Oklahoman | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Regions with significant populations | |
| United States, especially Oklahoma and California (primarily of ancestral descent) | |
| Languages | |
| English (including Oklahoman English), Native American languages | |
| Religion | |
| Predominantly Southern Baptist,[1] with Methodist, Lutheran minorities | |
| Related ethnic groups | |
| White Southerners, Native Oklahomans, Appalachians[2] |
An Okie is a person identified with the state of Oklahoma, or their descendants. This connection may be residential, historical or cultural. For most Okies, several (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their being Oklahoman. While not an official demographic used or recognized by the United States Census Bureau, Okies, due to various factors, have developed their own distinct culture within larger social groupings both akin to and separate from Midwestern and Southern influences. Included are their own dialect, music, and Indigenous-derived folklore.
In California, the term came to refer to very poor migrants from Oklahoma coming to look for employment. The Dust Bowl and the "Okie" migration of the 1930s brought in over a million migrants, many headed to the farm labor jobs in the Central Valley. A study in the 1990s indicated that about 3.75 million Californians were descendants of this population.[3] By 1950, four million individuals, or one quarter of all persons born in Oklahoma, Texas, Arkansas, or Missouri, lived outside the region, primarily in the West.[4]
Prominent Okies included singer/songwriter Woody Guthrie and country musician Merle Haggard. John Steinbeck wrote about Okies moving west in his Pulitzer Prize-winning 1939 novel The Grapes of Wrath, which was filmed in 1940 by John Ford.
- ^ "U.S. Religious Landscapes Survey". The Pew Forum on Religion and Life. Retrieved April 22, 2008.
- ^ Campbell, Rex R. Campbell, Mary. Hughes, Colleen. "A Revolution in the Heartland: Changes in Rural Culture, Family and Communities, 1900–2000" Archived March 3, 2016, at the Wayback Machine. University of Missouri: Department of Rural Sociology. Columbia, Missouri. 2004.
- ^ "Okies--They Sank Roots and Changed the Heart of California : History: Unwanted and shunned, the 1930s refugees from the Dust Bowl endured, spawning new generations. Their legacy can be found in towns scattered throughout the San Joaquin Valley". Los Angeles Times. 18 October 1992.
- ^ Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, "One or Two Things I Know about Us: Rethinking the Image and Role of the 'Okies'," Canadian Papers in Rural History 1998 10: 15–43