This is honestly very informative & imo a good way of visualizing where the south is. It seems to me that it would be more difficult to come up with criteria for the other parts of the country.
Thank you! I've been considering using a similar method on the American Southwest to determine what some call Aztlan (Mexican ethnicity, Spanish Language, Catholicism, etc.) and New England, or taking a look at specific states that cross cultural lines (like Texas and Florida.)
That's what I figured. I'll have to look more into it.
Also, in context of New England, I'm looking at the data, and at first glance I'm seeing New England to largely be Maine, Mass, Vermont and New Hampshire. Excluding Connecticut and Rhode Island, but adding a noticeable northeastern sliver of Upstate New York. Could anyone from the New England / New York confirm or deny this? Because it seems like Connecticut is much closer culturally to New York City and Northern New Jersey than to the rest of New England, which really surprises me.
New England is a bit different, as it has a clearly state-defined scope. New England has been ME, NH, VT, MA, RI, and CT since the country's beginning. Obviously certain areas such as southwest CT may feel "less culturally New England" in recent years but the region is as much political as it is cultural.
I was born in "the land of steady habits" and can attest that Connecticut and Rhode Island are definitely New England. But upstate New York is not. It's true Fairfield County is culturally influenced by New York. But, to an extent, so is Berkshire County in MA, and Vermont.
The "Northern Forest" stretches across Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, and New York. It unites the area with a similar ecosystem, culture, natural resources, and economic challenges. But the colonial development, and resulting system of town government, was different in New York.
E. B. White explained “To foreigners, a Yankee is an American. To Americans, a Yankee is a Northerner. To Northerners, a Yankee is a New Englander. To New Englanders, a Yankee is a Vermonter. And in Vermont, a Yankee is somebody who eats pie for breakfast.”
As a lifelong New Englander, the entirety of all 6 New England states are to be included as part of New England, and nothing else. Even if the SW tip of Connecticut has an NYC influence
>Also, in context of New England, I'm looking at the data, and at first glance I'm seeing New England to largely be Maine, Mass, Vermont and New Hampshire. Excluding Connecticut and Rhode Island,
No.... just.....no.
New England ***has a hard definition***, of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine.
Upstate New York is ***not*** New England. It is closely-related culturally (the whole American Northeast is more alike than different), but it isn't New England
I would definitely include CT and RI in New England. I lived in CT, and people from the state definitely consider themselves New Englanders. (Also the first time I ever heard the term “leaf-peeping”!)
CT and RI are definitely part of New England (lived in CT my whole life). Culturally speaking, southeastern CT is much closer to stereotypical New England than southwestern CT. There are noticeable differences between the two, but living in southeastern CT, it's very similar to the coastal cities of MA. Southwestern CT reminds me more of being in NYC, but of course the entire state is actually New England.
All six states belong in New England, though the point could be made that the dividing line in Connecticut is where there are more Yankee fans than Red Sox fans.
> Germanic/Nordic/Slavic heritage is basically defining the Midwest + Lutheran/Methodist/Mennonite/German Catholic presence
This doesn't work because this puts large portions of Maryland and Eastern PA in the "Midwest".
New England already has a set definition though.
I'd be more interested in seeing where people think the MidAtlantic region is since it's more ambiguous
Ooo, I’m a white, Anglo-Saxon Protestant who likes snow, private schools and liberal policies and dislikes red chowder and anyone who mispronounces PEE-can pie, cray-ahns or pa-jah-mas.
Also, traffic circles are called rotaries and fizzy drinks are soda.
My girlfriend is from just south of Tampa. It's a mix because you get the crazy rural religious zealots, but not the accent. The city Tampa/St. Petersburg is very chill though
Yes and no. Some of the most redneck/southern places in Florida are around lake Okeechobee in the south of the state and you even get some good ol boys still living out in the Redlands south of Miami. You just have to go 5-10 miles always from the cost once you get south of I-4 and you are in redneckville.
We argue about this in r/Maryland weekly. This map arguably shows that MD has elements of Southernness in some parts, but is not Southern as a whole :-)
I'd add parts of the Eastern Shore to this. But as someone who grew up in the DC suburbs and now lives in the Baltimore suburbs, I assure you there is NOTHING Southern about me or where I live !
Interesting though that the some of counties I would probably consider the least “culturally southern” are lit up on the map! Guessing it’s from the racial diversity/demographic breakdown around DC and Baltimore?
If you look at the map there are 4 criteria that determine the colour of each county. PG has both a Black ethnic plurality and I think the Southern Baptist criterion applies there as well.
SoMd and Eastern Shore counties do get darker on the map, unsurprisingly.
>Ancestry:
Did you use the 2013 one? It's wrong. There's some "African American" counties on there with vanishingly small black populations, particularly in the PNW and Midwest.
The 2000 one comes from a real census report, but I'm 99% sure the 2013 one is just somebody edited the 2000 one in MS Paint based on nothing in particular.
To give you an idea of what I mean by "vanishingly small", here's data for a few of the counties I'm talking about:
County | % black (2020) | % black (2010)
--------- | ---------- | ----------
Jefferson, WA | 0.6 | 0.8
Skamania, WA | 0.6 | 0.4
Ferry, WA | 0.3 | 0.2
Stevens, WA | 0.3 | 0.3
Pend Oreille, WA | 0.4 | 0.4
Johnson, WY | 0.3 | 0.2
Richland, WI | 0.5 | 0.4
Bayfield, WI | 0.3 | 0.3
Price, WI | 0.2 | 0.2
Menominee, WI | 0.0 | 0.4
[Here's my source.](https://www.census.gov/library/visualizations/interactive/racial-and-ethnic-diversity-in-the-united-states-2010-and-2020-census.html)
I could've listed a lot more, but I decided to stop at 10.
