Dixie

Dixie, also known as Dixieland and Dixie Land, is a nickname for the southern United States. While there is no official definition of this region, or the extent of the area it covers, most definitions include the U.S. states that seceded and comprised the Confederate States of America.[4]

As a definite geographic location within the United States, Dixie is usually defined as the eleven Southern states that seceded from the United States of America in late 1860 and early 1861 to form the new Confederate States of America, listed below in order of secession:

Although Maryland is rarely considered part of Dixie today,[5][6] it is below the Mason–Dixon line. If the origin of the term Dixie is accepted as referring to the region south and west of that line, Maryland lies within Dixie. It can be argued that Maryland was part of Dixie before the Civil War, especially culturally.[7] In this sense, it would remain so into the 1970s, until an influx of people from the Northeast made the state and its culture significantly less Southern (especially Baltimore and the suburbs of Washington, D.C.).[6] However, the southern part of the state and Maryland’s Eastern Shore still remain, culturally, Southern and continue to share many common traits associated with Dixie.[8]

As for the nation's capital itself: "Whether Washington should be defined as a Southern city has been a debate since the Civil War, when it was the seat of the Northern government but a hotbed of rebel sympathy," the Washington Post wrote in 2011. "The Washington area's 'Southernness' has fallen into steep decline, part of a trend away from strongly held regional identities. In the 150th anniversary year of the start of the Civil War, the region at the heart of the conflict has little left of its historic bond with Dixie."[9]

Similarly, the character of Florida—a state which seceded in 1861 and was a member of the Confederacy—lost much of its Southern culture in the 20th century due to a great influx of Northerners, in particular New Yorkers.[10] The Florida panhandle is still arguably culturally part of Dixie; it includes a county named Dixie.

The location and boundaries of Dixie have, over time, become increasingly subjective and mercurial.[11] Today, it is most often associated with parts of the Southern United States where traditions and legacies of the Confederate era and the antebellum South live most strongly.[5] The concept of Dixie as the location of a certain set of cultural assumptions, mindsets, and traditions was explored in the book The Nine Nations of North America (1981).[12]

According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the origin of this nickname remains obscure. The most common theories, according to A Dictionary of Americanisms on Historical Principles (1951) by Mitford M. Mathews include the following:

In terms of self-identification and appeal, the popularity of the word Dixie is declining. A 1976 study revealed that in an area of the South covering about 350,000 square miles (910,000 km2) (all of Mississippi and Alabama; almost all of Georgia, Tennessee, and South Carolina; and around half of Louisiana, Arkansas, Kentucky, North Carolina, and Florida) the term reached 25% of the popularity of the term American in names of commercial business entities.[19] A 1999 analysis found that between 1976 and 1999, in 19% of U.S. cities sampled, there was an increase of relative use of Dixie; in 48% of cities sampled, there was a decline; and no change was recorded in 32% of cities.[20] A 2010 study found that in the course of 40 years, the area in question shrank to just 40,000 square miles (100,000 km2), to the area where Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida meet.[21] In 1976, at about 600,000 square miles (1,600,000 km2)[b] Dixie reached at least 6% of the popularity of American; in 2010, the corresponding area was a 500,000-square-mile (1,300,000 km2).[22][clarification needed ]

Sociologists Christopher A. Cooper and H. Gibbs Knotts surveyed all 50 states and the District of Columbia for the use of the words "Dixie" and "Southern" in business names. Unlike the survey conducted by John Shelton Reed, who concentrated on cities, Cooper & Knotts surveyed entire states using modern technology rather than the physical search of telephone books that were available to Reed. They excluded the chain Winn-Dixie from the study. Their data, within these parameters, resulted in a 13 state region which they divided into three tiers, from high to low scores. In the first tier were Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi. The second tier was Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee. The third tier was Florida, Oklahoma, Virginia, and West Virginia.[23]

In the 21st century, some entities whose names contained "Dixie" chose to remove it from those names to cease glorifying the Confederacy; these entities include Dolly Parton's Dixie Stampede,[24] the music group Dixie Chicks,[25] and the Dixie Classic Fair. The board of trustees at Dixie State University in Utah voted unanimously in December 2020 to change the name of the institution.[26]

Coordinates: 34°N 86°W  /  34°N 86°W  / 34; -86