Why do I feel “Navarrese first, therefore a Spaniard”?
Why do Americans make calendars of blonde chicks wearing buttfloss made from their flag, and people from other countries don’t?
Why do Scots and Englishmen have so much fun pulling each other’s legs? Why does one with no sense of humor occasionally come around and start breaking things?
Dunnow, but it might be good material for an anthropology thesis: “National/Regional Pride and the Modern Tribes.”
Hmm. You make a good point. It still seems to me, though, that in mainstream America, country music and NASCAR are still viewed as being intellectually inferior interests. (No, I’m not sure what I mean by “mainstream”; these are just the impressions I’ve picked up.) And I don’t think anyone watches CNN or drinks Coke with a feeling that they’re watching a “Southern station” or drinking a “Southern beverage”; CNN and Coke have successfully made themselves into national, if not global, brands.
My point wasn’t so much about Southern phenomena as about the portrayal of Southern characters in the media; if you’re watching a nationally-aired TV show, and there’s a character with a Southern accent, that character is almost always depicted as being intellectually limited. Maybe it’s a vicious-racist kind of stupidity, or maybe it’s a happy, “just simple folk” portrayal, but either way, you’re not going to see Southerners taking part in witty banter.
Granted, there’s that show The Closer with Kyra Sedgwick (in which she faked, in the one episode I saw, an appallingly unconvincing Southern accent), but her character apparently uses the accent to make people think she’s stupid, so that they’ll let their guard down and she can outwit them. In other words, the show appears to acknowledge the stereotype in order to exploit it. And while I’m glad it does that, it also supports the fact that the stereotype exists.
A personal example: I’ve lived in the South for about 30 of my 36 years, and I consider myself thoroughly Southern, but I don’t have much of an accent. When I lived in Iowa for two years in the late '90s, I was talking to a friend (an erudite and worldly college professor) one night and the South somehow came up in conversation. He was firmly of the opinion that all Southerners are stupid and cruel and racist, and I said, “Jack, look at me; I’m Southern, and I’m not like that.”
His response was telling: He said, “Yeah, but you’re not a real Southerner.”
Clearly, in his mind, being Southern didn’t just mean being from the South; it meant being stupid and violent and drunk and lazy, the way Southerners are portrayed in the media.
(I’m not stupid, violent, or lazy. On “drunk” I’ll cop a plea.)
Everyone knows the stereotype, and some few people may still believe it, but do any Southerners truly suffer because of it? Does anyone switch off CNN because it comes from Atlanta? Does anyone not attend Duke University because it’s in North Carolina? Does any company withhold their advertising from NASCAR because all those Southerners wouldn’t be smart enough to buy their products? And if anyone does those things, they are cutting themselves off from information, education, and attention while the South suffers not at all.
Are media portrayals really that biased? How about The Beverley Hillbillies? Jethro was dumb as a bag of hammers, but Drysdale was greedy and conniving. The only one with a lick of sense was Jed, as southern as they come.
I can’t help but think of the mantras of Rush Limbaugh and Bill O’Reilly (sorry for the comparison, truly) who say “we’ll tell you the truth that the mainstream media doesn’t want you to hear.” They’re the outsiders, the renegades, the crusaders; and yet by labeling the “mainstream media” it’s clearly an elite cabal, out of touch with real America.
The defense of southern culture here sounds like you’re the stalwart backbone of the country and the plucky underdog. I just don’t think you get to have it both ways.
But whatever Southerner thought of that strategy is a fucking genius.
Australians are quite partial to this- I’ve seen quite a few calendars showing attractive women wearing string bikinis made from the Australian flag.
How about: “Does any Southerner ever get passed over for a job solely because his/her accent makes a bad first impression on the interviewer?”
I always hear people talk about Southerners as if they’re some kind of creature or subspecies of human. I guess this is considered hip or humorous. It only strikes me as being pretentious, though.
So? As I’m sure you’ve noticed there’s lots and lots of the same where you live now, too. I’m all of the above, and 4th generation New Englander - before that my family was still in those countries which would seem to make the influence from the old countries stronger because of more recent contact with the orginators of such pride. If lineage such an influence, why aren’t people around here as fiercely proud of where we live considering we decend from the same people?
