I am heading to the new world trade center Occulus for a meeting today. When I stepped onto it I can’t believe how gorgeous it is. How big and expanse, how church like when you look at the ceiling and how American when you look at all the fancy stores that populated its walkways.
I shake my head. Reverence and Consumerism what a clearly American trait.
Seeing the people pour out of the Path Train into the World Trade Center Occulus got me thinking about Managing Cultural Differences internationally and our much divided America. How can we move into an interconnected future, after the political process we just went through in which we fatly turned our backs into international connection and chose isolationism over internationalism. Is internationalism even a word?
The fact is that in order to move forward in the world, we have to understand the cultures that make up the United States.
It has been said that the Northerners are in their own bubble, while New Yorkers thinks the Midwest is in theirs, while everyone thinks the West is made of Hollywood Liberals bent on the destruction of everyone’s values.
But the reality is that there are no bubbles. There are however different cultures and according to Colin Woodward in his in his fourth book, “American Nations: A History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures in North America,” The United States is made up of 11 different countries.
Every one of these countries that make up the Union, have completely different cultures, and need to be communicated in completely different ways. This is the reason why America is divided politically, and ideologically.
According to Woodward these are the countries of America:
Yankeedom – wrapping the North of New York State and into Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin; Yankeedom is liberal, though not the most liberal. They are artistically driven, and calm, Yankeedom prizes education and intellectual achievement more than any other country within America.
New Netherland – New Jersey, New York, they have an independent, fast talking, fast moving streak. Never on time. This is the America that gets represented in movies like Spiderman and shows like Sex and the City. Because it has a hold on art, through Broadway, and develops the most writers in the country, it also over represents itself in the national media. They are also incredibly confrontational and blunt.
The Midlands – parts of New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Missouri, Iowa, Kansas, and Nebraska, make up the Midlands. The most independent minded states, do not look kindly on government regulation. The Midlands have a strong Germanic influence, so if you want to know them look at the cultural similarities between Germany and America.
Tidewater – The Tidewater region is a geographic area of southeast Virginia and northeastern North Carolina, part of the Atlantic coastal plain. Tidewater started as a feudal society, protectors of the middle border, and the gateway to north and south, they are incredibly disciplined, but have placed too much emphasis to tradition, authority and the past. This makes Tidewater the keeps of American history, but also some of its darkest prejudices.
Greater Appalachia – Within Greater Appalachia are parts of Kentucky, Tennessee, West Virginia, Arkansas, Missouri, Oklahoma, Indiana, Illinois, and Texas. Very suspicious of the countries of Yankeedom and New Netherland, “Woodard says Appalachia values personal sovereignty and individual liberty and is “intensely suspicious of lowland aristocrats and Yankee social engineers alike.” (Speiser, 2015)
Deep South – “Alabama, Florida, Mississippi, Texas, Georgia, and South Carolina are all part of the Deep South.” (Speiser, 2015) All make up the Deep South, this country in America establish by British slave lords that immigrated from Barbados. The British rigidity of social structures have survived here, they value their liberty, and they value their tradition. This is a country “within America” that values its elders and really differentiates itself from the rest of its Union, grits and all.
El Norte – El Norte is a place of complexity, deeply rooted in its Spanish traditions and culture, they still mistrust the Spanish speakers south of them. They value their traditions are slow to get to work, but quick to get to sporting events, they feel very separated from the rest of the country; so they pay the rest of the country very little mind.
The Left Coast – was settled by many from Yankeedom and New Netherland. This is why the often share so many cultural similarities, but with a ton more plastic surgery. The left coast is very precise in their fashion; from shoes to politics, they like to hold the most overall popular opinion.
The Far West – Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Utah, Washington, Oregon, North Dakota, South Dakota, Colorado, Nevada, Utah, Nebraska, Kansas, Arizona, New Mexico, were also settled by investments from Yankeedom and New Netherland, but somewhere along the lines they evolutioned differently and now hold themselves in contempt of each other.
New France – While New York and California advertised themselves as the most liberal of “countries within America” there is no more liberal place in the world than the very French New Orleans. Food, living a slow appreciative life, sex and superstition all build the cultural values of New France.
And the most important of all The First Nation. They hold the entire country all these other countries formed in, even though there’s very few of them left. They are the last remnants of the nation that was lost when all these other countries formed; however, they have affected behavior throughout the entire region. That sense of informality that is very American are rooted in The First Nation. We are often times as friendly and as open hearted as the first people to welcome us.
I understand that this post has to deal with the international management of cultural differences, but I also think before we can communicate with others, we have to accept that what Woodward’s thesis is correct. America is not one single country, it is many of them, bundled together into a massive business venture. We stay together because it is ultimately more economically safe, and while we started as one country, under god. It has become evident that we are not. We have to learn to communicate with each region of America as the very different country that it is.
or at the very least accept our differences and in the words of a great American patriot say.
“Do I contradict myself? Very well, then I contradict myself, I am large, I contain multitudes.” – Walt Whitman
References
Speiser, M. (2015). This map shows the US really has 11 separate ‘nations’ with entirely different cultures. Business Insider. Retrieved from http://www.businessinsider.com/the-11-nations-of-the-united-states-2015-7
This blog’s idea was inspired by the World Trade Center Occulus, a beautiful, divided work of art.
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