to Fort Worth as the city "where the West begins" and Dallas as the city "where the East peters out."

Dadgummit, Dan, you beat me to it. I love that story. Also the one about how Carter always took a sack lunch when he had to visit Dallas so he wouldn't be contributing to its economy.

[Wayne Countryman]

Regional bias is universal. As in other types of bias, it's largely based on history and ignorance. We tend to know our region more fully than others--and care more about it, too.

As has been said, what used to be the western edge of the U.S. now is nearer the center of the contiguous 48. Many of our geographic labels are out of date.

Having lived in New York and Maryland, I can say New England wouldn't want us and we wouldn't imagine that we were a part of it.

I've lived in three parts of Virginia: Two were in the South, one wasn't.

I've lived in Florida. Northern Florida is in the Deep South, but southern Florida is in another world.

The names of regions are imperfect labels, often based more on sentiment than logic. Use with care.

[LisaMc]

Gerri wrote:

(It's a vast waste land out there on I-70 ... just ask the people in central Kansas.)

Yeah, yeah, everyone dumps on Kansas. Flatter than a pancake and about as exciting. ;)
But -- we are the geographic center of the continental U.S. Does that count for something? We get lumped into "Heartland," "Plains," "Midwest" and "rectangle states." I kinda like that last one...

LM

[ahay]

Actually, Kansas doesn't get flat until you get out in the neighborhood of Hays. And southwestern Kansas is flat.

[ahay]

Sorry, just trying to stand up for us Kansans :)

[editer]

Actually, Kansas doesn't get flat until you get out in the neighborhood of Hays. And southwestern Kansas is flat.

Spoken like someone who's never driven west from Wichita.

[editer]

Joel Garreau in The Nine Nations of North America drew lines based on culture. Texas is in three "nations": Mexamerica, along its southern border; Dixie, in the east; and the Breadbasket, the rest of the state.

Texas is held together by its foundation myth, but in large part it's at least three different cultures. Some other states are similarly split.

[Jim Thomsen]

There would be a lot of popular support for splitting Washington into two states, straight down the Cascade Range line.

I imagine Oregon folk feel about the same.

[Deirdre Edgar]

I imagine Oregon folk feel about the same.

Then there's the southern Oregon folks who want to join up with far-northern California and become the state of Jefferson. ... Just a little tidbit I picked up on several trips up and down I-5.

[Jim Thomsen]

In Washington, they want the new state to be called "Cascadia."

[MFranco]

Re: DAR in the ABQ. ... I should have known better. I forgot the Albuquerque area was hit by a flood of dang Yankees during the 1970s. At the University of New Mexico, I knew more young New Yorkers whose families lived nearby than I did native New Mexicans. The Newk Yawkers were fun to chat with. Parts of Albuquerque could partition to be included in "The East." .... oops, I mean "petition", but "partition" kinda works too.

[Powderhorn]

Having lived in New York and Maryland, I can say New England wouldn't want us and we wouldn't imagine that we were a part of it.

I wasn't suggesting that I would put them there, but I think it would be an interesting undertaking to see not only where people believe they live themselves, but also where other states fall.

This sort of thing can often be excised by getting rid of needless adjectives: Once we've established a Texas dateline, then talked about what "Texas" did, is something along the lines of "... in this Southwestern state ..." a few grafs later really telling the reader anything he doesn't already know?

[Mike O'Connell]

Doesn't "South-Central" exist for this very contingency?

[Deadline Dame]

Here's a fun, quick quiz to see where you fall on the Yankee/Dixie scale as far as the words you use:

http://www.angelfire.com:80/ak2/intelligencerreport/yankee_dixie_quiz.html

[Powderhorn]

Here's a fun, quick quiz to see where you fall on the Yankee/Dixie scale as far as the words you use:

http://www.angelfire.com:80/ak2/intelligencerreport/yankee_dixie_quiz.html

Proving that nobody's actually from Arizona, I apparently talk like people from the western Great Lakes (however that region is defined). But that suggests the quiz is a bit incomplete, dontcha know ...

[LisaMc]

It seems that simply knowing what a "party barn" is really skews your score to Southern. Or maybe living in Texas for a while is enough to do that.

[Holly Kerfoot]

My score: 52% (Dixie). Barely into the Dixie category. Since I've lived in the Southeast for the past 29 years (more than half my life, now), I guess something has rubbed off. The other 48% was a mixed of Pennsylvania-Ohio-Michigan (where I was born & raised) and no bias.

[Deadline Dame]

Holly, I got the exact same score as you. I grew up in PA but left in '84 when I joined the Air Force. I lived in Southern California, Korea then Charleston, SC. I've been in Tennessee for 17 years now.

But what shocked me once when I visited PA about 10 years ago was that someone in a salon waiting room said to me "You must be from the south." I asked "WHY?" He said "Your accent." I was shocked! But down here, everyone says I sound like I just got off the bus from PA.

So I guess things do rub off. Time for a visit north to get re-Yankified!

[Deirdre Edgar]

Hmmm... I'm 46% Yankee, which is "barely into the Yankee category." I've lived on the West Coast for nearly my entire life, except for five years in Arizona. And my parents are New Englanders, which is why I pronounce aunt and ant differently. I'm not sure where my non-Yankeeisms would come from!

And even though Arizona has drive-through liquor stores, I have never heard the term "party barn"!

[Jim Thomsen]

Here's a question: Do you think of yourself as having an accent?

I don't, but whenever I travel out of the Pacific Northwest, I'm told otherwise.