Virginia Culture & Language

Virginia contains several cultures that barely overlap. The northern counties are effectively part of the capital region — diverse, expensive and fast. The Tidewater is old, naval and coastal. The southwest is Appalachian, and the piedmont is horse and wine country.

Old-time and bluegrass music are living traditions in the southwest, with a marked trail of venues, weekly jams and fiddlers' conventions rather than staged performances.

The state's relationship with its own history has shifted sharply. Museums and historic houses that once presented a romantic version now foreground slavery and its consequences, and the removal of Confederate monuments from the former Confederate capital in 2020 was a national story.

Virginia has around 300 wineries, and the industry is now taken seriously well beyond the state.

English is universal. Spanish is the main second language, and the northern counties have very large Korean, Vietnamese, Amharic and Urdu-speaking communities.

Accents vary more than in most states: the Tidewater has a distinct older coastal accent, the southwest is Appalachian, and the north has essentially no regional accent at all.

Local usage worth knowing: the eastern coastal region is Tidewater or Hampton Roads, the northern suburbs are NoVa, and the ridge road through the national park is the Skyline Drive — a different road from the Parkway that continues south from it.