It’s different with the Scots-Irish. There’s less of an influence on the Northeast by these people. There’s a lot of English and Irish influence, but Scots-Irish is not the same as the Boston Irish. Their religion was different, for one, and a lot of them came over here already inheriting the values we now know as “cracker” culture from their European ancestors long before any American Southern culture formed. They mostly came over here as indentured servants (in effect, white slaves - many of them were worked to death, treated barbarically, and never had any chance to advance in society whatsoever.) Others came over as convicts. Immediately they became the trash of America, as soon as they got here. The spirit of rebellion was in these people long before the Civil War occurred - that war just brought out what was already inside them: a hard-assed culture of stubborn pride, and a bravery and fighting spirit which Thomas Jefferson himself claimed to have been instrumental in shaping the American nation.
Born Fighting: How the Scots-Irish Shaped America.
On the other hand, the genteel, mint-julep, Colonel Sanders Southern lifestyle was very much influenced by the British and French aristocracy. But these people were not the majority.
slight hijack/ When was the last time that you crossed the Ohio river? Although I was not born in the south, I have southern ancestry and have lived here for a number of years. The biggest reason that I moved here was better job opportunities. Have you noticed that most of the auto plants and the accompanying industry that goes with it have been built in the south over the past twenty or so years? / hijack over 
This is pretty much my take on it as well. I don’t get the blanket statement of national pride, either. There is good and there is bad. Being “proud” without qualifying what it is you’re proud about just doesn’t make sense. A non-descript sense of pride, to me, anyway, says that you’re proud of all the bad things, as well. I don’t think most southerners are proud of the list of disgraceful lowlights mentioned by Boyo Jim. If you’re proud of a particular thing, like being part of the civil rights movement, for instance, then *say * that’s what you’re proud of.
I’d just like to know one thing. Would a die-hard Southerner of today give up their cell phones, PCs, cars, A/C, and everything else machines do for us to bring back slavery? C’mon…even your great grand-pappy would tell you to wake up and move on! You never had it so good!
Heck, I don’t think anyone really lives in the world of “Anytown”–it’s made up, a watered down fantasy that we’ve all gradually accepted as a norm–as is Standard English, which is more or less a midwestern accent with all the interesting stuff taken out to push it more towards something that sounds neutral to everyone. I’m just trying to define why cultural identity exisits for groups still in America. If you want to ask why “pride” is part of that cultural identity, you might as well ask why pride is part of any cultural identity–people are proud of being from NYC, too, people are proud of being Italian or Rom or Irish or whatever. Hell, we have a sort of family pride on my mom’s side, just because the family is large enough and weird enough to make us feel like having grown up in it marks you in some way. You may not be proud of your hillbilly identity, but there are plenty of other hillbillies that are.
If we want to talk about why group pride exists, that’s a different debate. As to the question “Why does Southern pride exist?”, IMHO the answer is that “Many members of cultural groups feel pride in their membership. The South is a cultural group, and that is reinforced by the way it is substantially different from the “Anytown, USA” that is understood to be the typical American experience”.
Apparently there is no history predating your birth. Sorry, I didn’t get it.
What I am saying is that I hear a lot of things like “Except for slavery…” or “Since the end of the War…”, the South has is great. Well, AFAIC, that’s bullshit. And I’m talking about history SINCE the Civil War, hence the references to things and people you seem only dimly aware of – despite the fact that they make up part of your glorious history. George Wallace ran for President in 1968 and '72, he was hardly some unknown post-WWII clownish historical figure. Perhaps you’ve heard of Jessie Helms and Strom Thurmon, two others of his ilk who have plagued our nation until recently.
Maybe I am ignorant – I ended my post with “I don’t get it either.”
OTOH, the people of the South (or if you insist, the politicians of the South) have been leading the fight against progressivism during my entire lifetime. Remember the Civil Rights Act of 1964? Maybe not – is that too old for you?
What I’m saying is that slavery and the civil War were not isolated stains on an otherwise glorious history.
Oh yeah, thanks for mentioning New Orleans, I hadn’t heard of it.
