The 2004 results of "Americas Most Literate Cities" are in

i am not surprised however at 20% of the ten least literate cities being in TEH OC. MUAHAHA

That seems to be a factor, too. The number of publications in the city raises the score. Well, so what? What if all they publish is sports pages? Most newspapers are still written at an 8th grade level, last I heard.

We finally did it, baby. *tear*

xpost. yes.

5 Texan cities in the Bottom 10. Of course the man in Washington with the top job is from TX!

The good news is that the Cowboys plan to bulldoze the major in-town Hispanic population center to build their new fucking stadium, no more worries about people speaking Spanish! (this is sarcasm, in case it wasn't clear)

Three (3) Borders book stores in town.

Four (4) Half Price Books stores in town.

Two (2) independent bookstores of significant size (that have websites, to boot).

Just eleven (11) book stores in a city with a population of approximately 1.2 million people doesn't seem like much, but this doesn't tell the full story of the San Antonio I know.

When talking about cerebral matters, there are two San Antonios -- that of the constantly aspiring (largely in the North and West sides, though pockets also exist elsewhere), and that of the resigning and surviving (largely in the East and South sides, though, well, you know).

The former part of San Antonio (with approx. 600K residents, for those of you not number-sharp) is very conscious about intelligence and learning. The tale of the teen daughter of a hardworking mechanic and waitress who devours a book a week while keeping up a high GPA and holding down a part-time job is most likely to be told in the West side, which benefits from having two solid universities in its grip.

The latter part (also with approx. 600K residents, for, well, you know) isn't so much about trying to reach for Something More than it is about just being happy with the lot they have in life, even if it's tiny and insignificant. Signs of this can be found in how various community colleges are viewed as locally. San Antonio College, which is centrally located, is considered a rather tough one to go through, and is filled with faculty members with master's degrees from Ivy League or similar institutions. Palo Alto College, which is located in the South side, is considered a VERY easy college and doesn't have the same prestige in its faculty.

That West side daughter who lives in an 80-year-old house appraised at just $45,000, will plan (not just hope) to graduate from UT-Austin, making her family proud and setting into motion a life of climbing and conquering. A similar daughter from a similar background who comes from the South side will probably not come from a background that encourages such a longing for that something more, and as a consequence will probably end up as a medical assistant or court reporter and won't leave the neighborhood she grew up in.

Consider a city with 600,000 residents. If such a city has 11 bookstores in its grasp, that's a very good thing. Even better would be if they have several public libraries to choose from and five major universities in its borders. That would indicate a highly literate city, even ignoring such things as average income levels and number of local periodicals. (BTW, speaking of periodicals -- "number of magazines published"? WTF does that have to do with anything? And we were a two-daily town until 1993, when Hearst decided it wanted to switch ownership over from the daily it owned to the OTHER one, and then closed up the non-"OTHER" one.) And the fact that the side of the Constantly Striving is gaining in population, as more and more children and grandchildren of immigrants get tired of just settling and want to make at least tiny steps toward a better life (e.g. more high school grads applying for admission to SAC vs. PAC), can't be reflected in cold data used by someone who lives about 2,000 miles away from where the reality is happening.

I did discuss this issue with my mother today and she came to some of the same conclusions reached above. gabbneb, thank you for bringing up "that the bottom 10 are disproportionately Spanish-speaking". I can recall how my dad would sometimes struggle to find English words for what he'd wanted to say and would end up having to dance around the word. She also brought up income levels, which does seem to have great importance in this ranking. A poor family won't budget money for daily newspaper delivery, nor will they be the type of people to have a large library of English-language books at home. Again, however, this does not reflect upon the literacy levels of those families that put a great emphasis on education and "making something of oneself", which should in all fairness count in such lists as these but doesn't.

So I suppose the author of this study can just, in crude and non-literate terms, kiss my ass.

The good news is that the Cowboys plan to bulldoze the major in-town Hispanic population center to build their new fucking stadium, no more worries about people speaking Spanish! (this is sarcasm, in case it wasn't clear)

You're fucking kidding me, milo. Ugh. As if I didn't have ENOUGH reasons already to hate the Cowboys.... "Go Cowboys, go"? NFW.

It snows. We need stuff to do.

2008 Results

I don't know if Dee the Lurker still posts but I want to thank him/her for the San Antonio post upthread. SA always in my <3.

