Missouri...Southern or Midwestern? (St. Louis, Poplar Bluff: foods, place, accents)

[jps]

Wow, I'd ignored this thread all this time because I figured it was just a bunch of polite agreeing going on. I read the first few pages and was very entertained, but don't have time to read the whole thread.

One thing I wanted to add but don't know if it's been discussed is the "Little Dixie" region. A few of you said you had spent time or had relatives from the area. The area was first settled by southerners. My grandparents said "I-Way" when referring to the state from the north (with residents from that state being known as "I-Weejuns"), as well as pronouncing the state "Missourah." As I grew up in Randolph County, most folks considered themselves southern, some more than others, but I figured we were more "hick" than anything - backward assed country folk.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Dixie_(Missouri)



Anyhow, the Little Dixie region is in Northern Missouri, which further complicates things.
http://www.missouridivision-scv.org/litdixie.gif

The ballad of Little Dixie:
It's the heart of Missouri, blooded of three,
Virginia, Kentucky, and Tennessee.
It's a tall spare man on a bluegrass hoss.
It's sugar-cured ham without raisin sauce.
It's coon dog, coon, persimmon tree.
It's son or brother named Robert E. Lee.
It's tiger stalking a jay-hawk bird.
It's the best hog-calling that ever you heard.
It's fiddler fiddlin' you out of your seat,
Fiddler fiddlin' you off your feet.
It's bluebird singing in a hawthorn thicket.
It's vote to a man the Democratic ticket.
It's crisp brown cracklin's and hot corn pone.
It's catfish fried clean off the bone.
It's hominy grits and none of your scrapple.
It's mellow pawpaws and the Jonathan apple.
It's sorghum sweetenin' and belly-warming corn.
It's old Jeff Davis a-blowin' on his horn.
Unreconstructed it rares and bites
At touch of a rein that would curb its rights.
It's come in, stranger, draw up a chair;
There ain't no hurry and we'll all get there.

Yeeee- Haaaww.

[ajf131]

Originally Posted by jps

Wow, I'd ignored this thread all this time because I figured it was just a bunch of polite agreeing going on. I read the first few pages and was very entertained, but don't have time to read the whole thread.

One thing I wanted to add but don't know if it's been discussed is the "Little Dixie" region. A few of you said you had spent time or had relatives from the area. The area was first settled by southerners. My grandparents said "I-Way" when referring to the state from the north (with residents from that state being known as "I-Weejuns"), as well as pronouncing the state "Missourah." As I grew up in Randolph County, most folks considered themselves southern, some more than others, but I figured we were more "hick" than anything - backward assed country folk.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Dixie_(Missouri)



Anyhow, the Little Dixie region is in Northern Missouri, which further complicates things.
http://www.missouridivision-scv.org/litdixie.gif








Yeeee- Haaaww.

i'm not debating that it was first settled by Southerners, but so what? THat doesn't mean it's the South, because many Northerners inhabited the region as well. And I certainly don't hear those kinds of accents today. My grandmother was from the region too and didn't talk even remotely like that. Also, those pronunciations you speak of are unheard of in the South, that's a dialect that I have never heard in my life in any part of the state.

[jps]

Originally Posted by ajf131

i'm not debating that it was first settled by Southerners, but so what?

I thought it was first settled by the French.

I don't know who you're debating, but I'm not debating anybody. I merely added some information.

You seem like quite a brat to me, with the, "but so what?" smack. Seems like you have a lot invested into this topic, but I can't figure out why it would be so important to you. It's meaningless fluff.

[ajf131]

Originally Posted by jps

I thought it was first settled by the French.

I don't know who you're debating, but I'm not debating anybody. I merely added some information.

You seem like quite a brat to me, with the, "but so what?" smack. Seems like you have a lot invested into this topic, but I can't figure out why it would be so important to you. It's meaningless fluff.

