158 replies to this topic

[Andrea]

Atlanta has always been treated like the red-headed stepchild by the rest of the state.

[Pillsbury]

markusparkus, on Jan 31 2007, 09:01 PM, said:

Oh Pills, you kill me. Atlanta is a gem...Cobb County's getting better but it has a long way to go. Of course by the time it's super nice, I'll be in my bf's home state of Arizona...which is ALSO getting better, well minus the heat.  

Augusta's FABulous too!  

Haha.  Atlanta truly is a gem.   My brother's in the process of moving to Marietta, so I have to love Cobb.  Good luck out there in Arizona---just remember, it's a dry heat.....  

Augusta is fabulously weird---it's like Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, only stranger.  Which reminds of an old joke:  In Atlanta they ask where you work; in Macon, they ask where you go to church; in Savannah, they ask what you drink; and, in Augusta, they ask who your parents are.

Atlanta doesn't want to be attached to Georgia because its ashamed of us......

[Andrea]

Pillsbury, on Feb 1 2007, 09:02 AM, said:

Atlanta doesn't want to be attached to Georgia because its ashamed of us......

I'm not the least bit ashamed of being a Georgian.  To the contrary, I'm very proud of it.  

However, the reason I started this thread doesn't have anything to do with that.  What I'm talking about is the fact that instead of just saying "Atlanta", you often hear our city referred to in the media as "Atlanta, Georgia."  The implication is that Atlanta not considered prominent enough to stand on its own, like cities such as Miami, Chicago, Boston, San Francisco, Pittsburgh, Denver, etc.  You rarely hear these other major cities identified by their state, because it's assumed everyone knows where they are.  

How come we're so often treated differently?

[Pillsbury]

^ Oh, my comment was very much tongue-in-cheek.      For the most part, I agree with you.  But Atlanta is one of the most important cities on earth.   The important people know Atlanta.   The New York Times refers to Atlanta as simply, Atlanta.   Same with the Times from London.  I read them both and Atlanta comes up a lot.

Atlanta is Atlanta----but to many older Southern people, who grew up believing Atlanta and Richmond were the New Yorks of the South, Atlanta is still Atlanta, Georgia, said really fast, almost as if it were one word.  Same with the rappers.  Maybe it's some of that? Like how sometimes people will say, New York, New York.  

[Kenneth Disraili-Jean]

Andrea, on Dec 7 2005, 06:59 PM, said:

Heh, I have to laugh at myself about this one. It reminds me of the argument I got into the other day with a friend who claims the media is liberal, whereas it seems to me to be dominated by a bunch of right wingers.

Anyway, when I was growing up, I always felt slighted because whenever I saw our city's name in print they listed it as "Atlanta, Georgia." As if people didn't know where Atlanta would be if you didn't tell them it was in Georgia.

By contrast, it seemed like almost every other big city got its own name, all by itself, without the state qualifier. You didn't read "Cincinnati, Ohio," "Detroit, Michigan", or "Los Angeles, California." And it's not like there were dozens of Atlanta's that could easily be confused either. Even towns like Milwaukee were just plain old Milwaukee, even though we got their baseball team. And what about Buffalo? What was their claim to fame other than getting O.J. Simpson to play football for them? I even remember reading about Memphis and New Orleans without their state being hung on the end. We were the red-headed stepchild down here!

Now, I thought all this would change after we got the Braves and the Falcons and the Hawks and the Flames and the Thrashers, and after we went to the World Series and the Superbowl. We had a subway way back before any of these other nouveau burgs, and we had the world's tallest stinking hotel. Herschel Walker played right up the road in Athens, we had Gone With The Wind and Ted Turner and CNN, and we had Designing Women. Bobby Jones and Dr. King came from Atlanta! We had Emory and Georgia Tech, and Coca Cola and Delta Air Lines. We had the dadgum Olympics here, for Pete's sake!

