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Southern american culture
Values across culture
Southern american culture
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Many wonderful memories come to mind when I think about my life growing up in the South. Family barbeques, friendly people, and neighbors that will help you in a time of need are only a few of the good things about growing up in the South. Neighbors will knock on your door and ask to borrow some sugar. Friends will bring you homemade soup when you are sick. There is almost always a kind person to help you if you are stranded on the side of the road with a flat tire. The South if full of wonderful people. If there were ever a natural disaster such as a hurricane, the best place to be is in the South because we pull together and help one another in times of need. Southern culture has taught me many good values that I live by even today. Manners have always been very important to Southerners. We must respect our elders and say yes ma’am and no ma’am. Saying please and thank you are also extremely important. A child being disrespectful was not tolerated, at least not in the home where I was raised. Most of the childhood friends I had growing up were raised the same way. Everyone was expe...
John Shelton Reed says that the South embodies three different regions. Do all of these regions still exist? Or have they become incorporated into what is considered the South today? “The Three Souths,” by Reed, divides the South into three categories: Dixie, Southeast, and Cultural South. Southern agriculture and the growth of cotton established Dixie. The Southeast region is a metropolitan region that relies on commerce and communication to grow. The valued qualities, such as religion, sports, and manners are characteristic ways that set apart the Cultural South. According to Reed, Atlanta is the only place one can be in all three “Souths” at once. The daily life of a person in the South is very similar to the daily life of a person in another part of the country. Each work a normal workday but their use of free time sets them apart (Reed 17-27). The South of the past still exists today through traditional Southern values passed down in families and carried throughout the nation, yet the division of the South no longer exists as a three part entity, but as a growing, changing region.
Reconstruction was a hard time were a lot of bad decision took place but some god ones were put in effect like the three amendments, the Civil Rights bill and the Tenure of Office. Is a fact that I took a lot of steps for the country to become stabilized the situation in the South, due to all the corruption that was going on during the period. Also thanks to the violence that spread around the south prevented Reconstruction from leaving the country in better conditions. But what it did was set the playground for the many civil right movements to come.
The South did not seem to have a problem with the system of slavery. After all, why should they? it had been successful for over 200 years. Instead, they saw the North as a cruel society full of the treacheries caused by capitalism. They saw factory work as "wage slavery" while they viewed Southern slavery as "paternalistic" and "benevolent." Slavery, they contended, helped eliminate all class distinctions in Southern society. In the North, they saw, factory owners became rich while their employees lived in a state of poverty. Slavery was the great unifier of Southern society.
In order to come to terms with defeat and a look of failure in the eyes of God, Southerners mentally transformed their memories of the antebellum South. It became a superior civilization of great purity which had been cruelly brought down by the materialistic Yankees.
One of the most destructive forces that is destroying young black people in America today is the common cultures wicked image of what an realistic black person is supposed to look like and how that person is supposed to act. African Americans have been struggling for equality since the birth of this land, and the war is very strong. Have you ever been in a situation where you were stereotyped against?
In understanding how my worldview was subconsciously constructed by my life experiences from the past nineteen years, I had to first think about my roots. I was born in Tampa, Florida to a Puerto Rican mother and white father. They divorced when I was too young to remember, and while I did have a relationship with my dad, I lived with my mother and was raised in a tight-knit Puerto Rican family, often times being cared for by my grandmother. I was an only child for ten years which I’m sure has impacted my personality, and at ten I got a baby sister whom I am very close to. Growing up in Florida was interesting because I was half white and half Hispanic, which mirror the main demographics of Florida well, but I never quite fit in with either group because while I look very white and this is what people perceive me as, I was not raised by the white side of my family but rather the Puerto Rican side. Still, I don’t quite fit into this group either because I don’t speak perfect Spanish at home and most Hispanic people treat me as an “outgroup” and not one of them.
Slavery was an integral part of the South. Not only vital to the southern economy, the existence of slavery became ingrained in the southern culture and way of life. As such, there were a variety of arguments that the southerners posed to rationalize and defend their lifestyle of slavery.