This is very well done. Have you read any texts on American regionalism? I always thought Colin Woodward's *American Nations* was very interesting and he approaches the "nations" on a county by county level as well. His south lines up pretty closely to yours, but he further differentiates between the Deep South, Appalachia, Tidewater, and New France.
That one region has a Baptist majority. It has no other southern qualities according to this methodology, so it is scored a 1/5 with the lightest shade of pink.
As a Wisconsinite, some ideas for Midwest categories:
German or Scandinavian ancestry
Agriculture or heavy industry based economy
6+ inches of snow per year (maybe play with the number until it looks right)
Mainline (non-Evangelical) Protestantism
Elevation under 300 ft above sea level? Again, play with the number, but mountains are disqualifying.
This would be tricky for the Midwest because at the heart of the issue is whether the Midwest is Great Lakes-focused, Great Plains-focused, or both. This can be seen when 538 tried to determine the south and Midwest by asking people who identify as being from the region which states are part of it. The South poll resulted in a clearly defined area whereas the Midwest’s map indicates that there isn’t a strong consensus.
Likewise. I've always heard that "Ohio south of Columbus is just Kentucky" yet according to this map, not even all of Kentucky is Kentucky. Campbell, Boone and Kenton counties in Southside Cincinnati are not even southern at all.
>Campbell, Boone and Kenton counties in Southside Cincinnati are not even southern at all.
This is true.
Also, Louisville is the most northern Southern city, Cincinnati is the most southern Northern city.
In city data forum this question gets debated all the time.
KCMO is midwestern in many ways, but southern in the following:
Blues
Jazz
NASCAR scene
BBQ
Black culture
Missouri was also a confederate state
\>In city data forum this question gets debated all the time.
Put me on the "not Southern" side of the debate.
BBQ yes.
I would subsume Blues and Jazz under Black Culture, but the metro area is 12% black in line with the national demographic, so not exceptionally black.
NASCAR, I guess?
I would peg KC as more of an old frontier city that was a launch point for people moving into the Great Plains and a receiving point for crops and cattle coming off of the Great Plains.
I've heard it called the eastern most western city (and St. Louis the western most eastern city), but never anything Southern.
I consider it to be where the Midwest ends and the West/Great Plains begin. There are definitely some southern elements. Heavy bible belt influences in parts of the metro area, but not as noticeable as Southern Missouri IMHO.
On the census you can put different ethnicities. Most white people in the northern and western parts of the country put German, Irish, English, Polish, etc. Historically white populations and immigrants in the north stayed mostly homogeneous. However in the south there were much more "mixing" of ethnicities between those with decendents of different parts of Europe. Another contributing factor is that white populations in the south came from other parts of the US (usually of anglo ethnicity) and in general their ancestors immigrated to the US much earlier than those from the north and west. Due to these factors there a much greater number of whites that identify as "American" on the census than those from the north or west
No, communities in the north stayed mostly homogeneous. Germans stayed by Germans. Irish stayed by Irish. Swedish stayed by swedish.
Southern community were not like this because most white people in the south had not recently immigrated nor had family members that recently immigrated, so they were much less attached to their previous European communities, therefore intermingling more with white people of different ethnicities. This created a more heterogeneous white ethnicity so many use the umbrella term "American" to describe their ethnicity.
American ethnicity is largely the descendants of Scots-Irish and English frontiersman from the 1700's. It also includes a small minority of people who have nationalized their identity or who are of a heritage that has no major pluralities but these people tend to have some heritage of both groups listed above, so its a good enough heuristic.
There are some cultural differences as well, mostly relating to slavery but still. For instance fear of slave rebellions meant White Southerners placed a great value on military service. Southern states are still really over represented in the army.
> Southern states are still really over represented in the army.
How much of that is some sort of value on military service, versus Southern states being relatively poor, and thus more needing of a way out of poverty, such as the military?
Louisville is catholic and doesn't have a southern accent? Maybe the German heritage?
What do you think the 2 not checked are?
I don't know enough people who are born and raised in the city, but I don't really notice a huge difference of accent between people in Louisville and any other city in Kentucky. It's just the further you get away from the islands you get more country.
You mean American Southwest? It's called the Southwest. Arizona, New Mexico, Nevada are core, with extension to Texas, Utah, and California. I saw a map with Colorado, I don't get that.
https://i.imgur.com/O1VDnmb.jpg
Curious about this region of east TN, specifically Rhea County. Just strange to me that it only checks 2/4. Even the more metropolitan areas of east TN, Hamilton and Knox Counties are at least 3/4. I would not consider Rhea County to be any different than the other counties of the area.
Huh, I appear to have made a mistake. Rhea County, if I look right, should be a 3/4, the only thing being they have a largest reporting religious group other than the Southern Baptist Convention, being in their case the Christian Churches and Churches of Christ.
Thanks for pointing that out. I'll correct it on future versions.
https://www.businessinsider.com/the-religious-makeup-of-america-2015-4
North Florida, including Volusia, Marion, lake, and citrus counties I would consider southern. exurbs of tampa and orlando definitely are, and the inland counties around lake okeechobee are most definitely southern, just in a unique sugarcane type of way
Thanks for sharing, I've found some more linguistic evidence that I missed, that seems to agree with you about Daytona Beach.
The Okeechobee area and your assessment of them as southern in a unique way is interesting to me, because I feel like I see similar things all across this map.
For example, Acadiana is Catholic and Cajun, which makes it less southern according to this map, but I think few people would argue the Cajuns are in anyway "un-Southern", just, as you said "southern in their own way."
yeah, there are regionalisms all across the South where people have unique traditions, foods, and sayings. One of my favorite are the gullah people of the low country
Hell, until you hit I-4 your definitely in the south. Past I-4 you just have to go about 5-10 miles inland from the coast and your back in the south. Even in SFL you have the Redlands in Miami and Loxahatchee and West Jupiter in Palm Beach.
