I agree, there should be a distinction. However, judging from your description, the two are not so different. In my (southern) opinion, a southern gentlemen in southern America is usually of high socioeconomic status, very formal, well-dressed, and essentially overlaps with The Charmer. They stand out in a crowd; you know one when you see them.
Additionally, this page is under the impression that American southern gentleman no longer exist in the south and are only used in fiction that take place around the Civil War. I'll do some serious work on this page when I have more time. Just look at the Southern Belle page and note the disproportionate content. Not to mention the notable southern gentleman of Tennessee William's plays and classic films like Gone With the Wind aren't even mentioned... But yeah, back to writing my damn biopsych paper...
I am wondering, is John Carter (of Mars), no a splendid specimen of an "Officer and a Southern Gentleman"?
The two ARE different, because London, the capital of England, is in the south of England. However, the capital of the USA is not in the South. The standard stereotype of the posh English accent is from the south of England, but the American south is nothing alike - it's more rednecky, religious, countryside etc.
To most of the world apart from England (including the rest of Britain, given this troper is Scottish) "Southern Gentleman" means this trope, while "Southern American Gentleman" means a polite man from Brazil.
Being a Southerner (born in Alabama and raised in Georgia), I know this trope very well. The reality is that the "Southern Gentleman" never really existed. Sure, you could pick out examples here and there, but those are exceptions to the rule. The idea of the Southern Gentleman was born out of the Reconstruction (post American Civil War for the non Americans) South. Almost all examples you could provide in literature won't have existed until the 1870's at the earliest.
That being said, American Southerners tend to be a little more polite that our Northern brethren. We aren't all racists despite popular belief and Southerners are generally accepting of non-Southerners (the American South has a large population of South-East Asian immigrants (Hmong, among others).
While this trope is less offensive to me as a Southerner than others (barring the racist, KKK stuff) I generally embrace it's essence. We Southerners are genteel, friendly, and accepting of others.
The problem is that in England, a southern gentleman is someone quite posh, from the south. Someone wearing a suit, with a posh southern English accent. This article seems to assume that everyone is American, which they are not. It should be renamed to Southern American Gentleman, just so we're clear.
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