How much time does it take to become a local?

[iheartthed]

This is inspired by the "real New Yorker" purity tests that are popular on social media right now. Anyway, how long does someone need to live in your city/metro before they can claim to be a local?

In my opinion, you become a New York City local when a native or long time resident cannot tell you are not from the city without directly asking the question. If you moved here as an adult then I think this requires about five years on the low end, and perhaps up to 10 years of living in the city. The exception to this are immigrants who have permanently relocated to one of the ethnic enclaves in the city. Those people are immediately accepted as locals. For people who do not fit into an exception box, I think you must at least fit one of these criteria:

-You've experienced at least one large scale national or local disaster or traumatic event (9/11, Hurricane Sandy, COVID). These tend to happen about once a decade, so if you've been here at least a decade then you've likely experienced one.

-You can authoritatively reminisce about some local institution that no longer exists. If you can reminisce about the Times Square Toys R Us, Modell's, the Virgin Megastores, J&R on Park Row, etc., you're a local. (The Times Square Red Lobster will soon join this list.)

-You have developed friendships and/or romantic relationships with people who were raised here. This is actually the short cut to becoming a local. The native New Yorkers will never consider you one of them but they also won't just consider you to be a "transplant" or "gentrifier" if you have

[mhays]

In Seattle the official test is not owning an umbrella but owning a performance rain jacket.

Also you have to correctly say "Pike Place Market." And you have to know that the airport is Sea-Tac but the city it's in is SeaTac. And properly pronounce Puyallup and Sequim.

[sopas ej]

I think generally, it takes around 5 years to become a native fill-in-the-blank demonym. Of course this varies on a person's willingness to immerse yourself into a place's culture and "assimilate."

Typically, I can tell someone's not a native Angeleno if they don't pronounce certain streets or place names the way natives do, like:

-Wilshire
-Los Feliz (though I've been noticing for a while now that there's some variation even among native Angelenos with this one)
-San Pedro

Some other ones that show someone's a native/assimilated into Los Angeles-dom:

Thinking it's cold below 60 degrees Fahrenheit.

Knowing what a Sigalert is.

Getting around LA without a map/GPS.

Knowing you can stay in the far right lanes southbound on the 110 through downtown and still continue on with thru traffic.

Knowing you can park at a yellow curb after hours or on Sundays without getting a parking ticket (I learned this at age 18, when I started going clubbing in West Hollywood).

Saying "the" before freeway route numbers, and NOT saying "the" before PCH.

Seeing celebrities and not thinking it's a big deal.

Calling it the Rose Parade and NOT the Rose Bowl Parade.

When people start asking you for LA recommendations (restaurants, nightclubs, good sushi places, etc.). I had a good co-worker friend years ago who I assumed was from LA, but as it turned out, she was from Schenectady, NY. She lived in Venice and knew all about the cool spots. It was fun hanging out with her.

[ColDayMan]

For Columbus, a week.
For Dayton, about 5 years or until you can pronounce Russia and Wapakoneta correctly.
For Cincinnati, never.

[JManc]

In Houston, if you can pronounce "Kuykendahl" Rd. correctly, you're a local.

[pj3000]

I think you have to grow up in a city to truly be considered a local. Your formative years of social-educational-physical-intellectual-cultural-cranial-etc. development have to be imbued with all the varied influences of living in a certain place. That's what makes you a local.

[Steely Dan]

You'd think that 6 generations (and currently raising the 7th) would be good enough to qualify me as a local, but I have friends who will legit argue that I can never be a True Chicagoan™ because my parents raised me "out in the fuckin' suburbs".

Despite the fact that I've lived here my whole life.

Despite the fact that I've never put ketchup on a hot dog.

Despite the fact that I was born into multi-generational chicago sports fandom like a religion.

Despite the fact that my freaking great great great grandparents home was destroyed in the great chicago fire of 1871.



And many people on this forum try to argue that city limits don't matter, hmph.

So to answer the question, it's all relative to how petty and provincial one wants to be.

[muppet]

Accent. If you arrived a few days ago, but speak one of the London accents most people will assume you are local and treat you as such, even if you arrived a week ago. There is a weird phenomenon I saw in Manchester of the teens speaking in South London accents, no longer Mancunian ones, despite never having set foot in London -such is national media.


