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Maybe I’m coming at Memphis from a different angle simply because I’m a tourist. But the things I saw and did in Memphis were fairly unique to Memphis. But I’ve never travelled through Mississippi, so maybe Memphis feels like that. I’m not inclined to think Mississippi is more Southern than other states though, so there is also that.
Rock 'n roll, blues, soul, BBQ, Pentecostalism, the mighty Mississippi, Civil Rights history, etc.--to me, the Southernness is thick in the air in Memphis. It's like the epitome of an urbanized version of the traditional rural South IMO.
Modern Memphis realistically is more about Fed Ex, St Jude, local universities, medical schools, hospitals, etc. Down in DeSoto County, Mississippi are big Amazon, Google, and Volvo facilities among many others.
I will say that downtown Memphis has crossed a threshold and is starting to feel like a real city. There is a new parking garage on Beale Street that sits right at the center.
Within two blocks are Beale Street, South Main district, Fed Ex Forum, the Orpheum, Tom Lee Park on the river (newly done and now very beautiful), Main Street pedestrian mall, the Peabody, the baseball stadium, and nearby Bass Pro at the Pyramid, Mud Island/ Harbor Town, and the Hernando DeSoto Bridge which is lighted up at night.
Much of that I don’t readily associate with the larger South per se. BBQ and civil rights feel unqualified, the rest seem loosely Delta specific to varying degrees. Pentecostalism’s main branches are in the Midwest and the Delta for instance, whereas most of the South is aligned with Baptists traditionally. Blues and soul (and I suppose the roots of rock n’ roll) came from a fairly specific (and originally narrow) subset of the Delta region.
That said it’s Southern. It just feels fairly unique Southern.
Neyland Stadium, where the University of Tennessee plays football, has a capacity of 101,915.
Kenan Memorial Stadium, where UNC plays football, and Carter-Finley Stadium, where NC State plays football, (the two largest collegiate football programs in the state) have respective capacities of 51,000 and 56,919.
Additionally, UTenn has a student enrollment of 28,321 while UNC has an enrollment of 29,469, so Tennessee isn't a bigger school overall.
If you're familiar with the South as a region, you know how important College Football is to Southern Culture and Identity.
Tennessee feels more southern but there isn't anywhere in NC that doesn't feel southern. These threads are getting ridiculous. I've been to every important city in NC and to the smaller cities from Morganton to Kinston...
Not a single one of the larger NC cities feels "not" southern...
Tennessee is less urbanized overall so in that sense it helps retain more typical southern aspects, I guess...
Easily Tennessee but I travel to NC a lot (specifically Raleigh) and that area still feels pretty southern but between the two states? TN wins that one.
Rock 'n roll, blues, soul, BBQ, Pentecostalism, the mighty Mississippi, Civil Rights history, etc.--to me, the Southernness is thick in the air in Memphis. It's like the epitome of an urbanized version of the traditional rural South IMO.
Memphis certainly has the feel of the deep south sure, but that doesn't necessarily trump the the 'other' southern feel of the other end of the state, football, nascar, moonshine, mountains and hollers, and bluegrass.
Maybe it would be more accurate to say that TN has more layers or diversity to it's southern feel.
Neyland Stadium, where the University of Tennessee plays football, has a capacity of 101,915.
Kenan Memorial Stadium, where UNC plays football, and Carter-Finley Stadium, where NC State plays football, (the two largest collegiate football programs in the state) have respective capacities of 51,000 and 56,919.
Additionally, UTenn has a student enrollment of 28,321 while UNC has an enrollment of 29,469, so Tennessee isn't a bigger school overall.
If you're familiar with the South as a region, you know how important College Football is to Southern Culture and Identity.
Wait, so there are 130,000 people in the Triangle attending football games on any given Saturday in the Fall, and that’s used to show the state doesn’t like football? We have more FBS schools in one area than most anywhere else in the country, and I think both ECU and App State lead their conferences in attendance.
Wait, so there are 130,000 people in the Triangle attending football games on any given Saturday in the Fall, and that’s used to show the state doesn’t like football? We have more FBS schools in one area than most anywhere else in the country, and I think both ECU and App State lead their conferences in attendance.
Right?!
While the overall obsession with "southerness" and the gatekeeping of it in both a positive and negative connotation is one of the most eye-roll worthy trends in this section of C-D regardless....
That was definitely the most ridiculous "hard evidence" attempt I've seen.
About the same, both feel like the Mid south. Big fast growing cities like Nashville and Charlotte are sprawling and full of Transplants , either from the West coast, Midwest or Northeast. Mountain tourist areas are similar. The rural country side is what it is in both states. Tennessee doesn't have an answer to N Carolina's Coastal area but all in all one is really no southern than the other. I will say they are both not Deep south in nature by any mean but Memphis feels like it could be a Big Deep South City.
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