Regional culture and identity in industrialized societies: the case of North-East England

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Abstract
Townsend A. R. and Taylor C. C. (1975) Regional culture and identity in industrialized societies: the case of North-East England, Reg. Studies 9, 379–393. A sample household survey of four towns in North-East England discovered wider areas and levels of attachment beyond those found in individual community studies. A comprehensive range of variables showed that behavioural experience and family links were largely contained within “sub-regions” around each town. Yet respondents were prepared to evaluate “the North-East” as a whole; through cross-tabulation it is possible to identify a “central core” of respondents whose past and present economic circumstances are prone to facilitate and retain elements of a common “regional culture”. People's varying geographical definitions of the region reflect both the locations of the towns and the character of their experience. Any reforms in English regional government may have cultural as well as economic significance, and ethnic, language and religious differences may have obscured the significance of such regional identities elsewhere in Europe.

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