[Sigia-l] The Nine Nations of North America

[Ben Henick]

On Sat, 20 Apr 2002, Lucie Melahn wrote:

> Ben,
> 
> I didn't intend to present this as a scholarly work.

I know.  That's why I labelled it a general rant.  I did not intend 
anything personal by it.

"Popular" works are known for presenting points of view that would never 
occur to an academic author/researcher, and also cut to the chase where an 
academic would be rather tiresome in achieving standards of scholarship 
necessary to successful peer review.  (cf. Web Pages That Suck)

However, those same popular works perpetuate misconceptions and sometimes 
urban legend, which is why I ranted.

> But there are some good things about the book. I do think it's legitimate 
> to talk about cultural regions. Are there nine? More? Less? We could argue 
> about it for weeks. But I think the book is a starting point. For one thing 
> it's the only book I know that talks about subregions in North America. If 
> someone knows a better one I'd love to know about it.

To the best of my knowledge, no such creature exists outside of research 
of frontier history.

On this we seem to agree more than anything else...

> I have no problem with ignoring political boundaries to describe cultural 
> geography.

Neither do I; I thought that was inferred in my previous message.  At 
times it is vitally necessary to ignore political boundaries if you're 
going to examine cultural geography (because diffusion has this bizarre 
tendency to ignore political boundaries, hehe).

> As a matter of fact, I am of French Canadian origin (see my first name), 
> grew up in New England, and have visited the Maritimes many times. I have 
> no problem putting the Maritimes in New England. The cultural links are 
> indeed very strong, in my view.

You are far better equipped to speak for this than I; case closed.

> I have a much bigger problem putting agricultural Upstate New York as part 
> of the "Foundry" with a cultural capital of Chicago. I lived there for over 
> five years, and we had no cultural relationship with Chicago that I ever 
> detected. I'm sure everyone on this list will also have a problem with at 
> least one area of the map.

...Which is why I posted my rant, and brought in the author-vs.-reader 
angle that I did.

What got me was the lumping of practically all of Western Canada (and 
a good part of Ontario) into the the "Empty Quarter" and the failure to 
include more of New Mexico in the area labelled "Mex-America" - these 
rather apalling displays of ignorance are what soured me on the viability 
of the book as presented.

Even the site referenced makes it clear that the scholarship of the book 
leaves a great deal to be desired.

Whatever the case, this presentation definitely brings home the need to 
know your audience.  Whether we realize it or not, we are trapped at times 
by our local perceptions, and risk inflicting those on our audience while 
on a project.  Yes, that's a lame effort to keep the thread on-topic.


-- 
Ben Henick
Web Author At-Large              Managing Editor
http://www.io.com/persist1/      http://www.digital-web.com/
persist1 at io.com                  bmh at digital-web.com
--
"Are you pondering what I'm pondering, Pinky?"
"I think so, Brain, but... (snort) no, no, it's too stupid."
"We will disguise ourselves as a cow."
"Oh!" (giggles) "That was it exactly!"