Southern hospitality is the best in the world. People that live in the South are very nice and are always willing to help another person in any way they can. If someone is from out of town and needs directions to a certain place southerners will make sure he or she knows how to get there before he or she leaves them. Southerners are very polite. Every time we pass someone on the rode, we are going to wave at him or her. Towns in the South have fewer people and everyone knows everyone. The people in the South are nicer than anywhere else in the United States.
The South was built politically, culturally, and economically on slavery. In the Antebellum South, the most important factor was not wealth but power. One theme of the Antebellum South was white supremacy and slavery ensured this through the control of labor which also worked as a system of racial adjustment and social order. Slave ownership elevated the status of the wealthy planters and this allowed the institution of slavery to be accepted due to the paternalistic culture of the South. This paternalistic master-slave relationship was important for slaveholders to maintain their power. The wealthy planters set the tone for the Southern society which maintained this idea of white supremacy through the exercising of hegemony. This infatuation
...he South felt that the federal government was placing taxes and laws that unfairly treated the South. The South also believed that they, as a state, had the right to secede from the union if they pleased.
Growing up on the south side of Chicago in the roughest neighborhood in the city I learned a lot from others and just observing my surroundings. At times, I would always think to myself my situation could always be worse than it was, and that there is always someone who is doing worst off than me. But my situation turned from being in a bad position to being in a position where my mother would come to lose her mother and our home that we had been living in, all in the same year. After losing her mother and bother my mom lost herself in her emotions and shut down on everyone and with that came the loss of a home for me and my siblings and her job. Shortly after my mom began to go back to church and so did we. It was the first time in a log time that we had attended church and it played a big part in a learning experience for me and my siblings. Through the days that came to pass going to church sparked a desire of wanting to help others who had or are struggling to get by. My mentor, Pastor, and teacher deserves appreciation for helping my mother through a hard time and keeping me and my siblings active in a positive manor.
In 1831, Northern public opinion began to shift dramatically from passive abolition to a more unrelenting abolition movement. New abolitionists, propelled by William Lloyd Garrison and his publication of The Liberator, used heated rhetoric that called for an immediate end to slavery. In tandem with thought provoking memoirs, written by slaves who escaped servitude, Northern society began to perceive slavery as the ultimate sin. One such memoir, Twelve Years a Slave, written by Solomon Northup, vividly describes the horrors and brutality many enslaved men, women, and children were subjected to. Northup described the heartland of the Deep South, Bayou Boeuf, Louisiana as a region that made it pure folly for those enslaved to attempt to escape bondage, generated a plantation society built upon cash crop production, which galvanized their position in plantation society, and introduced a unique social and political dynamic between slaves and non-white neighbors.
Historically the south is slow to change. Maybe it is the easy going gentile way of life, or maybe change brings the fear of the unknown. Slavery to segregation to racism to finally acceptance of people who didn’t have a choice in birth. Like a diamond in the rough
Slavery in America brought about a successful south but also proved to be one of the most terrible things done by humans to humans. Slavery became a way of life in early America. Eight out of the first twelve presidents owned slaves. People in the south benefited from slaves the most. Harvesting those huge cotton fields took many hands. That’s were the slaves became key to the success of the south. Slaves were predominately black Africans. Africans made up the majority but they were not the only ones. Native Americans and even English indentured servants made up the rest of the people put into slavery.
The Civil War was a time of great tension and political disunion in American history. It is said that almost 620,000 soldiers died from fighting, starvation and harsh climates. There are many advantages and disadvantages that the north and south each had that helped and hurt them as well. The North had more than half of the rail lines going through the nation, which allowed for easy access for transportation of goods and supplies. They had plenty of citizens to grow crops and send supplies to the soldiers, and they also had a large navy which gave them an advantage on the water. On the other hand, they had to travel thousands of miles to march to push the south back into union territory while fighting in unfamiliar territory. The South’s advantages