From “Know Your Place: Helping White, Southern Evangelicals Cope with the End of The(ir) World” by Justin R. Phillips
The irony of the South is that while we strictly enforce all sorts of boundaries – physical and cultural, seen and unseen – we cannot agree on our geographic boundaries, a clear sign of our disembodiment. Demarcating “the South” by the Mason-Dixon line means Maryland/DC makes the cut. Neither Missouri nor Texas should be considered the South, in my opinion, even after the SEC expanded to include the Missouri Tigers and the Texas A&M Aggies into its ranks. Virginians are clearly Southerners with RIchmond as the capital of the former Confederacy, but honestly, I forget about them. West Virginia never entered my mind as a southern state until I moved to East Tennessee, which shares the landscape and Appalachian culture. Southerners disavow Florida until it is time for vacation. Beyond this border or that one, Southern snobbery emerges clearly when one state dishonors the reputation of the entire region. Most Southerners can attest to perusing the latest national statistics on education or public health, scanning for their home state’s rank on the ignominious list, and whispering a quiet “Thank God for Mississippi.” We stratify ourselves this way because we know our homeland is no monolith.