LOL @ stockton, ca -- having just spent over 2 months out there, i can DEFINITELY understand why it's near the bottom of this list.

this list appears to ignore city size/layout. here's the land area of the top 10 cities (in sq mi):

Minneapolis, MN 55
Seattle, WA 84
Washington DC 61
St Paul, MN 53
San Francisco, CA 48
Atlanta, GA 132
Denver, CO 153
Boston, MA 48
St Louis, MO 62
Cincinnati, OH 78

and here's the land area of lower-ranking major cities

#19-20 Nashville 502
#24 New York, NY 305
#25 San Diego, CA 324
#28 Philadelphia, PA 127
#34 Chicago, IL 227
#38-39 Dallas, TX 343
#45 Ft Worth 293
#51 Detroit 139
#54 Houston 579
#55 Los Angeles 469

so basically you fall into the top 10 if you're a tiny city with a concentrated population of the very well-educated/upper-income (or if you're a medium-sized city in which book culture is well-distributed throughout both burbs and core?), but if you're a big megalopolis, you get averaged out of the running

and what i said upthread about hispanic population is still true

you're just upset because we read more than you do

how are they defining "literate"? does this just means cities with the lowest per-capita # of illterate people, or does this have to do with how "well-read" they are, or...?

the author of the study

http://www.ccsu.edu/amlc08/images/miller_ds.jpg

ah yes fat people hmm good thinking

he may be fat but i bet that guy can read

you're just upset because we read more than you do

you're just upset that i'm smarter than you. you live in the #1 highest-educated city in the country and one of only 3 cities on the list (with SF and Seattle) that is among the top 100 highest per-capita-income places of more than 1,000 households.

who said anything about smarts? i'm more literate--the survey said so. maybe you should volunteer with a reading program and NYC will be in the top 10 next time.

you got beat by Nashville, Cleveland and KCMO.

NYC 2009 resolution=put down the greasy pizza, stop arguing with each other, and learn how to read

who said anything about smarts? i'm more literate--the survey said so.

cut gabbneb some slack here, his reading comprehension can't be that good if he can't read.

excellent post. you seem very literate and well read.

i'm sad that "the city that reads" is not even in the top 10

Pretty pathetic how these non-cities always try to compete with New York. Unfortunately since New York is such a large, diverse, and basically better place than redneck provincial cities like San Francisco and Seattle, averages are always skewed lower. Doesn't mean the best of the best still isn't exclusively in this city.

San Francisco reading festival: a bunch of fat heads at the Readers Digest bi-annual convention fighting for space in a sea of balloon-seated khakis.

Thanks for showing us why the New York average skews lower, burt stanton.

(adjusts his monocle and cravat)

Ahem!

Apart from calculating one's odds of having a literate conversation with a complete stranger in any particular city you find yourself in, I fail to see how this information has any application. Taking pride in one's neighbors reading accomplishments is akin to feeling an unearned pride when some athletes you never met win a sporting contest while wearing a uniform that references your city of residence.

These lists are always pretty inane. America's Most Livable City: #1 - Cowplop, Texas

http://www.mostlivable.org/

Weird. There's not even a Texas city in the top 10.

I guess you don't know how to read.

sorry people were talking at me and that last post of mine makes no sense.

one thing to apply to the gabbnebb theory is the fact that pretending that Minneapolis and St. Paul (#1 and 4 respectively) can be viewed as discrete cities is kind of dumb. meaning that really our land mass (using gabbs numbers) is about 108.

As is referring to SF (as much as we're snotty about that) - the US Post Service refers to the San Jose Bay Area (based on population and not on history or culture).

no i understood it perfectly clear, JJ

signed,

Resident of City #3 on the list

Mr. Que, you shouldn't be talking about people who can't read when you can't read your own link

what link are you talking about, Illiterate Gabby?

the Twin Cities split just reinforces the point that this list fails to account for semi-arbitrary city boundaries

the link you placed on this thread, Mr. Que

Fourt Wurth

it includes a Texas city and does not include a Top 10

everyone knows Fort Worth is in Atlanta.

perhaps reading comprehension is not all you need to brush up on

I'd like to point out that I had a congenial great aunt who read at least 4 or 5 books a week and while she was exceedingly literate, it is debatable whether she was really well-read.

