re: Houston is the cultural capital of the South

Well, economy, past times, food, and architecture all are an input of and expression of an area's culture.

________________________________________________
It's not driving the future in regards to industry and job creation. It does remain a cultural hub re: food and music. It's also an extremely diverse city which lends itself to cultural innovation.
________________________________________________
Sad to say, but....that's all you have....show me some meaningful industry that's moving to New Orleans and I will hang up and listen - LA born and raised and lived in BR, NO, and Houston. Houston (and Dallas) sucked out 75%+ of the talent from LA over the past 40 years. Houston has been known for years as the "Concrete City" due to constant expansion and epic traffic jams and commute time for suburbanites. It's never been considered a "mecca" for culture - but, to say it's a big nothingburger in landscape of American cities is just not being honest - HUGE, HUGE medical complex with long history of the world's finest MD's and hospitals, oil and gas capital of the world, banking, arts, sports, aeronautics/space industry.....shall we continue?? I'll take that over a couple of "Jackson Square's" and other fine architectures of the past. The statues are all being torn down now by the "cultural police".....and I can get some pretty good Cajun food in Houston nowadays - many of the LA chefs have moved there from So. LA long ago!!

Not a Texas lover - Geaux Tigers through and through - but I can be honest about our state's shortcomings - they are many!

I was in Houston this weekend.. This is laughable. It's not all that bad. Not the most exciting city to be in, but has some things to do... But its not the cultural capital of anything.

That’s how it always has been and some of the greats throughout history such as Michelangelo or Mozart were payed by rich people who were interested in high art. They didn’t produce their works for some peasant on the street.
Quote:

And the fact that money was thrown at the art doesn’t make the cultural contribution any less significant.

Anyway, my original point was that when Houston is referred to as a “cultural hub”, what is meant by that is significant contributions to art and culture are coming from Houston. New Orleanians eating red beans and rice on Monday is local culture but has nothing to do with what is meant by the term “cultural hub”.
---------------------------------------------

Well said - about the best thing we can say for LA is that many of LA's finest help build Houston and Dallas into what they are today. The talent drain from LA to TX happened long before Katrina.....and we're not just talking sports.