Culture of Texas

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The "Lone Star" Belle, postcard, around 1908. The "Lone Star" Belle.jpg
The "Lone Star" Belle, postcard, around 1908.

The culture of Texas is very diverse, influenced by tremendous waves of migration out of the American North and West, in contrast to its eastern neighbors in the Deep South. It includes the regionalisms and distinct cultural identities of German Texan, Tejanos, Cajuns, Irish, African American, and White Southern enclaves established before the republic era and admission to statehood.

Contents

Texans will tend to acknowledge the five major regions, East Texas, Central Texas, North Texas, South Texas, and West Texas as regions within the state defined by urban centers, and differing cultural norms. The Texas Triangle, anchored by Houston, Dallas-Fort Worth, and San Antonio, is an interstate corridor between the three major Texan cities closest to the geographic center, that anchor three different cultural regions of the state.

Texas is bordered by the western prairies, the Deep South, and Mexico, influenced by Hispanic, African, and Anglo traditions. It includes island communities from Germany, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Mexico, southern African American and White Southern populations, and historic tribes of Native Americans. Texas is also larger in size and population than most European nations. Texas is placed in the Southern United States by the United States Census Bureau. [1]

Agriculture

Agriculture

Texas has the most farms and the highest acreage in the United States. The state is ranked No.1 for revenue generated from total livestock and livestock products. It is ranked No.2 for total agricultural revenue, behind California. [2] At $7.4 billion or 56.7 percent of Texas's annual agricultural cash receipts, beef cattle production represents the largest single segment of Texas agriculture. This is followed by cotton at $1.9 billion (14.6 percent), greenhouse/nursery at $1.5 billion (11.4 percent), broiler chickens at $1.3 billion (10 percent), and dairy products at $947 million (7.3 percent). [3]

Texas leads the nation in the production of cattle, horses, sheep, goats, wool, mohair and hay. [3] The state also leads the nation in production of cotton which is the number one crop grown in the state in terms of value. [2] [4] [5] The state grows significant amounts of cereal crops and produce. [2]

Ranch and cowboy culture

Texas has a strong ranching tradition which has had significant influence on American cowboy culture, particularly in rodeo. Texas has made a strong mark on national and international pop culture. The entire state is strongly associated with the image of the cowboy shown in westerns and in country western music. The state's numerous oil tycoons are also a popular pop culture topic as seen in the hit TV series Dallas. [6] [7]

Rodeo

In 1997, House Concurrent Resolution No. 21 was adopted by the 75th Legislature of the State of Texas, declaring rodeo as the official sport of Texas. [8] The annual Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo is the world's largest known rodeo. It is held over 20 days, from late February through early March. The event begins with trail rides that originate from several points throughout the state, all of which convene at NRG Park for a barbecue cook-off. The rodeo includes typical rodeo events, as well as, concert performances from major artists, and carnival rides. The Fort Worth Livestock Show and Rodeo last three weeks in late January and early February. It has many traditional rodeos, but also a cowboy rodeo, and a Mexican rodeo in recent years, that both have large fan bases.[ citation needed ]

State Fair

Big Tex, the mascot of the State Fair of Texas since 1952 BigTex-457.jpg
Big Tex, the mascot of the State Fair of Texas since 1952

The big State Fair of Texas, one of the largest state fairs in the United States by attendance, is held in Dallas each year between late September through mid- to late October at Fair Park. Two noteworthy college football games, the Red River Rivalry between the University of Oklahoma Sooners and the University of Texas Longhorns, and the State Fair Classic between the Grambling State University Tigers and the Prairie View A&M University Panthers are played at the Cotton Bowl in Fair Park during the State Fair. The State Fair is known for its fried food, particularly the corn dogs. The State Fair is also home to the Texas Star, the tallest Ferris wheel in the Western Hemisphere, and Big Tex, a 55-foot-tall (17 m) cowboy statue.

