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5:12:00 AM EDT
Feeling Quiet
I am Urban Appalachian
This weekend is the Appalachian festival in Cincinnati. I had planned on attending, but Tabby got run over by a friend on a bike and is all scraped up. I imagine she will be staying home tomorrow. I will be staying with her, of course.
These links below are about the "invisible minority," in this area---being Urban Appalachian.
There is now even a term called "Affrilachian" for Black Appalachians.
http://www.otterbein.edu/resources/library/cmbook/subappal.htm
We are culturally very different from mainstream America, and not just in the stupid stereotypical Beverly Hillbilly ways (who were from Texas, anyway.)
http://ag.ky.gov/victims/conf/c3.pdf is the best succinct explanation of what it is to be Appalachian.
By the way, it is pronounced "Ap-pa-latch-chun" NOT Ap-pa-lay-che-an. I've had non-Appalachian people tell me that it is not the way to pronounce our mountains. Excuse me, they are OUR mountains and we do know how to pronounce the name of our home.
:::slightly ruffled fur here::
Unlike the stereotype of being incestuous, we have no higher incidence of incest than the rest of America. The stereotype probably started as a result of first cousin marriage being the preferred partner for many Native Peoples who lived in the Mountains, and also of the fact that many people married their extended cousins. Now, unlike most Americans, we actually KNOW who our distant extended family is (or, as we would say it, who we are kin to.) That is the Scottish influence on Appalachian culture. When I went to my great Grandmother's funeral, I met some of my great grandfather's cousins who were related through THEIR great grandfathers....this is very, very distantly related. But we are kin.
Appalachians are not lazy, as is illustrated by the stereotypical picture of a drunken hillbilly laying on his porch with a jug of moonshine.
We do place a great deal of value on not just working all the time, but finding time to sing, tell stories, play, dance and pray. I thought the movie Songcatcher showed this aspect of our culture beautifully. But the average Appalachian farmer or coal miner worked very hard. The women worked even harder.
BTW, Songcatcher is a wonderful if slightly condescending movie, but I highly doubt the lesbian Flatlanders would have been burned out. I have lots of "maiden Aunts" in my extended family. If they live with another Maiden Aunt, no one thinks much of it. Many were midwives.
Appalachians served on both sides of the Civil War, although slave ownership was not common. Appalachians were too poor to own slaves, and also we had the idea that if you owned enough land you couldn't work it yourself, you had too much land. The Civil War was devastating in the mountains, much more of a personal war than in the flatlands. Neighbors literally killed neighbors. It was guerilla warfare, much like what happened in Bosnia. You knew the man who shot you, arrested you, or stole from your farm. When the war was over, the old resentments did not fade easily.
The negative aspects of our culture are a result of poverty, not of the culture itself. It is also a result of our cultural values not being respected by mainstream America. The same is true of Native People's, whose high rate of alcoholism is a result of their culture being devalued, being very poor, and also having a genetic weakness with alcohol. (The same can be said of us....having a great many Irish ancestors...and most of us have Cherokee ancestors.)
Appalachia can be very violent, however. There are fewer cultural prohibitions against violence.
The real traditional ways are disappearing rapidly with the influence of television. The difference between my great grandmother's accent and the accents of kids nowadays isremarkable. I don't sound Appalachian, unless I am talking to another Appalachian. I can "pass" for non-mountain.
I am only Appalachian genetically on my mother's side. Like me, my mother married a non-Appalachian man. Culturally, I identify much more with the Appalachian side of the family than my paternal Irish Catholic side. I have no contact with my father's family.
Appalachian women are Very Strong. We are very independent. We usually run our families, even if we let the men think they do.
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I found this post very interesting and I went to check out the appalachianwomen site. Very nice site. It is warm and comfortable. I had know idea that all these years I was pronoucing Applachian incorrectly. Well, being a Damn Yankee....
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Oh, they were real, all right. In fact, there were laws passed to protect them and give them the right to vote, even though they weren't white. It is another example of outlanders discounting the handed down wisdom of our culture. There are too many clean, clear descriptions of them...they just intermarried and were absorbed into the general population. During the Civil War they fought for the Union, and many of them mafe their way to Kentucky to enlist. Their mountain range was considered to be impassable to any one.
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Hope you're having a great Mother's Day. Thank you for bringing light to the "Appa-latch-uns." I lived in Eastern KY for ten years and I really learned a lot. I miss it, actually. I took Appalachian Culture in college and found it to be interesting too. (my professor tried to tell the class Mulungeons weren't real--my best friend is from WA and she thinks they were) I see some of the culture show up in my first three children since they lived there in formative years, my oldest daughter most. Thanks for the links, too. I will definitely check them out.
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Now you know why Tabby is so strong. Shes just like you Happy mothers day.
4/4/06 5:32 PM