Quite a brat? Excuse me No. I merely give the facts. I'm not a complainer. It's important to me because I find it interesting and I like discussing it. If it's not your cup of tea, then don't say anything. I'm not interested in hearing negative comments about me, I'm interested in discussing the subject of this topic. Thanks for the info though on Little Dixie. I don't debate that at one time Missouri was much more Southern than it is today. That I agree on you with.

[jps]

Originally Posted by ajf131

Quite a brat? Excuse me No. I merely give the facts. I'm not a complainer. It's important to me because I find it interesting and I like discussing it. If it's not your cup of tea, then don't say anything. I'm not interested in hearing negative comments about me, I'm interested in discussing the subject of this topic. Thanks for the info though on Little Dixie. I don't debate that at one time Missouri was much more Southern than it is today. That I agree on you with.

No problems, but it seems to me that you give an awful lot of opinion disguised as facts.

[northbayeric]

Guys! Guys! It's like we're rewinding back to page 4 or 5 or whatever of this thread, and starting this whole thing all over again. Been there, done that! Deja vu all over again, as the great Yogi Berra would say. Can we not just be happy to celebrate Missouri for the fine state that it is? And I think it's a fine state precisely because you can't quite compartmentalize it into one well-defined category. You used to be able to say that unconditionally about California, but California has become so dysfunctional that not a few people have seriously suggested splitting it into two or three sections. That's a different discussion, but as I've said, my main interest is just getting moved back to Missouri at this point!

[ajf131]

Originally Posted by jps

No problems, but it seems to me that you give an awful lot of opinion disguised as facts.

Right My opinions are not disguised as facts. If that were the case, I wouldn't even try to force them on people here. In any case, I certainly don't hear those accents of which you speak in Little Dixie today. Little Dixie today is all but solidly Midwestern, and this is coming from somebody who has been to the area many times. So you can call them opinions if you want to, but unless I was on drugs I heard virtually all Midwestern accents in the region that is dubbed Little Dixie. Any trace of the South that was once there is long-gone.

[jps]

Originally Posted by ajf131

Right My opinions are not disguised as facts. If that were the case, I wouldn't even try to force them on people here. In any case, I certainly don't hear those accents of which you speak in Little Dixie today. Little Dixie today is all but solidly Midwestern, and this is coming from somebody who has been to the area many times. So you can call them opinions if you want to, but unless I was on drugs I heard virtually all Midwestern accents in the region that is dubbed Little Dixie. Any trace of the South that was once there is long-gone.

So... "Southern" is defined primarily by accents?

[ajf131]

Originally Posted by jps

So... "Southern" is defined primarily by accents?

It doesn't just lack accents, it lacks the culture, climate, and lifestyle as well. It doesn't strike me as being laid back and the cuisine is hardly what I would call Southern either. No sweet tea, no grits, nothing...and while there is barbeque and fried chicken, that cuisine is also pretty much present all across the nation. The cuisine isn't Southern, the climate isn't Southern. Today it's hardly any different from most of Illinois, Indiana, or Ohio. So if you can say it can be the South while lacking many of these characteristics, I guess I'm wasting my time even trying to present this to you. If I have to go more specific, I will, but I've got a life outside of this forum, so we may have to continue this debate later.

[Jason1980]

Originally Posted by DocGSD

Yea, when I first visited MO from NY, I was really thinking it was going to be a big redneck trailer park. I was pleasantly supprised. Missouri is a great state. Given the chance, I would not move back to New York because I have really fallen in love with the midwestern Missouri envirnment. I have been to the bootheel on the way to Memphis. It was totally different than the southwest part of the state. STL reminds me more of NY than KC does but I must say that I like KC more. Seems to me that STL really has more of an eastern attitude than KC does. I do not see MO as a southenr state at all. You can see from my profile I have lived several places while I was in school. I like MO the best, hands down.

Richmond, Charleston, Wilmington, Savannah, Atlanta, Hilton Head, St. Simons Island, Sea Island and the rest of the real South. And no, they definitely don't claim it as part of the South by any means...

Missouri Trailer Trash