Other state fairs held in Texas include the North Texas State Fair in Denton, the South Texas State Fair in Beaumont, and the East Texas State Fair in Tyler.

History

The history of Texas, particularly of the old independent Republic of Texas, is intimately bound up with its present culture. Frontier Texas! is a museum of the American Old West in Abilene. The Texas Historical Commission is an agency dedicated to historic preservation within the state of Texas. The Texas State Historical Association publishes an encyclopedia on Texas history, geography, and culture called the Handbook of Texas .[ citation needed ]

In Norway, "Texas" is used as slang for something chaotic and uncontrolled, as influenced from popular Norwegian depictions of cowboy culture and Western literature associated with Texas. "Der var helt texas! (That was totally texas!)" has mostly pejorative connotations but can also refer to a party out of control or a runaway success. [9]

Folklore of Texas

Texas has a considerable independent body of folklore, primarily in connection with its historical ranching and cowboy cultures, the American Old West, and the Texas War of Independence. The Texas Folklore Society is the second-oldest folklore organization continually functioning in the United States. Many well-known figures and stories in American folklore are associated with Texas:

State holidays

Texas has several recognized state holidays, including:

Art

Architecture

Monuments & Statues

Music

The Lone Star State has helped popularize this musical style throughout the world and made the Texas cowboy an international icon that would forever be identified with country music. Although many people may think of country music when they think of the Lone Star State, Texas actually encompasses a wide variety of ethnic musical genres and regional styles. [11]

Texas has a vibrant live music scene in Austin boasting more music venues per capita than any other U.S. city, befitting the city's official slogan as The Live  Music  Capital of the World. Austin's music revolves around the many nightclubs on 6th Street and an annual film, music, and multimedia festival known as South by Southwest. The longest-running concert music program on American television, Austin City Limits , was videotaped at the University of Texas at Austin campus. Austin City Limits and Waterloo Records run the Austin City Limits Music Festival, an annual music and art festival held at Zilker Park in Austin.

In Houston, the annual Free Press Summer Fest is a major draw as well as the entertainment lineups at the annual Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo. Notable music venues for Houston are Fitzgerald's, Warehouse Live, and Walter's among others. Many renowned musicians' origins are in Houston including Lyle Lovett, Beyoncé, Clint Black, The Crusaders, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Kenny Rogers as well as groups including D.R.I., Helstar, La Mafia, the Geto Boys, and ZZ Top. The Houston Symphony and Houston Grand Opera are both attractions of the Houston Theater District.

Literature

Sports

Texas is well known for its love of football at all levels. Watching football is a dominant leisure activity across the state, and autumn weekends are filled with high school games on Friday nights, NCAA and other college games on Saturdays (Texas' 12 top-level or "FBS" schools are more than any other state), and the NFL's Dallas Cowboys and Houston Texans on Sundays. Texas high school football fans are famously passionate, and the various teams often become the obsessive pride of the towns they represent. This phenomenon was documented in the 1990 book Friday Night Lights: A Town, a Team, and a Dream and its popular film and television adaptations. School districts in Texas are sometimes criticized for the amount of money spent on their sports programs and facilities; for example, the Allen Independent School District spent $60 million to open Eagle Stadium in 2012, only to see it closed in 2014 due to serious structural problems. [12] However, this spending is often driven by local residents—the Allen stadium was built using funds from a publicly approved bond issue. [13]

Baseball is also very popular in Texas. In Major League Baseball, the Texas Rangers and Houston Astros claim followers across roughly equal territories, as North Texas, West Texas, and Panhandle residents are largely Rangers fans, while Southeast Texas, Central Texas, and South Texas are predominantly inhabited by Astros fans. Minor league baseball is also well-attended, with three teams in the Triple-A Pacific Coast League and five in the Double-A Texas League.

