Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Location: Appalachian New York, Formerly Louisiana
4,409 posts, read 6,539,156 times
Reputation: 6253
Honestly I don't know why the northeast and Midwest aren't just "the American north". I mean... it is, but it's not called such.
Living in central/western NY I honestly feel more akin to Ohio and Michigan than I do New Jersey or New England. A good number of people from NY and PA feel more like Midwesterners, honestly.
One can be part of a region and not identify with that regional identity. Just ask all the people in southern Florida, do they feel like they are in the South? Of course not, but that doesn’t mean it’s not the south. Culture changes.
The Midwest as a census designated region doesn’t really go by modern cultural regions. The Midwest is based on an old idea and Americans are becoming more and more migratory. The Midwest is simply general American culture. Variations exist, but for the most part everywhere is fairly similar. The only major exception in the 48 states is the south which is getting heavily diluted by outside migration.
I travel a lot to other countries, so maybe it takes more culture differences for me to really notice, but I don’t feel out of place anywhere in the Midwest, west, NE, or Florida. The south is the only region where I regularly feel out of place.
I think I'm weird among Chicagoans in feeling any kinship with Illinois as a whole, as opposed to just Chicago.
Even though I know it's just an arbitrary political boundary, I can cross from one cornfield in Indiana to another cornfield in Illinois and feel more "at home" somehow.
I feel what you mean. Even though I would never move back to Florida ever, ever, ever... its still the state I grew up in so I identify with it. I grew up in Miami, but back in 2015 when I first revisited Florida after moving out of state, as soon as I crossed that Alabama line into the northwest corner of the state, I felt a feeling of "home." Yea, I still had 11 hours of drive time to go to my hometown but I was in the same state and the ocean was right there.
Honestly I don't know why the northeast and Midwest aren't just "the American north". I mean... it is, but it's not called such.
Living in central/western NY I honestly feel more akin to Ohio and Michigan than I do New Jersey or New England. A good number of people from NY and PA feel more like Midwesterners, honestly.
Yes absolutely. Growing up in Cleveland, we would go places in NY during the summer: Buffalo, Niagara, Chautauqua, Finger Lakes. It always still felt like "our" kind of place. Once you get around Albany or Vermont, maybe not, but my experience with the state of New York has always felt like "home" in many ways.
As a kid growing up in Missouri, my dad would take us on road trips and it was always noted with some excitement when we crossed a state line. You could almost hold your breath going from Missouri to Kentucky through Cairo, Illinois -- or at least we tried -- because it takes only a couple minutes...three states. Illinois seemed foreign and a bit dingy although it was barely 15 miles away. The sun didn't shine as bright there and it was flat forever. I had relatives there that we would see at family reunions and they seemed like normal people. Crossing into Kansas or Oklahoma seemed more welcoming but that was usually a big trip out west and there was a better sense of anticipation. That being said, you could almost lose the will to live crossing Kansas. I never ventured north into Iowa until many years later and the corn went on forever. Anyplace where they could scratch the dirt they grew corn but they were friendly people.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
.
