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Location: Appalachian New York, Formerly Louisiana
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Verseau
Hmm... interesting comment. I suppose I can see where they're coming from if they associate "rural" with "Appalachian accent" (i.e. southern Appalachia), but in New England there also exist dialect differences between urban and rural areas. These folks, for example, sound pretty "rural" to me:
People pay no attention to northern Appalachia because they mistakenly assume that Appalachia is culturally homogenous, and that there's no need to differentiate. I've been stressing that northern Appalachia, from Maryland and northern West Virginia north, is very different from stereotypical "Appalachia," which is more an exaggeration of central and southern Appalachia.
I also think that the presence of coal seems to have hyperlocal influences on the culture as well, which can explain why some people believe there's a difference between rural Pennsylvania and rural New York/New England. For the most part, rural Pennsylvania is just like rural New York and rural New England, but there are five "coal patch" counties -- Greene, Fayette, Somerset, Cambria and Schuylkill -- that seem to be more like West Virginia and Kentucky, except without the accent. Those five counties have some of the worst quality of life in Pennsylvania, and they're outliers within rural Pennsylvania.
It is not accurate to assume that those five counties are an accurate representation of rural Pennsylvania as a whole. There's a difference between those counties, and counties like Elk, Huntingdon, Mifflin, Tioga and Columbia, which are more typical of rural Pennsylvania, and don't have nearly the degree of poverty or other social problems that the coal patch counties do.
Schulykill County? Do you mean Blair? Most rural PA counties have issues of poverty and population loss. My high school now graduates less than 1/2 the number of kids as when I graduated 40 years ago.
Location: Appalachian New York, Formerly Louisiana
4,409 posts, read 6,535,738 times
Reputation: 6253
Quote:
Originally Posted by BigCityDreamer
I think it's because the people in northern Appalachia aren't generally considered "mountain folk" in the way those in the southern Appalachia are.
That could be true. Though my family always considered itself mountain folk. And I know a lot of people in Vermont do call themselves such (and everybody else "flatlanders" lol).
That could be true. Though my family always considered itself mountain folk. And I know a lot of people in Vermont do call themselves such (and everybody else "flatlanders" lol).
While the political culture of Vermont has completely changed, hopefully this speech is still relevant. Was reprinted a lot in last year's flood. Locals helped each other a lot last year, perhaps they behaved similarly to 1927.
My fellow Vermonters:
For two days we have been traveling through this state. We have been up the East side, across and down the West side. We have seen Brattleboro, Bellows Falls, Windsor, White River Junction and Bethel. We have looked toward Montpelier. We have visited Burlington and Middlebury. Returning we have seen Rutland.
I have had an opportunity of visiting again the scenes of my childhood. I want to express to you, and through the press to the other cities of Vermont, my sincere appreciation for the general hospitality bestowed upon me and my associates on the occasion of this journey.
It is gratifying to note the splendid recovery from the great catastrophe which overtook the state nearly a year ago. Transportation has been restored. The railroads are in a better condition than before. The highways are open to traffic for those who wish to travel by automobile.
Vermont is a state I love. I could not look upon the peaks of Ascutney, Killington, Mansfield, and Equinox, without being moved in a way that no other scene could move me. It was here that I first saw the light of day; here I received my bride, here my dead lie pillowed on the loving breast of our eternal hills.
I love Vermont because of her hills and valleys, her scenery and invigorating climate, but most of all because of her indomitable people. They are a race of pioneers who have almost beggared themselves to serve others. If the spirit of liberty should vanish in other parts of the Union, and support of our institutions should languish, it could all be replenished from the generous store held by the people of this brave little state of Vermont.
It's sort of like "Long Island". The majority of Long Island's population lives in the NYC part, which is Brooklyn and Queens. And yet when you say "Long Island" people think of Nassau and Suffolk county.
So it's probably the same way with the Appalachians. Everyone knows that NH, VT, etc. are mountainous states. And everyone knows that there's a range of hills/mountains from GA all the way up to Canada, in the otherwise mostly flat Eastern U.S. But people still tend to think of the "Appalachians" as being WV/TN/NC/VA.
In rural Northern New England the towns generally fall into two categories. You have the well preserved New England towns that are often infused with outside wealth and higher levels of educational attainment. Many of these towns are touristy with a plethora of businesses that cater to tourists. Then you have towns that have been bypassed that have very few jobs and lower levels of wealth and educational attainment. These towns have more of an Appalachia feel and less of a New England feel. The one big item that ties the southern Appalachians and the northern Appalachians together is that it is a very fiscally conservative region that embraces its history and is resistent to change. The ancestry in much of the Appalachians is similar with a higher percentage of the population claiming English, Irish, Scots-Irish, Scottish, French, with lower perecentage German and Italian- higher in coal towns. The Appalachians, in general, have some of the lowest levels of in-migration than any other region in the country.
This is a very interesting thread, although I don't have much to add. Personally, though northern New England is one of my favorite places and I'm well aware of the presence of the Appalachian range there, I have never thought of it as "Appalachia." I tend to think of the White Mountains first, and the Appalachian part is an afterthought.
This is a very interesting thread, although I don't have much to add. Personally, though northern New England is one of my favorite places and I'm well aware of the presence of the Appalachian range there, I have never thought of it as "Appalachia." I tend to think of the White Mountains first, and the Appalachian part is an afterthought.
That is very true. New Hampshire is also more eonomically stable/middle class by having no income or sales tax and a poverty rate that is the lowest of all 50 states. Therefore, few towns in the state really have a strong "Appalachia" feel. You have some mill towns like Groveton and Berlin in Coos County that are continuing to struggle to get new jobs after the paper mills closed down so those towns tend to fall into the economically depressed category. Carroll County, NH seems most Appalachian like in its demographics of any county in the state as it has always had a sizable precentage of the population claiming Scottish, Scots-Irsh, Irish, and English ancestry. In the 19th century sheep grazing was very common throughout many parts of the county. Along N Wolfeboro Rd in Wolfeboro, NH the land was nearly all open with large concentrations of sheep. Now, it is a rural residential historic district and mostly all wooded.
This is a very interesting thread, although I don't have much to add. Personally, though northern New England is one of my favorite places and I'm well aware of the presence of the Appalachian range there, I have never thought of it as "Appalachia." I tend to think of the White Mountains first, and the Appalachian part is an afterthought.
Do New England mountains (White / Green / Longfellow) look distinctly different from the more southern Appalachians? Besides that the southern ones don't have a treeline.
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