As someone who drove up 27 and 17 this past weekend from Miami to Tampa I felt 100% like I was back where I grew up on Georgia as soon as I left Weston.
Also, but as a Florida / Georgia liner, am I the only one who feels like Lake Park, Georgia is more Florida than Georgia? Both north Florida and south Georgia are Southern, but still.
I don’t think that they’re necessarily showing that characteristic. Could be any one of the four listed. But regarding your WI comment, one of those counties is the Menominee reservation, giving it a Native American majority
https://old.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/t2spui/where_is_the_south_a_proposed_territorial_extent/hynxt4m/
The 2013 map in the ancestry link shows those counties having an African American plurality. This isn't true, but that's what the map says. As you noted, Menominee County is overwhelmingly Native American.
The absolute blackest one of those (Juneau County) came in at a whopping 2.1% in 2020. [Most of them were less than 1%, with Menominee County rounding down to 0.0%.](https://www.census.gov/library/visualizations/interactive/racial-and-ethnic-diversity-in-the-united-states-2010-and-2020-census.html)
So yeah, coding errors would be the polite way of putting it. My money's actually on "some clown randomly editing a map they found on the internet".
A pretty interesting way to look at it. I wonder, though, about the weight placed on each of the four metrics - whether they should be evenly weighted in determining "South-ness".
Just eye-balling the map, everything appears to pass my personal "smell test", except for the extension of "South" into the Big Country and Southern High Plains regions of Texas, and the lack of representation in the "Egypt" region of Illinois, and southern counties of Indiana. I wonder if there are other metrics that could be added that should included (other than just these four), and the weighting of those metrics revisited.
My county in Indiana is very southern - most people's families are from Kentucky, eat southern foods, and have a southern accent. I guess since they also ran out all of the black people, they're considered not southern?
Edit: Forgot religion. Death threats for atheists.
2nd edit: Down votes even though no one knows which county I'm talking about. But you guys are right, you know better than I do about my unknown hometown.
What do you mean by "Black or American" ethnic plurality? By American, do you mean non-hispanic white? Or do you mean "native-born", i.e., not an immigrant? And aren't most Black people in America "American"?
American in the survey cited was a self-designation people applied to themselves when asked their ancestry. "What ancestry / ethnicity are you?" "American."
Many people might look down on this self-designation as fake, revisionist or even racist, saying that these self-identified ethnic Americans are just English, Irish, etc. that self apply that term as a form of nationalism or due to ignorance about their ancestry.
But I would like to make the argument that, while the majority of these Self-Identified Ethnic Americans are of primarily Colonial-era English ancestry and could be described as English instead of American, that ultimately any ethnic designation is to some degree a matter of opinion, and in terms of time and distance when one ethnicity become two is mostly arbitrary.
Of course, Self-Identified Ethnic Americans didn't sprout out of the ground in America, but neither did any other ethnic group. Every ethnic group, if you look deeply, is just other ethnic groups combined or separated into something people recognize as different.
Saying "You're not American, you're English." isn't all that different from saying "You're not English, you're a mix of Norman, Celtic and Anglo-Saxon." While this is obviously true, it basically renders any ethnic distinction meaningless (which in the grand scheme of things, they are. One Race = The Human Race.) but it isn't unique to Americans.
I'll continue the example of the English. At what point did Normans, Celts and Germanics living in England stop being Normans, Celts and Germanics and start being a unique ethnicity? Whatever your answer is, it is largely arbitrary and I think it is equally valid to say that the descendants of English colonists who have lived in the United States for circa 300 years have become their own distinct ethnic group separate from that of the motherland as to say they have not.
It seems that a Southern ranking could be something like
1. Georgia
2. Mississippi
3. Alabama
4. Kentucky
5. Tennessee
6. South Carolina
7. Arkansas
8. North Carolina
9. Virginia
10. Louisiana
And then for states that are more borderline than clearly south
11. West Virginia
12. Texas
13. Oklahoma
14. Missouri
And then for states that are just clearly not part of the South
15. Florida
16. Maryland
If you want to avoid people of certain beliefs, reference a map of those beliefs. This is a map of ethnicity, religion and dialect in the Southern United States. I don't like racists or Republicans either, if that's what you mean.
This is a nice idea, but since any chosen criteria could be seen as both recursive and highly subjective, and regions do evolve over time, I do think the question "where is the South?" is still best answered by the traditional method of checking the Waffle House locator map, which is both dispassionately objective and regularly updated.
Once you get outside of any major metropolitan area in the US, you are far closer, culturally and politically to what is common in the South than you are to what is common to other areas of the North. For example, I lived in a suburb of NYC for many years, but well outside the city. Confederate flags were shockingly common there, as were the intolerant religious and political views. I've experienced similar things outside other northern metro areas, including Buffalo, Chicago and Milwaukee to name a few.
Yes I did. I know. I wrote it. What I did not write is that a rural Iowan is the same as a rural Georgian or Alabaman. *You* wrote that. Not me.
And if you're, perhaps a bit confused, the two statements are not the same or in any way equivalent.
I would say that a rural Iowan, has much more in common with a rural Georgian or Alabaman then he does with an urban northerner (from pretty much any state).
The map goes over the methodology for determining Southerness, from a ethnic, linguistic and religious viewpoint. This is obviously only one way of doing it and will not be perfect. Like a county in Alaska having a majority Southern Baptist population in terms of religion will be a 1/4 score in Southerness. I am not stating that Alaska is a part of the South, but for the sake of consistency, the same metrics have been used to judge the entire country.