So why couldn't we just be plain old Atlanta? I really thought all that would stop once the Olympics came, but I swear I still hear "Atlanta, Georgia" all the time. Do these people in New York and California think folks don't know where in the heck we are? When I call somebody in one of these places I always make a point to say, "This is Andrea from Atlanta" and leave it at that. And I double dog dare one of them to say, "Oh, and what state would that be in?" I'd love to come back with, "Oh, Buffalo where? New York, well, very well, could you spell that please?"

I could go on about this for days, but I was just wondering whether any of y'all had similar perceptions or whether it was just me.

Well if you think that is something, now it is the way we pronounce our city. Alot a natives say ATLAN-A, but now the press is always saying ATLAN-TA. I wonder which way is correct?????????

[JDC]

Atlanta alone, without "Georgia" should be adequate for most uses. Only a few US cities don't require their state in datelines, according to the AP Style Guide, and Atlanta is one of them:

Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, Chicago, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Dallas, Denver, Detroit, Honolulu, Houston, Indianapolis, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Miami, New Orleans, New York, Oklahoma City, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, Salt Lake City, San Antonio, San Diego, San Francisco, Seattle, Washington.

Sorry if this has already been posted.  

[j.midtown]

FWIW, on Wikipedia, the term Atlanta redirects to the Atlanta, Georgia article (the formal naming style always used on WP), indicating that the single word itself is predominantly and very closely associated with the city. For some cities/words, there is often great debate over the predominant usage or whether it simply goes to a general disambiguation page where all the options are listed.

[serapis]

I'm from Raleigh. Why would there be any debate, about Atlanta being called Atlanta GA. No one really says GA anymore, because Atlanta is HUGE!

[Andrea]

I just heard it AGAIN.  Chris Wallace on Fox News Sunday just said, "Joining us now is Sen. Obama's spokesman from Atlanta, Georgia."  He referred to several other cities during this newscast but in no other case did he mention the state.  I'm telling you, in the eyes of big media we're still treated like Podunk.

[912]

JDC, on Dec 7 2007, 09:27 AM, said:

Atlanta alone, without "Georgia" should be adequate for most uses. Only a few US cities don't require their state in datelines, according to the AP Style Guide, and Atlanta is one of them:

Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, Chicago, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Dallas, Denver, Detroit, Honolulu, Houston, Indianapolis, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Miami, New Orleans, New York, Oklahoma City, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, Salt Lake City, San Antonio, San Diego, San Francisco, Seattle, Washington.

Sorry if this has already been posted.  

While not as large as the cities above, but internationally known, I think Savannah should be afforded the same luxury.  When you say "Savannah", you think GA by default (unless you live in S. Central TN, where there is a Savannah, TN...but it's not famous by a long shot).

[Andrea]

fromsc2tx, on Jan 20 2008, 02:24 PM, said:

While not as large as the cities above, but internationally known, I think Savannah should be afforded the same luxury.  When you say "Savannah", you think GA by default (unless you live in S. Central TN, where there is a Savannah, TN...but it's not famous by a long shot).

I think they're still trying to force us to pay for the Civil War.

[912]

^ eh, who knows.

kennethdisraili, on May 9 2007, 09:12 PM, said:

Well if you think that is something, now it is the way we pronounce our city. Alot a natives say ATLAN-A, but now the press is always saying ATLAN-TA. I wonder which way is correct?????????

I thought the natives said "Add-lan-a"?  I know I call it that.

[Spartan]

I think for most Southerners its more like "Alanna" or "Atlanna"

[Kenneth Disraili-Jean]

I am a native Atlantan and have lived in this great city for 46 years as of today (being my birthday) and there are two symbols that have made Atlanta recognized around the globe. The two symbols are the Coka-Cola logo and the Olympic rings, the two most recognized symbols in the world.

As far as Atlanta vs. Atlanta GA, most of that comes from the media, as of a case in point , on ABC's Goodmorning America, Diane Sawyer was interacting with an ABC corrispondant in London, so there was a split screen and on the left was Diane Sawyer with her location listed above her picture as New York NY, and on the right was the corrispondant and above thier picture it listed the location as London, England.

So I don't see it as any big deal with the excption that there are I believe 10 small towns in the United States named Atlanta.