Other popular sports in Texas include golf (which can be played year-round because of the South's humid climate), basketball (the state's three NBA teams, the Houston Rockets, San Antonio Spurs, and Dallas Mavericks, have all won league titles), fishing, and auto racing, particularly at the Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth. Lacrosse, originally played by some of the indigenous tribes, is a visible sport and growing. Soccer is a popular participatory sportespecially among childrenbut as a spectator sport, it does not yet have a large following despite three Texas teams in Major League Soccer (FC Dallas, Austin FC, and Houston Dynamo FC). Ice hockey has been a growing participatory sport in the Dallas/Fort Worth area since the Minnesota North Stars became the Dallas Stars in 1993. Minor league professional hockey has since grown and is also home to the San Antonio Rampage and Texas Stars of the American Hockey League and the Allen Americans of the ECHL. Texas was home to many Central Hockey League and Western Professional Hockey League teams prior to the leagues' dissolution. Some of the organizations involved with the former leagues launched junior ice hockey teams in the North American Hockey League and the league headquarters were moved to Frisco. [14]

Rodeo is the official sport of Texas; see § Rodeo for more information.

Media

Media devoted to Texas culture include Texas Monthly , a monthly magazine headquartered in Austin that takes as its premise the idea that Texas began as a distinctive place and remains so. It publishes articles on all things culturally Texan, with past pieces on such topics as Texas politicians, the Texas Rangers, Texas cuisine, and true crime incidents in Texas. In 2013, the magazine established a food writing position entirely devoted to barbecue.

Cuisine

Important aspects of Texas cuisine include Texas barbecue and the local fusion of Southern, Mexican, American, and Southwestern cuisines called Tex-Mex cuisine.

Other

The Texas Folklife Festival is an annual event sponsored by the University of Texas at San Antonio's Institute of Texan Cultures celebrating the many ethnicities represented in the population of the state of Texas. Thousands attend the three-day event each year, which features food, crafts, music, and dances from ethnic groups that immigrated to Texas.

A 2015 report by non-profit organization Mission: Readiness found that 73% of military-aged youth in Texas were physically ineligible for military service due to issues with obesity and ill-health, a rate much higher than the national average. [15]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Texas</span> U.S. state

Texas is the most populous state in the South Central region of the United States. It borders Louisiana to the east, Arkansas to the northeast, Oklahoma to the north, New Mexico to the west, and the Mexican states of Chihuahua, Coahuila, Nuevo León, and Tamaulipas to the south and southwest. Texas has a coastline on the Gulf of Mexico to the southeast. Covering 268,596 square miles (695,660 km2), and with over 30 million residents as of 2023, it is the second-largest U.S. state by both area and population.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rodeo</span> Competitive sport

Rodeo is a competitive equestrian sport that arose out of the working practices of cattle herding in Spain and Mexico, expanding throughout the Americas and to other nations. It was originally based on the skills required of the working vaqueros and later, cowboys, in what today is the western United States, western Canada, and northern Mexico. Today, it is a sporting event that involves horses and other livestock, designed to test the skill and speed of the cowboys and cowgirls. American-style professional rodeos generally comprise the following events: tie-down roping, team roping, steer wrestling, Steer roping, saddle bronc riding, bareback bronc riding, bull riding and barrel racing. The events are divided into two basic categories: the rough stock events and the timed events. Depending on sanctioning organization and region, other events such as breakaway roping, goat tying, and pole bending may also be a part of some rodeos. The "world's first public cowboy contest" was held on July 4, 1883, in Pecos, Texas, between cattle driver Trav Windham and roper Morg Livingston.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stamford, Texas</span> City in Texas, United States

Stamford is a city on the border of Jones and Haskell counties in west-central Texas, United States. The population was 3,124 at the 2010 census, down from 3,636 at the 2000 census. Henry McHarg, president of the Texas Central Railroad, named the site in 1900 for his hometown of Stamford, Connecticut. The city is home to the Texas Cowboy Reunion.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">NRG Stadium</span> Stadium in Houston, Texas, United States

NRG Stadium is a multi-purpose stadium in Houston, Texas, United States. Construction was completed in 2002, at a cost of $352 million and has a seating capacity of 72,220. It was the first NFL facility to have a retractable roof.

The Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo, also called RodeoHouston or abbreviated HLSR, is the largest livestock exhibition and rodeo in the world. It includes one of the richest regular-season professional rodeo events. It has been held at NRG Stadium in Houston, Texas, since 2003, with the exception of 2021 due to the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. It was previously held in the Astrodome. It is considered to be the city's "signature event", much like New Orleans's Mardi Gras, Dallas's Texas State Fair, San Diego's Comic-Con and New York City's New Year's Eve at Times Square.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">East Texas</span> Geographic and cultural region of the U.S. state of Texas

East Texas is a broadly defined cultural, geographic, and ecological region in the eastern part of the U.S. state of Texas that comprises most of 41 counties. It is primarily divided into Northeast and Southeast Texas. Most of the region consists of the Piney Woods ecoregion. East Texas can sometimes be defined only as the Piney Woods. At the fringes, towards Central Texas, the forests expand outward toward sparser trees and eventually into open plains.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Index of Texas-related articles</span>

The following is an alphabetical list of articles related to the U.S. state of Texas.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cotton Bowl (stadium)</span> Stadium in Dallas, Texas, United States

The Cotton Bowl is an outdoor stadium in Dallas, Texas, United States. Opened in 1930 as Fair Park Stadium, it is on the site of the State Fair of Texas, known as Fair Park.

Dallas is a city in Texas, United States.

Houston is a multicultural city with a thriving international community supported by the third largest concentration of consular offices in the United States, representing 86 nations. In addition to historical Southeast Texas culture, Houston became the fourth-most populous city in the United States. Officially, Houston is nicknamed the "Space City" as it is home to NASA's Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center, where Mission Control Center is located. "Houston" was the first word spoken on the Moon. Many locals refer to Houston as "Bayou City." Other nicknames include "H-Town", "Clutch City", and "Magnolia City".

History of rodeo tracks the lineage of modern Western rodeo.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Culture of San Antonio</span> Overview of the culture of San Antonio, Texas

The culture of San Antonio reflects the history and culture of one of the state's oldest and largest cities straddling the regional and cultural divide between South and Central Texas. Historically, San Antonio culture comes from a blend of Central Texas and South Texas (Southwestern) culture. Founded as a Spanish outpost and the first civil settlement in Texas, San Antonio is heavily influenced by Mexican American culture due to Texas formerly being part of Mexico and, previously, the Spanish Empire. The city also has significant German, Anglo, and African American cultural influences. San Antonio offers a host of cultural institutions, events, restaurants and nightlife in South Texas for both residents and visitors alike.

Texas is home of several national sports league franchises among other professional sports, being the second most populated U.S. state. Since the state is located in the South Central United States, most teams are part of the Central / South or West league divisions, with the notable exception of the NFL Dallas Cowboys, which is an NFC East franchise.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Culture of Florida</span> Culture of a U.S. state

The culture of Florida is often different in metropolitan areas than in more rural areas. Many parts of rural northern Florida is similar to the rest of American Southern culture, particularly around the Panhandle. In the larger cities such as Miami, Orlando, and Tampa, where there has been a large number of people moving from other parts of the United States, and even other areas of the world, the culture is much more diverse, and has been heavily influenced by Caribbean, Latin American, Jewish, and European culture. Thus, modern-day Florida, from the second half of the 20th century through today, has been heavily influenced by the cultures of people moving in from foreign countries and other parts of the United States, and is often a mix of cultures, values, and ideas.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of African Americans in Texas</span> Ethnic group