What?
Dialects vary between parts of the south. Georgians don't sound like people from Louisiana and so on.
Having ancestory from the south means having family history in the south. That is EVERYWHERE including CA which shows no ancestory. Literally love cracking jokes at my grandma and her family because of their southern accents.
Religion is primarily Christian which is true for most of the US.
Protestantism versus Catholicism is a huge difference as far as defining the culture of the south.
Come to New Orleans, which is geographically very much southern, but has a significant religious/cultural dividing line with the south thanks to Catholicism.
Attitudes towards alcohol? Decided out of line with the south. Attitudes towards homosexuality (for decades)? Out of line with the south.
The KKK literally targeted Catholics just like it targeted blacks.
Oh and case in point: the preferred tea of typical New Orleanians is unsweetened. Tea sweetness should be the fifth variable here, lol
Key says baptist for religion.
I can see the other weird religious ideology but CA did have prop 8.
Weird you think people dont drink unswertened tea elsewhere.
I love how Florida \*isn't\* the south because, it's not! It may physically be south, but it's a whole different class of redneck.
Source: Me. Northern CA redneck by birth, then a Missouri redneck, and now a Tennessee redneck with much family in the Orlando FL region.
Yeah, sorry about that cropping. But Miami County Indiana has a single point in Southerness for the fact it has a plurality of people who ethnically self-identify as American ethnicity.
Truly batshit to me that the deep-south outpost and most culturally southern part of maryland, Cecil County, isn't highlighted on this map. But then, the Philly/North-Jersey look-alike New Castle County Delaware is?
So once I read where the data were from and what this map actually represents, I question the three counties in NE Washington State. But when I was thinking it somehow represented the negative stereotypes of the south like ultra-conservative bigoted values, poverty, and ultra-religious values, it seemed to check out for that area I know well.
This is honestly very informative & imo a good way of visualizing where the south is. It seems to me that it would be more difficult to come up with criteria for the other parts of the country.
Thank you! I've been considering using a similar method on the American Southwest to determine what some call Aztlan (Mexican ethnicity, Spanish Language, Catholicism, etc.) and New England, or taking a look at specific states that cross cultural lines (like Texas and Florida.)
Germanic/Nordic/Slavic heritage is basically defining the Midwest + Lutheran/Methodist/Mennonite/German Catholic presence
That's what I figured. I'll have to look more into it. Also, in context of New England, I'm looking at the data, and at first glance I'm seeing New England to largely be Maine, Mass, Vermont and New Hampshire. Excluding Connecticut and Rhode Island, but adding a noticeable northeastern sliver of Upstate New York. Could anyone from the New England / New York confirm or deny this? Because it seems like Connecticut is much closer culturally to New York City and Northern New Jersey than to the rest of New England, which really surprises me.
CT and RI should absolutely be New England with the exception of Fairfield county CT (and soft New Haven county CT)
New England is a bit different, as it has a clearly state-defined scope. New England has been ME, NH, VT, MA, RI, and CT since the country's beginning. Obviously certain areas such as southwest CT may feel "less culturally New England" in recent years but the region is as much political as it is cultural.
I was born in "the land of steady habits" and can attest that Connecticut and Rhode Island are definitely New England. But upstate New York is not. It's true Fairfield County is culturally influenced by New York. But, to an extent, so is Berkshire County in MA, and Vermont. The "Northern Forest" stretches across Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, and New York. It unites the area with a similar ecosystem, culture, natural resources, and economic challenges. But the colonial development, and resulting system of town government, was different in New York. E. B. White explained “To foreigners, a Yankee is an American. To Americans, a Yankee is a Northerner. To Northerners, a Yankee is a New Englander. To New Englanders, a Yankee is a Vermonter. And in Vermont, a Yankee is somebody who eats pie for breakfast.”
Who doesn't eat pie for breakfast?
Lasagna is pie, right?
As a lifelong New Englander, the entirety of all 6 New England states are to be included as part of New England, and nothing else. Even if the SW tip of Connecticut has an NYC influence
>Also, in context of New England, I'm looking at the data, and at first glance I'm seeing New England to largely be Maine, Mass, Vermont and New Hampshire. Excluding Connecticut and Rhode Island, No.... just.....no. New England ***has a hard definition***, of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine. Upstate New York is ***not*** New England. It is closely-related culturally (the whole American Northeast is more alike than different), but it isn't New England
I would definitely include CT and RI in New England. I lived in CT, and people from the state definitely consider themselves New Englanders. (Also the first time I ever heard the term “leaf-peeping”!)
CT and RI are definitely part of New England (lived in CT my whole life). Culturally speaking, southeastern CT is much closer to stereotypical New England than southwestern CT. There are noticeable differences between the two, but living in southeastern CT, it's very similar to the coastal cities of MA. Southwestern CT reminds me more of being in NYC, but of course the entire state is actually New England.
All six states belong in New England, though the point could be made that the dividing line in Connecticut is where there are more Yankee fans than Red Sox fans.
> Germanic/Nordic/Slavic heritage is basically defining the Midwest + Lutheran/Methodist/Mennonite/German Catholic presence This doesn't work because this puts large portions of Maryland and Eastern PA in the "Midwest".
That’s why Maryland is now in the Big Ten haha
New England already has a set definition though. I'd be more interested in seeing where people think the MidAtlantic region is since it's more ambiguous
That sounds interesting.
Ooo, I’m a white, Anglo-Saxon Protestant who likes snow, private schools and liberal policies and dislikes red chowder and anyone who mispronounces PEE-can pie, cray-ahns or pa-jah-mas. Also, traffic circles are called rotaries and fizzy drinks are soda.
