Culture shock and the Great American Migration, 2020–2022

Julia Purdy

When I worked as a park ranger at Vermont’s only national park (in Woodstock) in 2005, a visitor approached me and courteously inquired if what she had heard was true, i.e., that Vermonters are not friendly to people “from away.” I knew what she was asking: I myself — a Vermont native returning home after decades away — had experienced the same. Indeed, I have had local people ask me, again respectfully, if I was “a Vermont person.” I replied to the visitor as noncommmittally as I could. Had we had an hour, I could have explained what I am sharing here.

But these days the exchange may not be as civil. The nation is experiencing an episode of mass migration on a scale never experienced. Conflict is the historically inevitable result.

In 1954 Canadian anthropologist Kalervo Oberg gave a talk in which he posited the concept of culture shock to describe the experience of expatriates or people working overseas, but it can apply equally to people who relocate from the familiar to the unfamiliar, such as tourists and international students — and now, in-movers.

Oberg struck a rich vein of study to work with, which soon included tourists, who, ever since Boeing flew its first 707 across the Atlantic in 1958, have been flocking around the world. And now, permanent residents across the U.S. are getting used to new arrivals who find things not to their liking and then try to agitate for changes that more closely resemble what they left behind — a phenomenon known as culture shock. More than mere tourists, this mass exodus from overheated economies and overpopulated metropolises, climate-related natural disasters and Covid, is negatively impacting relatively untroubled, smaller communities and distorting their economies, politics and culture.

For the benefit of newcomers and locals alike, culture shock is a phenomenon worth understanding as small communities struggle to cope with the invasion.

Oberg assigned four distinct stages to the experience of culture shock, although subsequent researchers have listed as many as seven. The term “culture shock” has been homogenized and pasteurized by the new term “cultural adjustment” … as if adjustment was an inevitable outcome. (It isn’t.)

In any case, culture shock is experiential. Yesterday you felt at ease, you knew the local lingo, the figures of speech, the quirks and peculiarities and how to interpret them … because everyone did. Today you are thrust into all-new situations that mystify or make you feel uncomfortable, and your discomfort is translated into the “irritation” stage or, as some researchers call it, the “negotiation” or “frustration” stage.

First is the “honeymoon stage,” when everything is new and exciting, but the new arrival is still grounded in existence back home. Life is good. You are still in the role of spectator. You walk around the neighborhood, hand in hand, with or without dog, commenting on the differences between what you know and what is unfamiliar.

Then as you begin to settle in, you realize that “OK, this is it.” The excitement wanes, the balloon pops, perhaps disconcertingly. Why are the streets so bad? You mean I have to truck my own trash to the transfer station??

You once you knew your way around; you knew whom to do business with and whom not to; now you must learn all over again. As you cling to what you left behind, while confronting the mundane details of daily life, you may try to negotiate with present reality, to rebel against what cannot be changed because in fact you are now in an entirely different place on the planet.

This “irritation stage” can take the form of homesickness, depression, buyer’s remorse, dismay, regret, angry demands. You become frustrated and impatient. You bully the hapless barista, verbally abuse the sales associate, or engage in milder forms such as refusing to comply with local norms or grousing — loudly, so all can hear — about the minor inconveniences that now loom large, the cost, and a host of other disappointments.

If the newcomer can’t simply leave, shock gradually yields to reluctant resignation in the “adjustment stage.” If you are still not able fully and enthusiastically to embrace the new situation, you decide to make the best of it. You get on nodding acquaintance with your neighbors. You learn your way around, often by trial and error. You find interesting activities and make some new friends among likeminded people, who can give you tips about good places to shop and eat, medical care, and where to get your car fixed. If you take the time and have the interest to delve into the long history of the new place, quirky local mores, conventions, and traditions now start to make sense. Neighbors and the pharmacist, the independent gas station on the corner, the bookseller, now recognize you. You have arrived.

The final stage is “acceptance.” You say to yourself: you know, I think I like it here. This might actually work, just give it time. The glass is half full.

The acceptance stage may never be achieved, however. Some new arrivals are on a shopping expedition, as if for a new outfit: they come into the store, try something on, find the shoulders too big, legs too long or waist too small, browse a bit longer and then move on to the next store.

Others arrive and provisionally set down roots in spite of some disappointment in what they were led to expect by the local Chamber of Commerce hype, and then either move on or, if they are unable to do so for whatever reason, stay and join the chorus of “Ain’t it awful” or “Where I come from…” malcontents. The glass is half empty.

How long does each stage last? That would vary with your adaptability, of course. Some never make it to the final stage.

Commenters on the local scene in North Carolina have coined a new term: “halfbacks.” According to ncdemography.org > migration, halfbacks are domestic migrants, mainly New York-born in the 55+ age bracket, who have sampled the humidity, storms, cost and alligators of Florida and retreated “halfway back” to the more amenable Carolinas, Virginia, Tennessee, and Georgia. Whether those places will be all the halfbacks dream of, remains to be seen.

Actually, the halfback phenomenon is not new. Among the many determined men and their not-so-willing womenfolk who started out on the Oregon Trail, how many were met heading back East with the last of their reserves? Those particular stories probably lie buried in diaries and letters deep within the archives of local historical societies. They are stories that admit to discouragement and failure — and often tragedy — not the romantic enthusiasm of “Westward Ho! The Wagons.”

So if you find you are not getting along with your new neighbors, just remember two things: first, that gentrification inevitably generates conflict between newcomers and locals who are pushed out by it; and second, relocating requires a major change in mindset and outlook in order to get past the cold reception by locals to whom your presence is likely an irritant, a grain of sand inside their oyster. The pearl may develop, but with much effort and tolerance on both sides.