Editing Southwestern United States (section)

===Historical/archeological===
{{See also|Oasisamerica}}
As the [[Territorial evolution of the United States|US expanded westward]], the country's [[American frontier|western border]] also shifted westward, and consequently, so did the location of the Southwestern and [[Northwestern United States]]. In the early years of the United States, [[Overmountain Men|newly colonized lands]] lying immediately west of the Appalachian Mountains were [[State cessions|detached]] from North Carolina and given the name [[Southwest Territory]]. During the decades that followed, the [[Old Southwest|region known as "the Southwestern United States"]] covered much of the [[Deep South]] east of the Mississippi River.

However, as territories and eventual states to the west were added after the [[Mexican–American War]], the geographical "Southwest" expanded, and the relationship of these new acquisitions to the South itself became "increasingly unclear."<ref name="ReferenceA">"Encyclopedia of Southern Culture". Charles Reagan Wilson and William Ferris. University of North Carolina Press 1989</ref>

However, archeologist, Erik Reed, gives a description which is the most widely accepted as defining the American Southwest, which runs from Durango, Colorado in the north, to Durango, Mexico, in the south, and from Las Vegas, Nevada in the west to Las Vegas, New Mexico in the East. Reed's definition is roughly equivalent to the western half of the Learning Center of the American Southwest's definition, leaving out any portion of Kansas and Oklahoma, and much of Texas, as well as the eastern half of New Mexico. Since this article is about the Southwestern United States, the areas of Sonora and Chihuahua in Mexico will be excluded. The portion left includes Arizona and western New Mexico, the very southernmost part of Utah, southwestern Colorado, the very tip of west Texas, and triangle formed by the southern tip of Nevada. This will be the defined scope that is used in this article unless otherwise specified in a particular area.<ref name=LCASDefine />