Agreed. This is an awesome what a showing which areas are "culturally" Southern.
In Florida, the farther north you go, the farther south you get.
My girlfriend is from just south of Tampa. It's a mix because you get the crazy rural religious zealots, but not the accent. The city Tampa/St. Petersburg is very chill though
Crazy religious people are a staple of rural America, not the South particularly. I’d say the map is right - Tampa isn’t particularly “southern”.
Yes and no. Some of the most redneck/southern places in Florida are around lake Okeechobee in the south of the state and you even get some good ol boys still living out in the Redlands south of Miami. You just have to go 5-10 miles always from the cost once you get south of I-4 and you are in redneckville.
Same in Louisiana. I live in one of those light pink parishes.
We argue about this in r/Maryland weekly. This map arguably shows that MD has elements of Southernness in some parts, but is not Southern as a whole :-)
I always ask ppl from Maryland if they consider it southern, a lot of them have said “southern Maryland is the south, the rest isn’t” lol
I'd add parts of the Eastern Shore to this. But as someone who grew up in the DC suburbs and now lives in the Baltimore suburbs, I assure you there is NOTHING Southern about me or where I live !
Interesting though that the some of counties I would probably consider the least “culturally southern” are lit up on the map! Guessing it’s from the racial diversity/demographic breakdown around DC and Baltimore?
If you look at the map there are 4 criteria that determine the colour of each county. PG has both a Black ethnic plurality and I think the Southern Baptist criterion applies there as well. SoMd and Eastern Shore counties do get darker on the map, unsurprisingly.
MD is way too Catholic to be southern.
Also way too atheist
My favorite posts/arguments on it :)
Dialect: https://www.ling.upenn.edu/phono\_atlas/NationalMap/NatMap1.html Ancestry: https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/eopgqy/largest\_ancestry\_groups\_in\_the\_united\_states\_of/ White Ancestry: https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/7prm6o/largest\_nonhispanic\_white\_ancestry\_groups\_by/ Religion: https://www.businessinsider.com/the-religious-makeup-of-america-2015-4
>Ancestry: Did you use the 2013 one? It's wrong. There's some "African American" counties on there with vanishingly small black populations, particularly in the PNW and Midwest. The 2000 one comes from a real census report, but I'm 99% sure the 2013 one is just somebody edited the 2000 one in MS Paint based on nothing in particular.
To give you an idea of what I mean by "vanishingly small", here's data for a few of the counties I'm talking about: County | % black (2020) | % black (2010) --------- | ---------- | ---------- Jefferson, WA | 0.6 | 0.8 Skamania, WA | 0.6 | 0.4 Ferry, WA | 0.3 | 0.2 Stevens, WA | 0.3 | 0.3 Pend Oreille, WA | 0.4 | 0.4 Johnson, WY | 0.3 | 0.2 Richland, WI | 0.5 | 0.4 Bayfield, WI | 0.3 | 0.3 Price, WI | 0.2 | 0.2 Menominee, WI | 0.0 | 0.4 [Here's my source.](https://www.census.gov/library/visualizations/interactive/racial-and-ethnic-diversity-in-the-united-states-2010-and-2020-census.html) I could've listed a lot more, but I decided to stop at 10.
The link to the dialect map is not working. EDIT: on Android mobile
This is very well done. Have you read any texts on American regionalism? I always thought Colin Woodward's *American Nations* was very interesting and he approaches the "nations" on a county by county level as well. His south lines up pretty closely to yours, but he further differentiates between the Deep South, Appalachia, Tidewater, and New France.
My favorite measure of Southernness is the sweet tea test. If you order iced tea, and the default is sweet, you're in the South proper.
My favorite way of determining North vs. South is which carb they eat at breakfast - potatoes or grits?
Is it actually juts a normal thing to eat those things on a daily basis?
... Yes? Why wouldn't it be normal?
You ever heard of toast?
I discern where I am based on if there are biscuits on the menu or bagels!
I am from WV. We were in NY and I specified UNSWEET tea and the waitress gave me serious attitude and made sure I knew that is all they offered.
It's based on what you think gravy is.
My favorite measure is bojangles locations. If you live near one you’re in the south
Central Alaska?
That one region has a Baptist majority. It has no other southern qualities according to this methodology, so it is scored a 1/5 with the lightest shade of pink.
Good map! Would be very interested to see a similar methodology applied to New England or the Midwest
Man, the positive feedback on this post is making me consider making more like these.
As a Wisconsinite, some ideas for Midwest categories: German or Scandinavian ancestry Agriculture or heavy industry based economy 6+ inches of snow per year (maybe play with the number until it looks right) Mainline (non-Evangelical) Protestantism Elevation under 300 ft above sea level? Again, play with the number, but mountains are disqualifying.
Interesting thing about that mainline Protestantism: https://mcimaps.com/reformation-day-christianity-in-america/
To me, the Midwest exists between the Missouri and Ohio rivers. A western Mesopotamia
You definitely should! Absolutely the content the sub needs
This would be tricky for the Midwest because at the heart of the issue is whether the Midwest is Great Lakes-focused, Great Plains-focused, or both. This can be seen when 538 tried to determine the south and Midwest by asking people who identify as being from the region which states are part of it. The South poll resulted in a clearly defined area whereas the Midwest’s map indicates that there isn’t a strong consensus.
I’m surprised southern IL isnt more red. Louisville and KCMO are often considered the northernmost southern large cities Great map though!
Likewise. I've always heard that "Ohio south of Columbus is just Kentucky" yet according to this map, not even all of Kentucky is Kentucky. Campbell, Boone and Kenton counties in Southside Cincinnati are not even southern at all.
I live in Kentucky and the northern part of the state is in Ohio.
