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The Appalachian region of the Eastern United States is home to over 20 million people and covers parts of mostly mountainous areas of 13 states, including Mississippi, Alabama, Pennsylvania, New York, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, Kentucky, Ohio, Maryland, and the entire state of West Virginia.〔Hurst, Charles. (1992). Inequality in Appalachia. Social Inequality: Forms, Causes, and Consequences, 6th Edition. Pearson Education. pp 62-68.〕 The near-isolation of the area's rugged topography is home to communities with a distinct culture, who in many cases are put at a disadvantage because of the transportation and infrastructure problems that have developed.〔 Appalachia is often divided into three regions—southern (portions of Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, North and South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia), central (portions of Kentucky, West Virginia, Ohio, Virginia, and Tennessee), and northern (parts of New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Ohio, and West Virginia) Appalachia.〔 Though all areas of Appalachia share problems of rural poverty, inadequate jobs, services, transportation, education, and infrastructure, some elements (particularly those relating to industry and natural resource extraction) are unique to each sub-region. For example, Appalachians in the central sub-region experience the deepest poverty, partially due to the area’s isolation from urban growth centers.〔Tickamyer, Ann; Cynthia, Duncan. (1990). Poverty and Opportunity Structure in Rural America. ''Annual Review of Sociology''. 16:67-86. Retrieved November 28 from Academic Search Premier.〕 Appalachia is particularly interesting in the context of social and economic divisions within and between the region’s socioeconomic communities. In addition, outsiders’ often incorrect and over-generalized external perspectives, and their relationship to culture and folklore of this near-isolated area, are important to the region’s future development.〔 ==Poverty, politics, and uneven economic development== Though industry and business existed in Appalachia before the 20th century, the major modern industries of agriculture, large-scale coal mining, timber, and other outside corporate entries did not truly take root until this time. Many Appalachianites sold their rights to land and minerals to such corporations, to the extent that 99 percent of the residents control less than half of the land. Thus, though the area has a wealth of natural resources, natives are often poor.〔 Since at least the 1960s, Appalachia has a higher poverty rate and a higher percentage of working poor than the rest of the nation. Wages, employment rates, and education also lag. The Appalachian Regional Commission (ARC) was created in 1965 to address some of the region’s problems, and though there have been improvements, serious issues still exist. Communities that are not considered "growth centers” are bypassed for investment and fall further behind. In 1999, roughly a quarter of the counties in the region qualified as “distressed,” the ARC’s worst status ranking. Fifty-seven percent of adults in central Appalachia did not graduate high school (as opposed to less than 20 percent in the general U.S.〔Denham, Sharon; Mande, Man; Meyer, Michael; Toborg, Mary. (2004). Providing Health Education to Appalachia Populations. Holistic Nursing Practices 2{X)4:I8(6):293-3O1. Retrieved November 30 from Academic Search Premier.〕), roughly 20 percent of homes have no telephone, and the population is declining.〔 THORNE, DEBORAH; TICKAMYER,ANN; THORNE, MARK. (2005). Poverty and Income in Appalachia. ''Journal of Appalachian Studies''. Volume 10 Number 3. Retrieved November 29 from Academic Search Premier.〕 According to the statistics conducted by ARC, out of every three Appalachians, one suffered from poverty; their average income was 23 percent lower than the average level of American per capita income; and due to the poor infrastructure, health care, high unemployment rate and other tough living conditions, there were two million or more Appalachians who has left their homes for living during the 1950s. Poverty in Appalachian has not been paid attention until the 1960s. In the year 1960, the Region’s government was trying to solve the poverty problem with a will. After one year, the newly elected President John F. Kennedy was touched by the poverty he saw there and decided to improve the living standard of Appalachians. In 1963, President Kennedy set up President’s Appalachian Regional Committee, aimed to formulate a program to improve the Appalachian economy. The program was outlined in 1964. And one year later, his successor, President Lyndon B. Johnson submitted PARC's reports to the Congress and was passed in 1965.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Social and economic stratification in Appalachia」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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