On the flip side, many people who've lived here the majority of their lives but still speak with a non-London accent will often be asked where they're from. This is a bug bear for Northerners who tend to tone down their accents or lose them entirely.


Three London accents.

Cockney 0:46, Contemporary Received Pronunciation (CRP) 2:11, Estuary 3:43




• Video Link

There is also Multicultural London English (MLE) and South Asian MLE -you no longer have to be of any particular ethnicity or class to speak either of them.

• Video Link

[Hudson11]

go hang out at a bar for a couple of nights a week for like a month. People will learn your face. Heck, it doesnt need to be a bar. Just support local businesses regularly.

[xzmattzx]

There's a few ways to know you are a local in Delaware.

~ You are officially from Delaware if you have gone to one of the Delaware beaches.
~ You are officially from Delaware if you see someone from a place you know in another spot. For instance, if you see someone from work at a baseball game, or someone from your church or your kid's sports team at the beach. (This sounds like any neighborhood or city anywhere, but you would have to know from living here.)
~ You are officially from Delaware if you see a Delaware license plate out in the wild in some other state, and you check to see if you know who is driving (one time in western New York, I actually drove past someone I knew).

There's a few other things as well, but these give you an idea of how insular it is in Delaware. Once you are "inside" as much as other locals, you are a local.

[James Bond Agent 007]

I think the only criteria necessary to becoming a "real" Kansas Citian is that you've gone to a local BBQ joint at least a few times and have a couple Chiefs T-shirts.

[craigs]

Fuck this bogus gatekeeping shit. If you live in Los Angeles, you are a local.

[pj3000]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

You'd think that 6 generations (and currently raising the 7th) would be good enough to qualify me as a local, but I have friends who will legit argue that I can never be a True Chicagoan™ because my parents raised me "out in the fuckin' suburbs".

Yeah, that's BS.

I think if you grew up within a let's say 30-mile radius of the city, then you can consider yourself a local.

[Riverranchdrone]

In Texas, if you are not born in Texas, then you will never really be a Texan. If you are from outside of the state, people will assume you are from Cali.

[MolsonExport]

On Amity Island, unless you are born there, you can never be called an "islander"

-Jaws (1975)

[PhilliesPhan]

5-10 years is a good barometer for Philly. In that time, you should learn how to pronounce the following words:

-Schuylkill
-Shackamaxon
-Cynwyd
-Llanerch
-Lancaster
-Swarthmore (you don't pronounce the first "r")
-Nesquehoning

You should also know the following phrases and mannerisms:

-"Down the Shore"
-"North-south street and east-west street" (it annoys me when transplants say "Market and 17th" instead of "17th and Market)
-Crossing against the light (if no cars are coming, nobody waits for the crossing signal)

I'm more a purist when it comes to the suburbanites saying that they're "from Philly". It's fine when you're traveling outside of the region, but I'll absolutely call you out on it when you're within the city. Living in Philly is radically different than living in its suburbs (with a few exceptions, such as Southwest Philly vs Darby and Fox Chase vs Rockledge). Too many suburbanites don't know how to navigate the city outside of Center City and the Sports Complex, don't know how to take SEPTA outside of the Regional Rail, and generally lack the street smarts that come with living in the city for years.

[pj3000]

Originally Posted by Riverranchdrone

In Texas, if you are not born in Texas, then you will never really be a Texan. If you are from outside of the state, people will assume you are from Cali.

So if you're born Dallas, but you're parents move to California when you are 2 months old and you grow up in Los Angeles and reside there for your entire life, you are a Texan?

But if you're born in Los Angeles, but your parents move to Texas when you are 2 months old and you grow up in Dallas and reside there for your entire life, you are not a Texan?