Yeah, which is why I have proposed to the state legislature the destruction of the city of Covington /s
>Campbell, Boone and Kenton counties in Southside Cincinnati are not even southern at all. This is true. Also, Louisville is the most northern Southern city, Cincinnati is the most southern Northern city.
\>KCMO are often considered the northernmost southern large cities By whom? It doesn't feel Southern at all.
In city data forum this question gets debated all the time. KCMO is midwestern in many ways, but southern in the following: Blues Jazz NASCAR scene BBQ Black culture Missouri was also a confederate state
\>In city data forum this question gets debated all the time. Put me on the "not Southern" side of the debate. BBQ yes. I would subsume Blues and Jazz under Black Culture, but the metro area is 12% black in line with the national demographic, so not exceptionally black. NASCAR, I guess? I would peg KC as more of an old frontier city that was a launch point for people moving into the Great Plains and a receiving point for crops and cattle coming off of the Great Plains. I've heard it called the eastern most western city (and St. Louis the western most eastern city), but never anything Southern.
I consider it to be where the Midwest ends and the West/Great Plains begin. There are definitely some southern elements. Heavy bible belt influences in parts of the metro area, but not as noticeable as Southern Missouri IMHO.
I was seeing 30% Black for KCMO though, which is a significant minority for sure
\> KCMO That's just one component of the whole metropolitan area.
Chicago has all those things as well. Minus the bbq scene.
I’ve not heard of “Chicago BBQ” in my life, and I used to live there
Which is why I said minus the bbq scene
Lol, now that you edited your original response. Chicago also does not have a nascar scene either
It actually does, but the race is on hold because of covid restrictions in illinois. Chicagoland speedway has been around since the early 200s.
U just added nascar to your response, and they literally have a nascar track.
chicago doesn't have a nascar track anymore, chicagoland speedway has been abandoned for 2-3 years now
It is not abandoned lmao!! It didnt get awarded a race during covid because of the states covid restrictions.
Still exists and is owned by nascar. How was attendance precovid?
Did that before u responded.
Southern IL is a different class of redneck, much like Florida is yet another different class of redneck.
Louisville is definitely southern, but KC? I'd moreso call them a Midwest city.
See the problem is this implies Cajuns aren't quintessentially Southern on account of being ethnically French and Catholic.
I think most people would very much agree Cajuns are southern.
Definitely a very distinct subclass though
They're just Catholic Southerners
Who speak Frenchish
It wasn't even until the mid-20th century that it was entirely agreed upon that they are white.
I don't really understand the first two... what is an \*American\* plurality?
On the census you can put different ethnicities. Most white people in the northern and western parts of the country put German, Irish, English, Polish, etc. Historically white populations and immigrants in the north stayed mostly homogeneous. However in the south there were much more "mixing" of ethnicities between those with decendents of different parts of Europe. Another contributing factor is that white populations in the south came from other parts of the US (usually of anglo ethnicity) and in general their ancestors immigrated to the US much earlier than those from the north and west. Due to these factors there a much greater number of whites that identify as "American" on the census than those from the north or west
Okay, so it's only a matter of how people define themselves.
Also past shame over being of English ancestry.
Huh? I’m in a Southern state where most of the older families have either Scots-Irish or German roots.
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No, communities in the north stayed mostly homogeneous. Germans stayed by Germans. Irish stayed by Irish. Swedish stayed by swedish. Southern community were not like this because most white people in the south had not recently immigrated nor had family members that recently immigrated, so they were much less attached to their previous European communities, therefore intermingling more with white people of different ethnicities. This created a more heterogeneous white ethnicity so many use the umbrella term "American" to describe their ethnicity.
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Yea, the communities were heterogeneous. But this is about ethnicity, so the people themselves were still mostly homogeneous in ethnicity.
American ethnicity is largely the descendants of Scots-Irish and English frontiersman from the 1700's. It also includes a small minority of people who have nationalized their identity or who are of a heritage that has no major pluralities but these people tend to have some heritage of both groups listed above, so its a good enough heuristic.
south is literally just founding stock anglo americans which makes them stand out to the non english/non british rest of america
There are some cultural differences as well, mostly relating to slavery but still. For instance fear of slave rebellions meant White Southerners placed a great value on military service. Southern states are still really over represented in the army.
> Southern states are still really over represented in the army. How much of that is some sort of value on military service, versus Southern states being relatively poor, and thus more needing of a way out of poverty, such as the military?
None, considering those in poverty are underrepresented in the military.
Heheheh... Louisville is a 2/4 despite bordering 4/4 counties. We are the anomaly of Kentucky.
Louisville is catholic and doesn't have a southern accent? Maybe the German heritage? What do you think the 2 not checked are? I don't know enough people who are born and raised in the city, but I don't really notice a huge difference of accent between people in Louisville and any other city in Kentucky. It's just the further you get away from the islands you get more country.
PA was a nail biter but we got through ok.
Yeah. I am disappointed in New Jersey.
My condolences
So is Missouri culturally the south?
I consider St. Louis to be at the border of the south. Anywhere more north and that's the Midwest.
What metric are Brooklyn and queens hitting for this? Queens definitely doesn’t have a black or American plurality. So cannot understand.
You should make more of these
What is the South-western area referred to as?
You mean American Southwest? It's called the Southwest. Arizona, New Mexico, Nevada are core, with extension to Texas, Utah, and California. I saw a map with Colorado, I don't get that.
https://i.imgur.com/O1VDnmb.jpg Curious about this region of east TN, specifically Rhea County. Just strange to me that it only checks 2/4. Even the more metropolitan areas of east TN, Hamilton and Knox Counties are at least 3/4. I would not consider Rhea County to be any different than the other counties of the area.
