i agree with your observations of STL. i do think it's more of the "riverboat" thing, like i want to lump it in with memphis or louisville or cincy in the "river towns" category.warwickland wrote:St. Louis is weird, it could be the "river city" feel. I mean the northern midwest doesn't have any real river cities - maybe St. Paul - to compare to. KC feels like it has threads of southern/or more accurately rural southernish plains to me, interestingly - when I talk to people on the phone in our KC office some of the people have a very light twang. On the other hand, around st. louis the nothern vowel shift mixes with a bit of a drawl in some places (say the more southern part of the metro) in a weird way too, and kind of a light "riverboat southern" thing in some places maybe (vs more "cowboy" for kc). I could be really reaching here, I don't know. But I do feel like St. Louis is an outlier of an (for lack of a better term) "urban great lakes" feel in places as well.chrizow wrote:
i would even say that STL feels more "southern" to me than KC for whatever reason.
i was talking to a friend recently (who grew up in south City) about south city and near south county, which feels like new jersey or something to me, esp. nearer to the river. and not just new jersey, but a very specific, bruce springsteen-esque vision of new jersey: tightly-packed homes, american flags, baseball diamonds, and smokestacks on the horizon. where old-school union men begrudgingly rub elbows with immigrants. northeast KC is the closest analogue in this area, but i feel like south city is less stabby than northeast. south broadway is a fairly amazing tableau of brick buildings, faded Budweiser signs, and earnest, hardworking folks.
STL is old enough that it really is its own thing. i don't get a "great lakes" feel from it at all, other than the industrial feel - which again i would put more in the category of baltimore or NJ or "mid-east" river towns than anything else. the "vowel shift" speech island thing is interesting, and noticeable among longtime families from the interior STL area, but it seems like the center of gravity has shifted enough in that metro area that you're just as likely to run into generically-midwestern st. charles folks vs. old-line, blue-blood nasally folks.
i don't think KC has a single "southern" strand in its DNA, but it is inextricably bound with "rural plains" dialects and mannerisms. i feel like every year i notice more and more how KC "looks west" rather than north, south, or east.