Staying "Minnesota Nice" in a Conversation.

I first heard the term "Minnesota Nice" when I came here to the University of Minnesota last year. I myself being from Wisconsin practice the same sorts of mannerisms that Minnesotans use in everyday life. When you really try to escape the hegemony to look at yourself with outside eyes, the little things become really apparent. This is when I noticed how my body really is a docile body even during conversation.

Take a look at this clip from the movie "Fargo." Even though the movie exaggerates the quirks of Minnesotans, these exaggerations prove useful in allowing those of us ingrained the in the culture to see how we talk and act. First, there the wave. This comes before any verbal greeting. Notice how the police officer and the man then keep a solid five or six feet between them. People in Minnesota, unless meeting for the first time, don't tend to shake hands, and they always keep their distance. Even when I shake hands with someone, we step in, and as soon as the hands release, the other person steps back a foot or so, and so do I. People keep their distance in an attempt at respecting the other person, and trying not to seem offensive or pushy. It is our Minnesotan way of having intelligible bodies and by assuming the other person doesn't want to get close. What's tricky is if we are really being polite or has it only become a social construction by our docile bodies?

But there is still more. Notice at the end of the clip how the men never say goodbye. They awkwardly turn around and mention the weather, and then leave. People never want to say, "I'm sorry, but I have to go," in the Midwest. We are always trapped in these long or awkward goodbyes because we never want to be rude. People here in the Midwest always work themselves into those double binds, where both people want to leave but both are afraid they will insult the person by saying they can't talk.

After watching "Fargo" and seeing myself as an cultural object, it became clear that I don't really do these things to be nice. When I was born in Wisconsin, I was always-already a polite Midwesterner, and I'm not really controlling my mannerisms in conversation. My position in culture does that for me.