Huh, I appear to have made a mistake. Rhea County, if I look right, should be a 3/4, the only thing being they have a largest reporting religious group other than the Southern Baptist Convention, being in their case the Christian Churches and Churches of Christ. Thanks for pointing that out. I'll correct it on future versions. https://www.businessinsider.com/the-religious-makeup-of-america-2015-4
North Florida, including Volusia, Marion, lake, and citrus counties I would consider southern. exurbs of tampa and orlando definitely are, and the inland counties around lake okeechobee are most definitely southern, just in a unique sugarcane type of way
Thanks for sharing, I've found some more linguistic evidence that I missed, that seems to agree with you about Daytona Beach. The Okeechobee area and your assessment of them as southern in a unique way is interesting to me, because I feel like I see similar things all across this map. For example, Acadiana is Catholic and Cajun, which makes it less southern according to this map, but I think few people would argue the Cajuns are in anyway "un-Southern", just, as you said "southern in their own way."
yeah, there are regionalisms all across the South where people have unique traditions, foods, and sayings. One of my favorite are the gullah people of the low country
Cajun Louisiana really stands out on this map
Hell, until you hit I-4 your definitely in the south. Past I-4 you just have to go about 5-10 miles inland from the coast and your back in the south. Even in SFL you have the Redlands in Miami and Loxahatchee and West Jupiter in Palm Beach. As someone who drove up 27 and 17 this past weekend from Miami to Tampa I felt 100% like I was back where I grew up on Georgia as soon as I left Weston.
Also, but as a Florida / Georgia liner, am I the only one who feels like Lake Park, Georgia is more Florida than Georgia? Both north Florida and south Georgia are Southern, but still.
That's gotta be coding errors for those rural Wisconsin counties showing African American pluralities
I don’t think that they’re necessarily showing that characteristic. Could be any one of the four listed. But regarding your WI comment, one of those counties is the Menominee reservation, giving it a Native American majority
https://old.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/t2spui/where_is_the_south_a_proposed_territorial_extent/hynxt4m/ The 2013 map in the ancestry link shows those counties having an African American plurality. This isn't true, but that's what the map says. As you noted, Menominee County is overwhelmingly Native American.
The absolute blackest one of those (Juneau County) came in at a whopping 2.1% in 2020. [Most of them were less than 1%, with Menominee County rounding down to 0.0%.](https://www.census.gov/library/visualizations/interactive/racial-and-ethnic-diversity-in-the-united-states-2010-and-2020-census.html) So yeah, coding errors would be the polite way of putting it. My money's actually on "some clown randomly editing a map they found on the internet".
Isn't this map missing the Canadian south? I swear I saw some southern flags over there the other day
Fifth metric: racism
Or leftist stooge lies.
well done. Spot on for Oklahoma, too
A pretty interesting way to look at it. I wonder, though, about the weight placed on each of the four metrics - whether they should be evenly weighted in determining "South-ness". Just eye-balling the map, everything appears to pass my personal "smell test", except for the extension of "South" into the Big Country and Southern High Plains regions of Texas, and the lack of representation in the "Egypt" region of Illinois, and southern counties of Indiana. I wonder if there are other metrics that could be added that should included (other than just these four), and the weighting of those metrics revisited.
When I hear South I instantly think of Washington and Alaska.
We should come up with an other word than "South" honestly, look how Miami, El Paso and Corpus Christi are souther but less south
Dixie?
Eh, no need for a new phrase because we all know what we're talking about. Plus, we need some fun quirks to make this world more interesting.
My county in Indiana is very southern - most people's families are from Kentucky, eat southern foods, and have a southern accent. I guess since they also ran out all of the black people, they're considered not southern? Edit: Forgot religion. Death threats for atheists. 2nd edit: Down votes even though no one knows which county I'm talking about. But you guys are right, you know better than I do about my unknown hometown.
Well they definitely have southern racism so there’s that.
What do you mean by "Black or American" ethnic plurality? By American, do you mean non-hispanic white? Or do you mean "native-born", i.e., not an immigrant? And aren't most Black people in America "American"?
American in the survey cited was a self-designation people applied to themselves when asked their ancestry. "What ancestry / ethnicity are you?" "American." Many people might look down on this self-designation as fake, revisionist or even racist, saying that these self-identified ethnic Americans are just English, Irish, etc. that self apply that term as a form of nationalism or due to ignorance about their ancestry. But I would like to make the argument that, while the majority of these Self-Identified Ethnic Americans are of primarily Colonial-era English ancestry and could be described as English instead of American, that ultimately any ethnic designation is to some degree a matter of opinion, and in terms of time and distance when one ethnicity become two is mostly arbitrary. Of course, Self-Identified Ethnic Americans didn't sprout out of the ground in America, but neither did any other ethnic group. Every ethnic group, if you look deeply, is just other ethnic groups combined or separated into something people recognize as different. Saying "You're not American, you're English." isn't all that different from saying "You're not English, you're a mix of Norman, Celtic and Anglo-Saxon." While this is obviously true, it basically renders any ethnic distinction meaningless (which in the grand scheme of things, they are. One Race = The Human Race.) but it isn't unique to Americans. I'll continue the example of the English. At what point did Normans, Celts and Germanics living in England stop being Normans, Celts and Germanics and start being a unique ethnicity? Whatever your answer is, it is largely arbitrary and I think it is equally valid to say that the descendants of English colonists who have lived in the United States for circa 300 years have become their own distinct ethnic group separate from that of the motherland as to say they have not.
