An interesting question asked over at Nate Silver’s joint. I’m going to ask it again here.
I could make a rule for interpreting a state like Pennsylvania, but I’ll leave the interpreting to you.
As a former resident of Ohio, I would definitely include the states created out of the old Northwest Territory: Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio and Wisconsin. I can then see an argument for including the next three to the west of that: Iowa, Minnesota and Missouri. But I would not include anywhere else.
I believe that what I learned in grade school in the 60s was: North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Iowa, Missouri, Wisconsin, Illinois, Michigan, Indiana, Ohio.
I grew up in Ohio and my wife was born in Iowa, with lots of extended family in Minnesota. We’ve had an ongoing “argument” for years about Ohio’s status as a Midwest state.
It’s a little tricky, because Ohio falls on the boundary of three distinct regions, with each of its major cities in a different one. Cleveland and the rest of northeastern Ohio has traditionally been part of the old Northeast rust belt- heavy industrialization, very blue-collar. Cincinnati is culturally a Southern city, and rural southern Ohio, in the Appalachian foothills, is culturally similar to the rural south.
Columbus (where I’m from), however, is culturally a Midwestern city, and most of the rest of the state is flat farmland and smaller Midwestern cities and towns. It’s the largest of the three segments of the state in terms of both geography and population, so Midwest it is for Ohio.
I grew up in Oklahoma and never knew to what “region” I belonged. I always thought that Kansas was part of the Midwest, but even that was considered stretching it.
I think the “South” ends with Louisiana being the westernmost state.
Texas is essentially its own region.
New Mexico is the easternmost part of the Southwest.
Arkansas & Kentucky are in the South. Montana, Colorado, and Wyoming are in the West. Pennsylvania is in the Mid-Atlantic. West Virginia is an oddball: not really Mid-Atlantic, not really the South, and not really the Midwest.
All the other are in the Midwest, altho Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Minnesota are sometimes grouped together as the Great Lakes region.
I consider Arkansas, Missouri, and Texas to be part of the South based on their history of slavery. Kentucky is a mixed bag - in some ways it is Southern but I really consider it part of Appalachia along with West Virginia. There’s a cultural distinction between “rednecks” and “hillbillies” that I think is still important today. In addition, the South has had, and continues to have a large African-American population. Appalachia is mostly white and black people are relatively rare and may be considered outsiders (though they aren’t going to be shot at nowadays).
Appalachia overlaps with other regions, since it includes southeast Ohio (Midwest), most of Kentucky and Tennessee (the old South), and part of Pennsylvania (the northeast, or the Mid Atlantic). West Virginia is definitely all in Appalachia – I know because I’ve visited most of the counties of WV – but it doesn’t really fit with other regions. However, I’d put WV in the old South, even though it joined the north during the Civil War, because historically it was part of the slave state Virginia, and West Virginia and western Virginia (the part of Virginia along Interstate 81) are very similar parts of Appalachia. WV is not part of the Midwest.
I grew up in Kansas. I don’t think I’ve ever encountered someone from eastern Kansas who would not describe themselves as “Midwestern”. If you don’t allow the actual residents to define who/what they are, then I think you’re doing it wrong.
I honestly don’t know what to do with the Dakotas. But I find it curious that Montana has 1 vote, and Wyoming 2 votes. That’s bizarre.
It’s just people fuckin’ with the polls, I expect.
As for what to do with the Dakotas, Nebraska, Kansas, and Oklahoma, I don’t see what is difficult about this. They’re the Great Plains states.
As for Colorado, Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, Utah: Rocky Mountain States. (ETA: of course the eastern halves of MT, CO, and WY are more or less part of the great plains, but still…)
The West is Washington, Oregon, California, and Nevada.
Southwest is Arizona and New Mexico, and arguably Southern Nevada.
But I’m saying that the vast majority of Kansans would describe themselves as midwestern. Same with Nebraska. I have no idea about people from the Dakotas or Oklahoma, but I suspect the same. “Great Plains” is a geographic description that simply has no meaning for any demographic group. So for the purposes of the OP, the distinction needs to be made. Demographically, Kansas is absolutely 100% the Midwest.
From what I’ve heard, the number of states whose citizens consider themselves to be part of the midwest is larger than the number of states any one state would say were midwest states.
So maybe a dozen or more states think of themselves as in the midwest, but they’d all agree there were no more than eight or nine midwest states.
I only picked eight states, for example. Has anyone here has selected ten or more states? Where are you from?
I’m a native of Cleveland. I’ve had people from Indiana and Iowa tell me that they consider Cleveland to be part of the East Coast region. When I told my friend from Long Island that, she laughed.
Personally, I agree with my friend from Long Island. But that’s what makes the question so fun. I also consider Kansas and Nebraska part of the “Plains,” but that’s apparently not a distinction that Kansans recognize.
The problem is, the rust-belt isn’t really Northeast. It’s Great Lakes. Chicago, Detroit, Gary, Milwaukee, and even Duluth are part of it.
The Great Lakes rust belt, from Cleveland westward, is part of the Midwest. But so is the Corn Country in Illinois, Indiana, and Iowa, and the Corn Country and the Rust Belt don’t have much in common.
But if my Midwest has to follow state boundaries, I include IL, IN, WI, OH, MI, MN, IA, and MO. The eastern parts of the Dakotas, Nebraska, Kansas, and Oklahoma are midwestern, but those states also include the Great Plains which I like to put in the West. Because, Dodge City has to be Western!
Being on the west coast, I view the continental divide as the western border of the Midwest. To the west, there’s mountains. To the east, there’s flatland prairie which I don’t view as part of the West. Eastern portions of Montana, Wyoming and Colorado belong to the Midwest, both geographically and culturally, except for the legal marijuana in Colorado.
I chose Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Dakota and Wisconsin and I, myself, am from Minnesota.
I picked these same 12. Born in Nebraska, raised in Kansas, live in Indiana.
I’d include all the ones you mentioned. Those further west I see as “Plains States” and anything further east is something else.
Much of the Midwest is also the Great Lakes region and I’d potentially include Pennsylvania as part of that (western Penn anyway) so there’s some connection but I wouldn’t call Pennsylvania “Midwestern”.
I think the 100th Meridian (which bisects the plains states) is really the western border of the Midwest. It’s what was traditionally considered the border between the wet farmable East and the arid West. If you’re driving west across the plains states, it’s still definitely noticeable on the ground as the Midwestern corn fields give way to wheat fields and cattle ranches. The culture clearly changes as well, rather abruptly sometimes.
So, for purposes of this, the eastern halves of the Dakotas, Nebraska and Kansas are clearly Midwestern, but just as clearly the westernmost parts aren’t.
That is not at all my own personal experience, for what it’s worth. Kansans by and large have relatively little in common with people from Minnesota or Michigan (for example) unless they’re transplants.
In any case, of course geography has everything to do with it. You can say you think you’re a midwesterner, but if you live in Oregon, you’re not in the midwest. Calling the plains states midwest is silly.