It strikes me that alot of people on SDMB, specifically but not exclusively in the United States just don’t get it when it comes to pride in anything other than perhaps your personal achievements. I’m sure some would claim you can’t even have that because it’s just a preprogrammed biological imperative.
Just because something cultural/identity-related is irrational doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist or shouldn’t exist. I understand the negative connotation with Southern pride, civil war politics et al. I’m proud of being Irish even though I know it was just an accident of birth. I’m proud of my history, culture, my family history etc. I love Irish music, the general Irish sense of humour and of carry on. I know I’m not responsible for any of these things. I’m not so proud of the bigotry, violence, bloody-mindedness, backwardness, and the like that is also endemic to my country’s culture and history but these things don’t cancel out the things I am proud of. Much of what is now called Irish culture was largely manufactured during the late 19th century and ideas of Ireland and being Irish don’t remain static.
Is there less social mobility in the South? Many of my Yankee friends would be what I would essentially call rootless (not meant pejoratively), having spent most or all of their lives in a variety of American locales on either coast, the midwest or south etc. Maybe this moving about doesn’t engender a sense of geographical pride. I dunno.
I really do need to apologize to the OP for my posts. I believe what I said in them, but it really wasn’t the correct venue. My first post I contrued in my own head to be in support of the OP in the sense of, “Yeah, given my knowledge --thin as it is – about the South, I don’t see much of anything to be proud of.” My second post was purely a reaction to Shagnasty’s reply to me. Both were off topic.
Perhaps Shagnasty wants to continue this elsewhere, as he(?) seems to have some other resentments stewing about some of my past posts. Whatever. So if the debate must continue, Shagnasty can take it to the pit.
Again, apologies to the OP.
I definitely don’t get it.
In last month’s Gourmet magazine there was an article about the South. It’s very food focused but read it and you can’t help but appreciate the fact that the South has a food, a way of speaking, a lifeway and a history (actually, several different ones) that defines the people that have lived there for generations . If something is a part of you, and you are a part however small of it… it’s only natural to have a sense of pride in it’s beauty.
I kind of get it, kind of don’t-- I think it comes down to the way one defines pride. My heritage, relatives and ancestors, geographic location, et al., are all things which I had no control over, so I don’t necessarily feel proud about them. There’s a sense of enhancement with that term, as though I am made a better or more worthy person because of these uncontrollable events. Kind of reminds me of Vonnegut’s concept of granfalloon.
I do find some of my heritage interesting, some of it I actually cherish, some is embarrassing. It’s fun to research, it’s fun to tell others. I even like the embarrassing bits (if only in the sense of “thank God I am far removed from that past”). It’s interesting to see all the little historical threads that come together to form the culture in which I live. Perhaps this is what others mean when they say they’re proud-- in that sense, I guess I could say I’ve pride as well. I just don’t use the word.
I too am Irish, to the point of having Irish citizenship, as my dad was an immigrant. But I suppose I too don’t get it , because I don’t take any particular pride in it, or my American citizenship for that matter. What I do feel is lucky to be where I am.
Personally I see this lack of connection to our ancestors as a plus. People connected to their anscestors carry grudges, for centuries, or millennia. Thank you, but we can all do wihout the baggage of righting the wrongs done to our great-grandparents.
That’s completely different from being ignorant of history, which is an ignorance that has been proven to be dangerous again and again. But hisory, IMO, is not something to be proud of. It is a field of knowledge to be learned and apllied to the real world.
Very well put.
To use an example from my own heritage, there are two common spellings of my German last name around these parts. One spelling has a T in it. The other, the one I grew up with, doesn’t.
Turns out that my great-great-great-whatever grandfather killed his sister-in-law over a cow. Her descendants, in order to separate themselves from my whatever grandfather, put a T in their names.
So, I’m from the murdering side of the family.
That whatever grandfather also convinced the judge and sheriff and such that he didn’t speak a word of English, and in the court transcripts it sounded like everyone felt very sorry for him and his age and his lack of English. In reality, he was perfectly bilingual.
I think that story is kind of odd and funny, but I’m neither proud nor ashamed of it.