North and South Carolinians often call themselves Carolinians, likewise with Dakotans. Do West Virginians ever call themselves Virginians?
West Virginians
- Thread starter hammerklavier
- Start date
You may get a better response from someone else on the board, but my daughter-in-law is from West Virginia. She and her family refer to themselves as Mountaineers. I think from some of the things said about Virginia there, the wouldn't take kindly to Virginian as a descriptor.
From Maine - where the smart ones live and are Mainers, the crazy ones leave and become maniacs. (paraphrased from Ed Muskie)
From Maine - where the smart ones live and are Mainers, the crazy ones leave and become maniacs. (paraphrased from Ed Muskie)
I have four friends born in WVA and never have they referred to themselves in that matter. On the other hand I was born in NC and have never referred to myself as a Carolinian. Southern Boy, Rebel, yes but never as a Carolinian.
NOOOO. They are not Virginians, no matter what they tell you, they are secessionist...
Just to pile on - we're so sensitive about the fact that some folks don't know we're actually a separate state that "Virginians" would never fly. Mountaineers is right.
This is funny, this just came up the other night. Someone called someone else from WV a "Virginian" and my hubby (who hails from WV) nearly had a heart attack. He gave me geography and history lessons (despite the fact that I was totally innocent in all this!) and the whole bit. Yeah, he's a Mountaineer through and through.
Around Miles City, Montana, and into the territories on east, there's two handles for the Dakotans, if you don’t want trouble and the smell of gun smoke:
They’re either NoDaks or SoDaks. Never mix ‘em up.
Chase, with apologies to Matt Dillon and his old radio intro to Gunsmoke
I was thinking more of in local media: Do local radio stations, etc ever try to use one word to lump the two states together?
Ah....
No.
If they're on the border they might use a term like the Shenandoah area... or the Ohio River Valley Area... or Eastern Panhandle area (including Maryland and parts of Virginia) but there is no "ArklaTex" type word.
Some West Virginian's might consider:
Ohioians as Buckeyes,
Marylander's as Turtles,
Pennsylvanian's as Yankee's
Kentucky'ian's as cousins...
and just not ever mention Virginians...
I'm somewhat kidding -not that I ever would use any kind of blanket generalization like that at all- but West Virginia's often feel very slighted. The state has been forgotten on maps, many people don't know it's not a part of Virginia. and being completely overlooked gets annoying after awhile...
So, No, they would not mix the two together if they could help it.