LOL @ stockton, ca -- having just spent over 2 months out there, i can DEFINITELY understand why it's near the bottom of this list.

the 1/3 hispanic population or the per capita income of $15,405?

grabneb's right. That list up there is a good go-to guide to the whitest upper middle class cities in the US.

shut up burt

lol gabb i actually thought that's what you were saying

it's a list of cities with populations of high-income, highly-educated people (who are predominantly, but not exclusively - see especially DC - white) who are concentrated in a relatively small city and/or outside an urban core but within the city limits

"Reading" is too general...I mean are we talking about cities with most per capita consumption of James Patterson or Thomas Pynchon?

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1355/is_/ai_16717078

thats weird i live in nyc and i can read

it's a list of cities with populations of high-income, highly-educated people (who are predominantly, but not exclusively - see especially DC - white) who are concentrated in a relatively small city and/or outside an urban core but within the city limits

DC is less than half white. Over 50% of the population in DC is black. You still don't know how to read.

Population, 2006 estimate
DC 581,530
NYC 19,306,183
USA 299,398,484

White persons, percent, 2006
DC 38.4%
NYC 73.7%
USA 80.1%

Black persons
DC 56.5%
NYC 17.4%
USA 12.8%

although this map is hella LOL

http://www.21csf.org/csf-home/DocUploads/DataShop/DS_34.pdf

read(ILX_BORAD_HANDLE, &m_myBrain, 77);

Over 50% of the population in DC is black.

no shit

You still don't know how to read.

lol @ u madd

can we all just agree that wherever burt lives is the stupidest city in the world

shakey, stop running your mouth with provincial redneckisms, lol

yes we can, Shakey

gabb you said DC's population was predominatly white. just wanted to point out that you were wrong.

this looks like a good place to learn how to read

http://www.nypl.org/branch/local/crw/

both minneapolis and st paul are somewhere around 62% white according to various sites i checked, which appears to be lower than NYC

so yeah burt you dumb

gabb you said DC's population was predominatly white

um, this is not correct. Gabbneb noted that DC was the exception, ie, is not predominately white.

hmmmmm. well if that's what he meant he should learn to post clearer and more precisely--a couple of literacy classes could probably help.

que,

Learn to read.

Merry Xmas,
Gabb

NYC's white population is about 39% if you take out Puerto Ricans, Hondurans, and other crazy shit.

i love that reading comprehension is a overflowing well of hilarious zings

Also, I'm pretty sure NYC's population is not 19 million, unless North Jersey has been officially declared a new borough.

burt maybe you and gabby can sign up for a literacy class together

Oh, you're just trying to be obnoxious, and god bless you for it, too.

you are like tiny tim with a terrible learning disability

predominatly
post clearer and more precisely

Que, when you're done learning how to read, may I recommend learning how to spell and write. here is a very fine local institution of higher learning that may be able to assist you:

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/83/229551714_a5b4f7bc43.jpg

I'm pretty sure NYC's population is not 19 million

that's a metro area pop, including parts of NJ and CT. NYC proper is 8 mil, and it is 26% black (about half the percentage in DC) and 35% non-hispanic white (slightly more than DC, which has less than 1/3 the hispanic and asian population of nyc).

Gabbneb noted that DC was the exception, ie, is not predominately white.

and also that DC citizens, both white and black, are better-educated on average than citizens just about anywhere else. the role of the largely white-collar federal government as primary employer (and service provider, and growth restrictor) - and the lesser role of industry associated with the "working class" - surely have a big impact here, as does, quite likely, the presence of what's probably the leading historically-black college in the country (also a factor in Atlanta).

and also that DC citizens, both white and black, are better-educated on average than citizens just about anywhere else.

OTM.

LOCK THREAD

morbs impression?

if dc residents are so well educated then WHY DO THEY LIVE IN DC were they sick on the day the how not to live in a super shitty place class was taught

i may not know how to read a book but at least i know HOW NOT TO WORK FOR THE GOVERNMENT

maybe everyone spends so much time reading the BECAUSE THERES NOTHING BETTER TO DO and BECAUSE U HAVE TO SWIPE ON THE WAY OUT OF THE SUBWAY

also burt otm re sf being a redneck hellhole

God forbid we imagine that the WHITE people in New York City might not be as literate as we think. You mean all those people who work for the fashion industry and/or are struggling to make it as actors aren't reading Proust in their spare time?

burt, ice cr?m, please to explain SF redneckisms

sodomy, for starters

white ppl