As far as how to pronounce the city's name, it can depend on what part of the city or metro area you might live in.

I have lived in Buckhead all my life and pronounce Atlanta with every letter pronounced, as AT-LAN-TA.

[poonther]

Spartan, on Jan 20 2008, 08:22 PM, said:

I think for most Southerners its more like "Alanna" or "Atlanna"

I agree.  I grew up in L.A. (Lower Alabama) and I must have been 12 before I realized that there were T's in the word.  Everyone I knew called it Alanna.  Here in North FL, people seem to pronounce the first T but often forget the second one.

[Plasticman]

Andrea, on Jan 20 2008, 10:52 AM, said:

I just heard it AGAIN.  Chris Wallace on Fox News Sunday just said, "Joining us now is Sen. Obama's spokesman from Atlanta, Georgia."  He referred to several other cities during this newscast but in no other case did he mention the state.  I'm telling you, in the eyes of big media we're still treated like Podunk.

Get a grip man.  I've heard newscasters say "Chattanooga" without Tennessee being hung on the end.   The likely reason?  Laziness.  You have to figure in the laziness factor.  Time is money on TV so names like Indianapolis take longer to say and frankly sticking Indiana on the end is somewhat of a tongue twister.  Atlanta, Georgia flows very well and is an easy thing to say. I will bet the farm that you will get the same occasional complaint from Houston and Dallas because saying Dallas, Texas is easy and quick.  I'll also bet you don't hear Minnesota on the end of Minneapolis very often because it's cumbersome and clunky to say.

Edited by Plasticman, 05 February 2008 - 03:59 PM.

[Kenneth Disraili-Jean]

^^^^ I agree with you Plasticman, you have some valid points, but when you tell Andrea " to get a grip man", she is only stating facts, that especially in Atlanta's past, the Northern press HAS in fact tried to make Atlanta seem like  Andy Griffith's Mayberry, NC, so I agree with Andrea as well.

[Scraper Enthusiast]

Andrea, on Jan 20 2008, 08:32 PM, said:

I think they're still trying to force us to pay for the Civil War.

I think that Rand McNalley has a personal vendetta against Atlanta.  They still have the same 1980 urbanized area outlined in orange.  They have yet to update it, while every other city has been updated.  It's quite pathetic.  None of Gwinnett, with the exception of a small sliver in Norcross, as well as one in Lilburn, is colored in orange.  Much of Cobb is not colored.  Much of North Fulton is not colored, nor is any of Fayette, Henry, much of Clayton, none of Rockdale, little of Douglas, none of Paulding, etc.  The amount of urbanized area shown is one-third the actual size, and it continues year after year, even when they update road changes.  Other cities continue to have their urbanized areas updated.  It's part of the reason why I switched over to "American Map" atlas, a much superior atlas, and one that has urbanized areas accurate, including Atlanta.

[perimeter285]

Scraper Enthusiast, on Feb 16 2008, 08:43 PM, said:

I think that Rand McNalley has a personal vendetta against Atlanta.  They still have the same 1980 urbanized area outlined in orange.  They have yet to update it, while every other city has been updated.  It's quite pathetic.  None of Gwinnett, with the exception of a small sliver in Norcross, as well as one in Lilburn, is colored in orange.  Much of Cobb is not colored.  Much of North Fulton is not colored, nor is any of Fayette, Henry, much of Clayton, none of Rockdale, little of Douglas, none of Paulding, etc.  The amount of urbanized area shown is one-third the actual size, and it continues year after year, even when they update road changes.  Other cities continue to have their urbanized areas updated.  It's part of the reason why I switched over to "American Map" atlas, a much superior atlas, and one that has urbanized areas accurate, including Atlanta.

Yes I've noticed that with Rand McNalley as well.  I've wondered for a long time why we only get a pathetic little 1/2 page.  Minneapolis-St.Paul gets a gigantic full page.  The little downtown inset map needs to include Midtown as well.

In fact, every year when the new RM atlas comes out, I check to see if they've given Atlanta an update.  And every year I'm disappointed.

Edited by perimeter285, 18 February 2008 - 09:52 AM.