African American Texans or Black Texans are residents of the state of Texas who are of African ancestry and people that have origins as African-American slaves. African Americans formed a unique ethnic identity in Texas while facing the problems of societal and institutional discrimination as well as colorism for many years. The first person of African heritage to arrive in Texas was Estevanico, who came to Texas in 1528.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Texan cuisine</span> Food and drinks from Texas

Texan cuisine is the food associated with the Southern U.S. state of Texas, including its native Southwestern cuisine influenced Tex-Mex foods. Texas is a large state, and its cuisine has been influenced by a wide range of cultures, including Tejano/Mexican, Native American, Creole/Cajun, African-American, German, Czech, Southern and other European American groups. The cuisine of neighboring states also influences Texan cuisine, such as New Mexican cuisine and Louisiana Creole cuisine. This can be seen in the widespread usage of New Mexico chiles, Cayenne peppers, and Tabasco sauce in Texan cooking.

The Powell Brothers is a Country music recording artist from Kingwood, Texas. The group was formed by brothers Taylor and Blake Powell in February 2014.

The African American population in San Antonio, Texas has been a significant part of the city's community since its founding. African Americans have been a part of the Greater San Antonio's history since the late 1800s. San Antonio ranks as the top Texas destination city for Black professionals.

The COVID-19 pandemic in Texas is a part of the ongoing viral pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), a novel infectious disease caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The state of Texas confirmed its first case on February 13, 2020, among U.S. nationals evacuated from China to Joint Base San Antonio–Lackland beginning in early February; however, retrospective analyses have suggested a much earlier origin than previously thought. The first documented case of COVID-19 in Texas outside of evacuees at Lackland was confirmed on March 4 in Fort Bend County, and many of the state's largest cities recorded their first cases throughout March. The state recorded its first death associated with the disease on March 17 in Matagorda County.

References

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  2. 1 2 3 "The Texas Economy". netstate.com. June 5, 2007. Retrieved April 29, 2008.
  3. 1 2 Electronic Municipal Market Access (2013). "Appendix A" (PDF). The State of Texas. Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board (MSRB). Retrieved October 23, 2016.
  4. Carmack, Liz (June 21, 2013). "The Legacy of 'King Cotton'". County. Texas Association of Counties. Archived from the original on July 23, 2015. Retrieved July 23, 2015.
  5. "Crop Production: 2014 Summary" (PDF). United States Department of Agriculture. pp. 48–49. Retrieved July 23, 2015.
  6. Dallas (Drama, Romance), Larry Hagman, Ken Kercheval, Patrick Duffy, Linda Gray, Lorimar Productions, Lorimar Telepictures, Lorimar Television, April 2, 1978, retrieved December 28, 2020{{citation}}: CS1 maint: others (link)
  7. Arnold, Richard (August 2, 2018). "40 years on from the TV series, Dallas is much more than oil barons and big hats" . The Telegraph. Archived from the original on January 10, 2022. Retrieved December 28, 2020.
  8. "Rodeo – not football – is the official sport of Texas. Here's how that happened". www.msn.com. Retrieved 2023-12-26.
  9. Barford, Vanessa (October 23, 2015). "Why do Norwegians use 'texas' to mean 'crazy'?". BBC News .
  10. "Swamp Thing of Ottine: Your Friendly Neighborhood Bigfoot". Texas Hill Country. 2018-01-26. Retrieved 2018-05-13.
  11. Hartman, Gary. The History of Texas Music. N.p.: Texas A&M University Press, 2008. Print.
  12. "Cracks force closure of $60M stadium in Allen, Texas". Espn.go.com. February 28, 2014. Retrieved July 11, 2016.
  13. "Allen (Texas) High School ready unveils $60M football facility". Espn.go.com. September 1, 2012. Retrieved July 11, 2016.
  14. "NAHL contacts". North American Hockey League . Retrieved February 6, 2018.
  15. Alvarado, Beatriz, "Too fat, too frail to serve, report states", Corpus Christi Caller-Times/Stars and Stripes , October 10, 2015