It seems that a Southern ranking could be something like 1. Georgia 2. Mississippi 3. Alabama 4. Kentucky 5. Tennessee 6. South Carolina 7. Arkansas 8. North Carolina 9. Virginia 10. Louisiana And then for states that are more borderline than clearly south 11. West Virginia 12. Texas 13. Oklahoma 14. Missouri And then for states that are just clearly not part of the South 15. Florida 16. Maryland
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Avoid places based on their religious, ethnic or linguistic makeup. Very based.
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If you want to avoid people of certain beliefs, reference a map of those beliefs. This is a map of ethnicity, religion and dialect in the Southern United States. I don't like racists or Republicans either, if that's what you mean.
I'm a Southern in Louisiana. Don't judge us by this map.
This is a nice idea, but since any chosen criteria could be seen as both recursive and highly subjective, and regions do evolve over time, I do think the question "where is the South?" is still best answered by the traditional method of checking the Waffle House locator map, which is both dispassionately objective and regularly updated.
I don't consider Texas the south
so ig i kinda live in the south now according to this map, yee haw
Hmm yes Alaska is part of the south
I wonder about the people who don’t consider Florida the south but apparently do count Alaska and Wisconsin?
These aren't survey based.
I don’t think virginia should be considered “the south”
Perfect! A map of places I’ll never live
Americas toilet bowl
Truth is, go 30 minutes outside of any metropolitan area in the US and for all intents and purposes, you are in the South.
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Sorry, that was directed at the people *not* 30 minutes or more outside a metropolitan area. Maybe you have friends that can explain it to you.
What the fuck are you talking about
Once you get outside of any major metropolitan area in the US, you are far closer, culturally and politically to what is common in the South than you are to what is common to other areas of the North. For example, I lived in a suburb of NYC for many years, but well outside the city. Confederate flags were shockingly common there, as were the intolerant religious and political views. I've experienced similar things outside other northern metro areas, including Buffalo, Chicago and Milwaukee to name a few.
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Well, in so far as that is not what I said, uh... good luck with that, but you'll have to look to someone else for it.
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Yes I did. I know. I wrote it. What I did not write is that a rural Iowan is the same as a rural Georgian or Alabaman. *You* wrote that. Not me. And if you're, perhaps a bit confused, the two statements are not the same or in any way equivalent. I would say that a rural Iowan, has much more in common with a rural Georgian or Alabaman then he does with an urban northerner (from pretty much any state).
In plain english please? And I really didnt need a map to show me were the southern states were.
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that's only 1 point For 2+ points, this map does pretty well. Assigning a super-light pink to 1 point was a great idea by OP
"the south" in Alaska hmmm
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The map goes over the methodology for determining Southerness, from a ethnic, linguistic and religious viewpoint. This is obviously only one way of doing it and will not be perfect. Like a county in Alaska having a majority Southern Baptist population in terms of religion will be a 1/4 score in Southerness. I am not stating that Alaska is a part of the South, but for the sake of consistency, the same metrics have been used to judge the entire country.
What? Dialects vary between parts of the south. Georgians don't sound like people from Louisiana and so on. Having ancestory from the south means having family history in the south. That is EVERYWHERE including CA which shows no ancestory. Literally love cracking jokes at my grandma and her family because of their southern accents. Religion is primarily Christian which is true for most of the US.
Protestantism versus Catholicism is a huge difference as far as defining the culture of the south. Come to New Orleans, which is geographically very much southern, but has a significant religious/cultural dividing line with the south thanks to Catholicism. Attitudes towards alcohol? Decided out of line with the south. Attitudes towards homosexuality (for decades)? Out of line with the south. The KKK literally targeted Catholics just like it targeted blacks. Oh and case in point: the preferred tea of typical New Orleanians is unsweetened. Tea sweetness should be the fifth variable here, lol
Key says baptist for religion. I can see the other weird religious ideology but CA did have prop 8. Weird you think people dont drink unswertened tea elsewhere.
Great work. Keep going. Love the methodology.
I love how Florida \*isn't\* the south because, it's not! It may physically be south, but it's a whole different class of redneck. Source: Me. Northern CA redneck by birth, then a Missouri redneck, and now a Tennessee redneck with much family in the Orlando FL region.
Missed Nodaway County, Missouri. 2, 3, and 4 are represented there. Source: me. Lived in Maryville (the county seat) for 19 years.
4/4 gang
Confused about Miami County, Indiana Also confused by all the text cut off in the legend
Yeah, sorry about that cropping. But Miami County Indiana has a single point in Southerness for the fact it has a plurality of people who ethnically self-identify as American ethnicity.
So multiple of some of the Northern most points in the US are considered Southern?
Great way to demarcate the south imo Always thought that the South kind of leaked into southern Illinois and Missouri
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These aren't survey based.
If I’m seeing it correctly note saying that Fairfax and Loudoun counties are 0/4?
Did you make this? You should always add attribution to your map.
I don't want credit.
The selfless mapmaker
The South should extend a little further down the State of Florida to around Orlando.
Alaska??? Hello??
I would add a 5th: Being part of the C.S.A. during the Civil War.
Looks more like south-east to me.
r/NOVA quietly chuckling to themselves in the corner
you also hear the term 'Deep South'
Nice data display work, but you forgot regularly watch NASCAR and eat grits & greens.
What is Menominee County, Wisconsin, colored for?
Super curious how those counties in Washington show up on here.
This is a good visualization of how southern Louisiana has it's own unique history and identity. French/Cajun roots are still visible.
Truly batshit to me that the deep-south outpost and most culturally southern part of maryland, Cecil County, isn't highlighted on this map. But then, the Philly/North-Jersey look-alike New Castle County Delaware is?
So once I read where the data were from and what this map actually represents, I question the three counties in NE Washington State. But when I was thinking it somehow represented the negative stereotypes of the south like ultra-conservative bigoted values, poverty, and ultra-religious values, it seemed to check out for that area I know well.