While reading this article, I am reminded of a discussion I often have with my friends; Austin vs. Dallas. The city that I grew up in and the city I now live in. On the surface these two cities would seem to have a lot in common, after all they are both in Texas. But the cities themselves are completely different in almost every way, except for the damn heat. The type of people who live in these cities is also different. Dallas seems to breed a ultra-conservative redneck-cum-millionaire. These people (and I can say this, because I am related to some of them) value status over happiness. Whereas Austinites (or transplants like myself) seem to lean left politically (at least a lot of them do) and value happiness over money.
The layout of the cities are different as well. Austin has a vibrant downtown, and an abundance of green space, whereas Dallas' downtown is good for business, and that's it(the downtown becomes a ghosttown at night).
Why are these two cities so geographically and environmentally similar, yet so culturally different? To quote Edbauer: "Place becomes a space of contacts, which are always changing and never discrete. The contact between two people on a busy city steet is never simply a matter of those two bodies; rather, the two bodies carry with them the traces of effects from whole fields of culture and social histories (10)".
I think that this helps explain how Dallas and Austin can be so different. Each city is built upon the "traces of effects from whole fields of culture and social history". But the question this leaves me with is this: Am I a different person, when I am in these different cities? Well if the transmission of affect is real, then yes, yes I am. (Incidentally I did vote for George Bush during my last year in Dallas; the year 2000).
I'm not entirely sure how to say this, but I think that in large part it has to do with the desires of those who inhabit the city. Like attracts like. Dallas was in large part built and populated by those focused on business much earlier than when Austin boomed, and attracted that type of person as they feel more at home in that environment. Austin on the other hand had UT so ingrained in its early development that as it began to really expand later on, it attracted more and more people of that type. The kind of business similarly helped attract a different breed than Dallas. And once this type of thing is set, it really doesn't change. Expectations are established, and people will not start thinking of Dallas downtown as a place for fun not business, just like how they won't start thinking 6th Street is a place for day business and not fun.
ReplyDeleteI agree completely, except that you do know how, because you do say it, and you say it quite well
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