[pj3000]

Originally Posted by PhilliesPhan

5-10 years is a good barometer for Philly. In that time, you should learn how to pronounce the following words:

-Schuylkill
-Shackamaxon
-Cynwyd
-Llanerch
-Lancaster
-Swarthmore (you don't pronounce the first "r")
-Nesquehoning

You should also know the following phrases and mannerisms:

-"Down the Shore"
-"North-south street and east-west street" (it annoys me when transplants say "Market and 17th" instead of "17th and Market)
-Crossing against the light (if no cars are coming, nobody waits for the crossing signal)

You're pretty generous! I think most of my family/friends/colleagues from Philadelphia are way more hardline on what it means to be "from Philly"

Originally Posted by PhilliesPhan

I'm more a purist when it comes to the suburbanites saying that they're "from Philly". It's fine when you're traveling outside of the region, but I'll absolutely call you out on it when you're within the city. Living in Philly is radically different than living in its suburbs (with a few exceptions, such as Southwest Philly vs Darby and Fox Chase vs Rockledge). Too many suburbanites don't know how to navigate the city outside of Center City and the Sports Complex, don't know how to take SEPTA outside of the Regional Rail, and generally lack the street smarts that come with living in the city for years.

Totally true, but this seems to be pretty much par for the course for many older big cities, no?

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by muppet

Accent. If you arrived a few days ago, but speak one of the London accents most people will assume you are local and treat you as such, even if you arrived a week ago. There is a weird phenomenon I saw in Manchester of the teens speaking in South London accents, no longer Mancunian ones, despite never having set foot in London -such is national media.


On the flip side, many people who've lived here the majority of their lives but still speak with a non-London accent will often be asked where they're from. This is a bug bear for Northerners who tend to tone down their accents or lose them entirely.

That's interesting. Something close to the reverse seems to have happened in NYC. The famous "New York" accents have aged out and/or moved to the suburbs. Most native New Yorkers under the age of 50 have adopted a neutral North American accent. There is a modified accent in some pockets of the city that is still holding but it's milder. For instance, there's a localized version of the accent typical and among Black and Dominican natives to the Bronx. But nowadays the strongest New York accents are usually on white NYC public service workers (police, fire, transit) who live on Long Island or in the Hudson Valley.

[mr1138]

Originally Posted by pj3000

You're pretty generous! I think most of my family/friends/colleagues from Philadelphia are way more hardline on what it means to be "from Philly"

Totally true, but this seems to be pretty much par for the course for many older big cities, no?

My impression is that this is generally true. The city-limit debate seems to matter a LOT more in older big cities where life in the city is truly different than life in the suburbs. Somebody on this forum recently tried to call me out for saying I am a Denver local when I actually live in a nearby suburb and, as some might recall, I was not having that shit. In the west, cities are basically suburban in character outside of their downtown areas anyway, and in places like Phoenix and Houston, the cities went ahead and annexed what would have become their own suburbs, and then proceeded to allow the land to be developed in the most suburban manner possible. So I will die on the hill that our city limits are a figment of our political imagination and the metro area is the actual city.

Originally Posted by iheartthed

That's interesting. Something close to the reverse seems to have happened in NYC. The famous "New York" accents have aged out and/or moved to the suburbs. Most native New Yorkers under the age of 50 have adopted a neutral North American accent. There is a modified accent in some pockets of the city that is still holding but it's milder. For instance, there's a localized version of the accent typical and among Black and Dominican natives to the Bronx. But nowadays the strongest New York accents are usually on white NYC public service workers (police, fire, transit) who live on Long Island or in the Hudson Valley.

I recently watched an interesting YouTube video about this. The presenter makes a case that mass media does not have as big an effect on people's accents as we might think. What really appears to influence somebody's accent is the result of face-to-face interaction with people whose social approval matters to us.

This totally makes sense to me, because we are all exposed to different kinds of accents through the media all the time. But HEARING another accent isn't what matters. What matters is the nods of approval we get from our peers, and people will subconsciously alter the way they speak to obtain this approval. This also explains why accents change with generations, because the approval of one's friends or peers often matters more than the approval of their parents. And this can also explain why teens in a certain city might start to adopt a new accent, or why blue-collar workers in Long Island might retain the old-school New York accent even while younger people in the city have been shaking it off.

He also directly addresses the spread of the London accent and makes the case that this is the result of mobility, not media.

https://youtu.be/su2IeakC7tc?si=sUJWbpS4jOlI8yZC