Which of these states do you consider Southern?

[muon2]

^ Of course.  Southern Illinois is *The South* in most senses of the word, but the fact is, it's in Illinois, which isn't part of the South.  I know that sounds ridiculous, and if I were making a county map of where "The South" is, I would include parts of several states, but I think if you are doing a map of which WHOLE states fit into the South, you would have to include WV, as most measures include it.

Here was my county level map of the South that I posted in 2013. It splits a number of states in the poll, but only KY and WV have a majority of their population in the South based on this division. MO has a majority of its counties in the region, but not a majority of its population since both KC and St Louis are outside it.

Only east TX is in this split of the South with DFW and San Antonio outside it. Houston is outside, too, but it is on the border and could go either way. Even if metro Houston is added it still would leave most of the state outside.

The last of my reworked states using the Nine Nations of North America are those in Dixie and the Islands. South Florida was part of the Caribbean-based Islands and not in Dixie, and I followed the division from the book. However, in the 30 years since publication one could make the case for central FL to go there, too. Even the Cajun area of south LA could move to the Islands, with a culture unlike most of Dixie as Garreau noted in the book.

Over all there is enough population for 13 states, but the need for some smaller states in other regions drop the number of states in these two nations to 12. Within Dixie the states follow the geography of the Appalachians and Coastal Plain. If there were an additional state it would likely be one that linked Charleston to Jacksonville, leaving central FL and the deep South.

States (and principal city) with 2010 populations in millions are:

Dixie
Chitimacha (New Orleans) 3.7
Caddo (Shreveport) 3.3
Osage (Little Rock) 4.7
Tunica (Memphis) 4.3
Chickasaw (Atlanta) 9.3
Shawnee (Nashville, Louisville) 6.8
Cherokee (Knoxville) 8.8
Powhatan (Virginia Beach) 7.5
Catawba (Charlotte) 7.0
Muskogee (Montgomery, Augusta) 9.1
Seminole (Jacksonville) 9.8

Islands
Colusa (Miami) 7.1

[muon2]

I would include the Dallas, Houston, Oklahoma City, St. Louis, and maybe Kansas City metro areas in the South.

The first three I could definitely fathom arguments for, but St. Louis and Kansas City?

I get to St Louis fairly often, and it's no more Southern than Indianapolis. Both feel a lot more like Chicago than Atlanta.

There's virtually no way one can consider KC to be anything other than a Great Plains city like Omaha. My family lives in KC and I know it pretty well. From my visits to OKC you could put it in the Plains category or link it with western cities like Denver, but I didn't find it to be Southern at all. I lived and worked in Dallas as recently as the late 1980's and unless it has changed a lot in 30 years I lump it with OKC as either a Plains or Western city, but not in the South.

[muon2]

I would include the Dallas, Houston, Oklahoma City, St. Louis, and maybe Kansas City metro areas in the South.

The first three I could definitely fathom arguments for, but St. Louis and Kansas City?

I get to St Louis fairly often, and it's no more Southern than Indianapolis. Both feel a lot more like Chicago than Atlanta.

There's virtually no way one can consider KC to be anything other than a Great Plains city like Omaha. My family lives in KC and I know it pretty well. From my visits to OKC you could put it in the Plains category or link it with western cities like Denver, but I didn't find it to be Southern at all. I lived and worked in Dallas as recently as the late 1980's and unless it has changed a lot in 30 years I lump it with OKC as either a Plains or Western city, but not in the South.

I'll concede Kansas City, I guess.  But, almost all of the people I know from OKC, DFW, Houston, and STL are very Southern culturally.  I would bet a suburban area in Dallas would have a ton in common with a suburban area of Atlanta or Nashville.

Then your use of Southern is very broad. If St Louis is in that category, so must Indy, Cinci and other towns in Middle America that got significant migration from the South during various stages of their growth in the 19th and early 20th century. I hope it's not just about liking country music, since based on my family that would apply to rural areas of IA, too.

[muon2]

Only Texas.  I define the South as the states that seceded.

I get the logic behind this, but I imagine people in the Midwest or Northeast would be absolutely perplexed if you included WV in their regions...  Doesn't fit at all.

... or KY. It would be just as weird to have a two state Appalachian region of just WV and KY. Though at least with WV the northern part as far south as US 50 is fairly similar to western PA and southwestern NY, and the WV panhandle fits with the MD panhandle.

[muon2]

Texas, Kentucky, and West Virginia are Southern without question—all of Texas, Kentucky (sans perhaps the Cincy burbs) and West Virginia (sans Wheeling) fit right (that said, my family's mostly from the Southern-est parts of both WV and KY, so that colors my perception of the states). Oklahoma’s a trickier case, but I’m inclined towards “no” just because I feel Tulsa and OKC fit better with Kansas than Texas, but the presence of Little Dixie makes it probably the trickiest state to place. Missouri is more easy to call Midwestern, because the bulk of the state is Midwestern and only some small cities towards the southern edge of the state are really that Southern. Delaware is entirely Northeastern, and most of Maryland is too. You could make a case for Salisbury I guess.

How is San Antonio and the Rio Grande valley southern? It's culturally much more like the other southwestern states.