So I was having a conversation with my partner who is from one of the Northern Midwest states. She claimed that Kansas, where I am from, is not Midwest. She said that there was a set group of Midwest states and that Kansas was Great Plains. Several other people from the state agreed with them.
So, first, is Kansas in the Midwest?
Secondly, on a more serious question, what makes a region? The census defines Kansas as in the Midwest but is that the end all? Or is it conventional wisdom? Or, is it based by feel? To me the state Iām in now and Kansas feel very similar, like they have the same vibe. I also jokingly suggested that if you heard a country song and 75% of the time it could take place in your state, itās the Midwest. (Which would exclude most of the Great Lakes Midwest states.)
EDIT: But for real, as a Marylander, this is a question I think about constantly. There are parts of Maryland that feel like Maine or New Hampshire as there are parts that feel like Georgia or Tennessee. I suppose itās commonly referred to the as the Mid-Atlantic, but what characteristics does that even entail?
Being a member of the clueless northeastern coastal elite, I was not aware that the Midwest and Great Plains were recognizably different regions.
On my end though, no one better call New York a part of New England. Pennsylvania as well. New England has a hard cutoff at the western edge of Vermont/Massachusetts/Connecticut. Why? No one knows.
(Actually Iām sure thereās probably a reason and someone does know, but I donāt.)
in pittsburgh weāre either the most western part of the mid atlantic region, most eastern part of the midwest, most south eastern part of the great lakes, most south western part of the northeast, or most northern part of Appalachia. its a mess
tbh great plains is probably a subregion of the midwest since like ohio and kansas dont exactly have a ton in common
The Northeast looks like an outline of Rex from Toy Story. But for real, why canāt some āGreat Plainsā states also just be considered the Midwest but not all Midwest states are necessarily Great Plains states? Connecticut still gets lumped in with New England even though two-thirds of it is really an extension of New York.
Interestingā¦Iāve honestly not heard this before in relation to Kansas. It is something Iāve thought about before, but for me itās usually in regards to the South and Florida. I lived in Florida for 20 years, and while itās definitely about the farthest south you could go in the US, I never really consider it as The South. Ya know, like Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia āSouthā. And it seems to be a thing Iāve heard from other Floridians as well. If you pass through Northeast Florida, you donāt get much of a āSouthernā vibe, and Southern Florida (Miami, going toward the Florida Keys), itās more of a Hispanic and Caribbean feel.
I moved to Georgia a year and a half ago, and the area around where I live feels more āSouthernā than just about anywhere in Florida Iāve ever beenā¦weird stuff.
Iād say Kansas is in the Midwest but Iāve also never really been to the midwest and donāt know anyone from there. Iāve known more people from Colorado or Utah or Nevada or NY, living in the south, despite the midwest being closer. I guess to me, if the state starts west of the Mississippi River, itās in the midwest. I only just found out recently that people from Arkansas often consider it part of the south, and Iād personally consider it part of the midwest prior to learning that.
So I guess for me its a cultural thing and what most people there consider it to be. Lots of people in North Carolina donāt consider Virginia part of the south, but (almost) everyone in Virginia considers it part of the south and lots of them would start a fight if someone implied otherwise. Some states I feel are opt-in based on the individual. Like, you can choose to be southern or not if youāre from West Virginia.
I think what Iām finding from my talking with people is that thereās the capital āMā Midwest, otherwise known as the Great Lakes, and it feels like those people donāt accept those from the Great Plains as Midwestern, but most everyone else, including those from the Great Plains, think theyāre from the Midwest.
As someone who grew up in the Great Plains, itās amusing that some people donāt consider us Midwest even though we are uhhhhh more west than them? Like look at a map people.
The current regional system should be abolished and replaced with a French-Revolution-style rationalized system under which Kansas would belong to the āzonecentraleā
That is wild. I grew up on the West Coast and honestly, Idaho felt more like a neighborhood than a state. Could be because its landscape is so similar to Washington, Oregon, and Utah, you often wonāt know youāre in Idaho until the license plates change.
Great Plains and Midwest arenāt mutually exclusive. Kansas, Nebraska, North, and South Dakota are midwestern. Kansas, Nebraska, North, and South Dakota are all Great Plains along with most of Montana, Wyoming, and Texas, and a small slice of Colorado. Evidence I present in favor of Kansas being midwestern culturally is Dan Rychert of Giantbomb.
Coloradan here. Iāve been to Topeka a lot, and suburban Kansas shares a lot more culturally with Ohio or Indiana than it does with the Colorado Front Range. Iād personally but the westernmost Midwest boundary somewhere near the easternmost edge of Wyoming and Montana, if you were to extend that south through Colorado. Great Plains seems more like a sub-region than a fully different entity.
I grew up in Kansas, I lived in Kansas for the first twenty-three years of my life, I graduated from the University of Kansas, and I can confirm that it is not in the Midwest, or the Great Plains, or the South, or wherever. It is in Hell.
This tracks with my experience. I grew up in Wisconsin, and my spouse grew up in Kansas. I grew up thinking Wisconsin, Illinois, Minnesota, Iowa, Michigan, Indiana, and Ohio were āthe Midwestā and anywhere west or south of their was either āGreat Plainsā or āThe Southā. My spouseā¦disagrees with thatā¦and for the most part, Iāve come around to it, with us now living in one of those āGreat Plainsā states (Nebraska), that still feels distinctly āMidwestā.
Iād say all this stuff is pretty much arbitrary nonsense, because Iāve lived in Miami my whole life, which I absolutely wouldnāt classify as āThe Southā and youād have to drive several hours north before you hit somewhere that would fit the typical idea of the South.
Despite its position farther south of and historical membership with the states that are usually regarded as āThe South,ā most northeasterners I know consider Florida a distinctly separate entity to the rest of the South, and not at all part of the āDeep South.ā
Basically, agreed, itās all weird and arbitrary.
I grew up in Nebraska (Just North of Kansas for ya coastal elites) and always considered it part of the Midwest (and concur with others here that great plains is a sub-section of the Midwest). I went to a great show at the BSA Space one time that had this nice break down of the midwest into agrarian midwest and industrial midwest (ND,SD,NE,IO,MN,KS,OK,MO and IL,MI,OH,IN, WI, or the great plains and the great lakes regions), which feels correct from an economic perspective.
I always thought there were five regions? East Coast, West Coast, Midwest, South, and Mountain (CO,MT,ID,WY). TX and FL are definitely separate entities
Just to bring in a non-US view here about regions and borders:
Norway is in the process of readjusting our counties, for the first time since the 70s, mostly combining into larger regions. The western shores of Norway ā around four counties ā has, informally, been called āVestlandetā (The western land, definite singular), a bit like the US calling the area āThe Midwestā or āThe Southā.
Now two counties are combining, and formally calling the area āVestlandā (West land, indefinite singular), which has caused a lot of angry people. Imagine the Dakotas and Minnesota joining up and formally calling the state āMidwestā. In Norway, both north and south of the āVestlandā border, people have considered themselves āVestlendingerā (People from The Western lands).
Can the nomenclature of the old informal borders still a thing, or would you say that those names are dead now?
