While waiting for the thrice-annual meeting of the University Park Community Council to begin, I figured I'd do a little blogging...
I've been reading Cultural Regions of the United States, in which Raymond Gastil applies something like David Hackett Fischer's analysis of the founding American cultures to the various regions of the United States. The results are fascinating (see maps), and comport with my experience living and visiting around the country. For instance, his Rocky Mountain region is essentially most of Colorado, Wyoming, and Montana, with a few exceptions: far southern Colorado is part of his Interior Southwest cultural region, far eastern Colorado is part of his Central Midwest cultural region, far southwestern Wyoming is part of his Mormon cultural region, and a small strip of Idaho along the Montana border is part of the Rocky Mountain region (not the Mormon or Pacific Northwest regions). It would be interesting to extend his regional approach to Canada as well; for instance, most of Alberta, parts of western Saskatchewan, and parts of eastern British Columbia might also be considered part of the Rocky Mountain cultural region (as anecdotal evidence from just this week, western Canadian companies actively cooperate with companies in Colorado). It would also be interesting to see how this kind of regionalism aligns with the CommonCensus Map Project.
Note to self: I need to re-read The Nine Nations of North America and read All Over the Map: Rethinking American Regions as well as some of the books and articles referenced here.