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Originally Posted by JHikka
statcan
NB's high belonging to a local community and low belonging to province are due to the rural nature of the province and the Acadiens, which are also mostly rural by community.
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We're average in sense of belonging to the country, and highest in belonging to the province and our community.
The provincial attachment is obvious enough - former country, isolated, island, a population whose overwhelming majority can trace their family heritage to one of just two European cities (Waterford, Ireland; Bristol, England). 100 different factors that on their own could result in a number that high, let alone combined.
The community one, though, intrigues me. I imagine a lot of it is simply because much of the province is rural, so you get the same thing you can find in every long-settled rural place - people guessing your surname by your face, people knowing exactly what town you're from and your religion (or family's religious background) based on surname, etc. And the city has pretty strong, active neighbourhoods as well. It doesn't work anymore for people my age, but anyone over 60 from St. John's will be able to guess which neighbourhood my mother's from based on surname, where she went to school, and probably name off a few of her relatives that they know.
We're also so Balkanized. Ontario has 440-or-so municipalities for however millions of people. Newfoundland has 271 municipalities for 500,000ish.
Reminds me of this Irishwoman's loving but near-scathing description:
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Newfoundland is not Canada, as the people there never tire of telling you.
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It may all look the same to an outsider, but as you travel through the vast beauty of the landscape, you begin to lose yourself in the fractal variation of one bay or inlet that is crucially different to the inlet or bay before it, and the names you pass are more a story than a map: Random Island, Come by Chance, Witless Bay.
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https://www.irishtimes.com/life-and-...orld-1.1538579