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I think most Americans would be surprised at the high degree of similarity between the culture and people of Northern Pennsylvania/Upstate New York/Western New England and Northern Ohio/Michigan/Northern Illinois/Wisconsin.
Bear in mind that the Eastern seaboard (north of the Outer Banks) and the Applachian Mountains both run more NE-SW than N-S. So geographically, the Northeast both starts and ends to the east of the South.
Bangor, Maine: 68.7712° W
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: 79.9959° W
Wilmington, North Carolina: 77.8868° W
Little Rock, Arkansas: 92.2896° W
I think most Americans would be surprised at the high degree of similarity between the culture and people of Northern Pennsylvania/Upstate New York/Western New England and Northern Ohio/Michigan/Northern Illinois/Wisconsin.
What's funny about that is that the accent changes once you cross the NY/PA border (in my experience)
Slavery is probably a major reason. I don't think the Southern states thought of themselves as all that similar until after the Civil War when they all suffered the same economic blow and national humiliation.
I think you are confusing the issue a bit. “Southern pride” probably coalesced strongest after the Civil War whereas before it was largely state pride, but the bond was already there. The states didn’t just accidentally secede all in a few months’ period. They had grown together over the previous 2 centuries and were very much working in coordination on the federal level in the decades before the war.
Beyond slavery and the economy, the divergence was fairly deep and wide. As early as the 1796 election, the country was split by two political movements whose fault line was roughly the Mason-Dixon Line. There was also a demographic difference as new immigrants found more plentiful jobs in the North, therefore keeping the South Scotch-Irish heritage stronger and longer than northern cousins. Similar food staples also were part of a shared bonding experience that wasn’t replicable from Boston to Philadelphia let alone to Columbus or Chicago.
The southeast would be the southern Atlantic coastal states. Florida, Georgia, the Carolinas, and Virginia...not to be confused with the traditional "South", of which it is a part. Since these states must conform to the southwest trend of the Atlantic coast, Atlanta is west of Detroit. Florida extends further westward along the Gulf (Panhandle) because it generally conforms to the boundaries of Spanish (and British) colonial East and West Florida and did not become a state until 1845. Alabama was already established as a state since 1819. The northeast mostly bumps into Canada.
This.
People who don’t know any better use south and southeast interchangeably. Arkansas and South Carolina are VERY different. They don’t share culture, architecture or history.
Arkansas and South Carolina are VERY different. They don’t share culture, architecture or history.
I'd disagree with this relative to their shared "plantation" culture and I'd say that upstate South Carolina has some similarities to western Arkansas.
I think a combination of population density and culture. To me, IL is less similar to NY than MS is to FL. Also, it should be noted that the northest extends further east than the southeast does, in other words, you are comparing different starting points, so judging how far west they go in not a fair comparison.
Lastly, for purposes of covering a certain general area, you want you population sizes to be as similar as possible. So if the US gov't needs to have a social security office in each region (just as an example), you want to have somewhat equal population service areas. Given the lower density of the Southeast, they needed to go further west.
I was a political sciernce major witha minor in history, although ny emphasis was more on international relations. So I found this fascinating and humbling.
I was a political sciernce major witha minor in history, although ny emphasis was more on international relations. So I found this fascinating and humbling.
This is a great link! Thank you!
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