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Old 08-05-2010, 05:41 AM
 
146 posts, read 392,145 times
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What local experience or "thing" is it that makes a person a "Bostonian"?
Is it riding the T?
Eating breakfast lunch and dinner at Dunkin Donuts?
Being a lawyer?
Going to Harvard?
Pronouncing "car" as "cah"?

So, how do you define a Bostonian in a simple stereotype?
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Old 08-05-2010, 09:04 AM
 
Location: Newton, Mass.
2,954 posts, read 12,262,641 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by shiraziman View Post
What local experience or "thing" is it that makes a person a "Bostonian"?
Is it riding the T?
Eating breakfast lunch and dinner at Dunkin Donuts?
Being a lawyer?
Going to Harvard?
Pronouncing "car" as "cah"?

So, how do you define a Bostonian in a simple stereotype?
Maybe it's just coming from Boston? All the stuff on your list is part of Boston, but plenty of people have spent their whole lives here without doing any of them.

A rise in blood pressure at the sight of a Yankees logo might be a good sign, though.

Why lawyer? I'd think doctor would be more fitting.
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Old 08-05-2010, 09:40 AM
 
Location: a bar
2,710 posts, read 6,072,487 times
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You'll need to own at least one scally cap, and a Bird throwback jersey.
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Old 08-05-2010, 11:50 AM
 
7,235 posts, read 7,000,849 times
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There are a thousand different ways to be a Bostonian. This is a city with many, many different races, income levels, careers, ages, interests, neighborhood niches....how can one experience be the quintessential one?
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Old 08-05-2010, 12:12 PM
 
40 posts, read 107,578 times
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Hating the Yankees
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Old 08-05-2010, 03:03 PM
 
39 posts, read 163,288 times
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I don't hear too many people with the "cah" accent, unless you go into Revere or parts of Southie. I think Good Will Hunting just perpetuated that stereotye. Also, I don't care about sports. The sports fanaticism comes more from the communities outside Boston... which you clearly notice if you ride the commuter rail after any sporting event.
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Old 08-05-2010, 08:21 PM
 
4,948 posts, read 18,629,946 times
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I guess if born in Boston and loyal to the Red Sox may do! If not just be you and don't wish for
where I did live etc.! One word Boston is loyal to there teams in sports even if it took the Red Sox years to reward the faithfull!
Boston in Forbes voted the faith of Boston in the Red Sox tops!
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Old 08-05-2010, 10:06 PM
 
Location: SoCal
2,261 posts, read 7,204,872 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by NG1284 View Post
I don't hear too many people with the "cah" accent, unless you go into Revere or parts of Southie. I think Good Will Hunting just perpetuated that stereotye. Also, I don't care about sports. The sports fanaticism comes more from the communities outside Boston... which you clearly notice if you ride the commuter rail after any sporting event.
Are you KIDDING me? EVERYONE... and I mean EVERYONE here has the Boston accent. OK, I know maybe 4 people who don't (and even THEY say "I sawr it," including me). Most of the people I know don't think they have an accent, though. I once took a poll. Just today my cousin was saying she'd gotten rid of her Boston accent (and, ironically, made fun of my sister for having one, heh). I didn't have the heart to tell her that she really really hasn't. So, maybe you just don't hear it because you're used to it?

Anyway, I think what makes a Bostonian is the requisite crew cut, baseball hat (backwards or forwards), khaki shorts or pants, sports team t-shirt. And a really really bad accent.

Mostly the accent. I can spot a Bostonian a mile away on TV, movies, and sometimes even just walking down the street in LA.
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Old 08-05-2010, 10:18 PM
 
39 posts, read 163,288 times
Reputation: 20
Quote:
Originally Posted by readymade View Post
Are you KIDDING me? EVERYONE... and I mean EVERYONE here has the Boston accent. OK, I know maybe 4 people who don't (and even THEY say "I sawr it," including me). Most of the people I know don't think they have an accent, though. I once took a poll. Just today my cousin was saying she'd gotten rid of her Boston accent (and, ironically, made fun of my sister for having one, heh). I didn't have the heart to tell her that she really really hasn't. So, maybe you just don't hear it because you're used to it
That may be, though I've been in California for about two months and nobody has called me on it yet

Also, what I consider to be the "Boston" accent is the oh-so-cannonical "pahk the cah in havad yahd". I only know three or four people who actually talk like that.
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Old 08-05-2010, 10:31 PM
 
548 posts, read 2,091,309 times
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If you aspire to be a Bostonian, you can't rush it. Authentic Bostonians have been here a while. It helps to be Irish, Italian, WASP, or African-American and know which neighborhoods are which. You know what a trolley car is...but you don't know where Whitey Bulger is.

I agree with NG184 about the team sports fanaticism being suburban. A Bostonian might be more attuned to hurling or camogie, and know their museums and libraries. Many have an intimate personal relationship to the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, certain individual paintings or collections in the MFA, and the Busch Reisinger or Fogg in Cambridge, and have favorite trees at the Arnold Arboretum.
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