Regions of the United States

The United States of America is a vast country: third largest in land and population. Local cultures within the United States have been influenced by factors like the identity of nearby peoples, particular economic strengths of each area, and immigration patterns. The country's long, broad history has led to specific regional as well as national identities. Some regions, such as New England, are as old as the nation itself. Other regions, such as Silicon Valley, are thoroughly modern.

This text explores regionalization patterns of the United States, focusing on the forces that led to particular separations. It is a book about borderlands and geographic identity.

What is a region?

A geographic region is some portion of a larger geographic entity. Region boundaries may be artificial, political, and precise, but more often they are blurry and ill-defined. In The Rise of the Region State, Kenichi Ohmae writes that the "boundaries of the region state are not imposed by political fiat. ... They follow, rather than precede, real flows of human activity, creating nothing new but ratifying existing patterns manifest in countless individual decisions. They represent no threat to the political borders of any nation, and they have no call on any taxpayer's money to finance military forces to defend such borders."

Regionalization forces

• Culture, language, faith, race and ethnicity
• Economics, agriculture and industry
• Natural geography, ecology and weather