Culture
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The South Wales Valleys became a symbol of the whole of Wales for many foreign people and people in the rest of the United Kingdom. The valleys do, however, contain a large proportion of the Welsh population and remain an important centre of Welsh culture, despite the growing dominance of Cardiff. The UK parliament's first Labour Party MP, Keir Hardie was elected from the area and the Valleys remain a stronghold of Labour Party power. Rugby union is very popular and pitches can be seen along the valley floors. Football is also popular in the valleys, as in the rest of the UK. The area was overwhelmingly Welsh-speaking at the end of the nineteenth century, but today, English is most commonly the everyday language.
The geographical shape of the valleys have their effect on culture. Many roads stretch along valleys connecting the different settlements in the valley. Consequently the different towns in a valley are more closely associated with each other than they are with towns in the neighbouring valley, even when the towns in the neighbouring valley are closer on the map. The Heads of the Valleys road, the A465 road, is significant due to its connection of valleys with each other, and there are hopes that the upgrading of this road to dual carriageway will improve the economic performance of the region as the road becomes the main thoroughfare to South West Wales from the West Midlands.
Read more about this topic: South Wales Valleys
Famous quotes containing the word culture:
“Everyone in our culture wants to win a prize. Perhaps that is the grand lesson we have taken with us from kindergarten in the age of perversions of Dewey-style education: everyone gets a ribbon, and praise becomes a meaningless narcotic to soothe egoistic distemper.”
—Gerald Early (b. 1952)
“The problem of culture is seldom grasped correctly. The goal of a culture is not the greatest possible happiness of a people, nor is it the unhindered development of all their talents; instead, culture shows itself in the correct proportion of these developments. Its aim points beyond earthly happiness: the production of great works is the aim of culture.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)
“Both cultures encourage innovation and experimentation, but are likely to reject the innovator if his innovation is not accepted by audiences. High culture experiments that are rejected by audiences in the creator’s lifetime may, however, become classics in another era, whereas popular culture experiments are forgotten if not immediately successful. Even so, in both cultures innovation is rare, although in high culture it is celebrated and in popular culture it is taken for granted.”
—Herbert J. Gans (b. 1927)