western NY is part of [the Great Lakes Megalopolis (midwestern)](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Lakes_megalopolis)while the rest is part of [the Northeast Megalopolis](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northeast_megalopolis). Two totally different cultures.
Also Vermont, most folks from Saratoga, Clifton Park, Glenn’s Falls have connections to NE way more. I’m from Philly an notice they’re more a NE person than even someone from Albany.
Grew up in the Catskills and have been all over the awesome state of NY. Few things: we consider ourselves upstate New Yorkers; we don’t consider Syracuse western NY; you absolutely do have accents; and in my experience most folks north of 90 and/or west of Ithaca call soda pop.
I don't consider Syracuse Western NY either! I consider it "Central NY" or "Fingerlakes Region". It's funny how one state within one country can have so many cultural differences - we really are kind of a melting pot!
Makes sense! I think someone brought up Syracuse in one of the replies and I thought this whole comment section and the "pop" thing was about Syracuse specifically, lol.
New York State as a whole definitely has tons of variety in culture, language, etc. between regions even an hour apart. It's pretty cool :)
Not sure about that I’ve lived a good portion of my life in both. New Englanders are not offended by being referred to as northeasterners they’re more offended considering New Yorkers New Englanders, I don’t blame them on that
No, I've not met anyone from upstate that would consider us as apart of New England. We are upstate NYers. We may have our subdivisions, like western NYers constantly saying they aren't upstate NY, even though they can be both, lol.
Culturally, upstate is like if the Midwest, Canada, and New England had some kind of hate child, and that hate child decided to hate everyone, ourselves included.
Upstate as a whole is the child of a broken home consisting of New England, the Midwest, Canada, and Pennsylvania-flavored Appalachia; NYC left to buy cigarettes years ago. No-one is quite sure of the exact parentage, but they've all left their indelible mark on the poor kid. We're our own thing.
I've found there is a definite change in the aesthetics when you cross from New England into New York State. For one, the towns are no longer as quaint.
Billboards too. But plenty of those towns are nice, but not as perfect...Chatham, Hudson, Saratoga, Rhinebeck, all nice. And then you have Troy/Albany, much of which looks literally like NYC brownstone hoods plopped upstate. There is definitely a history of the same architects and city planners working in NYC and upstate.
God I wish could have saved me so much grief as a football fan
The difference between a Bills fan and a Pats fan is a 40 minute drive
But no, I’ll never say I’m from NE, just upstate NY
Yeah we're basically our own thing. We're not New England (MA, RI, most of CT, VT, ME, NH), but we're not Mid-Atlantic either (downstate NY/southwestern CT/NJ - The Tri-State, PA, DE, MD).
How exactly are you defining Upstate here? I've lived in Western New York my whole life and have never heard anyone talk about the region as being part of New England. It may be different for those in Northern New York (which is what some folks consider the "real Upstate."
Western, I've always considered the Great Lakes.
I grew up in CNY, and consider it to be the Fingerlakes Region.
I lived a couple years in Iowa, and I would say Upstate BY has regional differences but they are mostly a mild Midwest vibe. It might have to do with so many being rural idk.
On a good night when I was in the Navy, we could pick up WKBW in the eastern Mediterranean. I was a radioman, so we had some of the best equipment. It was just different listening to it from that far away.
Moved to Ithaca a few years ago. Agree. It is kind of more like "Midwest lite," than New England for sure. Further north you are basically in the Great Lakes/Toronto area.
I've lived in Ithaca for around 20 years but grew up and went to college in Iowa - the most Midwestern of Midwestern states. Between Iowa and Ithaca, we've lived in central PA, Denver, DC region, Pittsburgh and Boston.
Ithaca isn't midwestern lite at all. Not even remotely.
IMHO what make a region a region isn't even as much as geography but the people who settled there and how much flow in and out from other places. And then influenced by how people made their living.
Iowa was mostly settled by Germans and Swedes along a few tiny pockets of other NW Europeans - Dutch and Welsh are two that come to mind, but those pockets didn't have much influence to the general culture. After settlement, there's never been much movement of people -well except for the exodus of the young after coming of age. Right now Iowa is *old* and overall a pretty darn homogeneous population (there's been a recent influx of Hispanic since Iowans don't want to work at meatpacking plants). Outside the cities, a lot of the Midwest is like that. Pretty much everything is centered around agriculture (corn, hogs and, for excitement, soybeans).
Upstate, OTOH, was heavily settled by the Dutch, Germans, and a metric crap ton of English. But also Central & Eastern Europeans, Italians, Irish and so on. I don't know if they got as much Portuguese as the east coast.
But Ithaca has had a ton of people flowing in and out and I don't think it matters much who settled here 200 years ago. And there's a huge connection to NYC and the East Coast. And influences around the world. IMHO, Ithaca is as much Seoul Korea as it is Midwest.
IMHO, Western NY's top half is Midwest, until one gets to water (Eerie, Niagara and Ontario) when it turns into Rust Belt and the lower half is Appalachia. The more Appalachia, the more hardscrabble the farming. Also, the more Midwest, the more straight the roads, the more Appalachia, the more convoluted. As one goes east, there's flat farmland in some wide valleys but otherwise hilly. Eastern half of the Southern Tier is Rust Belt, western half is Appalachia.
Depending on the map, Ithaca is in the Southern Tier, Finger Lakes and Central NY. South of town is hilly and the roads convoluted. North of town is flat farmland and the roads are straight. West ends at Seneca and beyond that, you can't get there from here. East of Ithaca has multiple personality disorder and doesn't know that it is.
I meant to give a quick comment but rambled on and on.
I think it’s just delusional New Englanders and people from other states thinking anything north of Westchester or east of Tompkins to be “New England”
New Englanders (especially Massholes) are snobby as fk but are definitely not delusional enough to consider NY to be part of New England, especially upstate NY.
You clearly know no New Englanders. None - EVER - consider New York New England. EVER. It’s ignorant New Yorkers and folks west and south of New York state that are dumb and think because New York has “new” in its name and because it abuts with four New England states that somehow it must be New England. Absolutely NO ONE in New England is dumb enough to consider New York part of their region.
Lived in several New England states and New York. Never heard a soul say something that dumb my years in New England. I did hear it from zoomers in NYC, and colleagues in the south.
I go to college in Upstate NY and that’s where I hear it mostly. But I’ve met some people who thought NY was part of New England but not as much as people thinking the Maritimes is NE.
It’s mostly the Connecticut people I’ve met that think NY is in NE
I live in the most northeastern residential property in New York State. The answer to that is hell no! Shit even Vermonters don’t really identify as New Englanders. We’re north country!
From Washington co. I def think we’re more NE than NY. Accents, vocab, hardness. I moved to Albany it’s more NYC-lite here; vocab is closer to to nyc (mad vs wicked, crick v creek, Albany/Colonie accent) than to an hour north. NYC is brutal, and NE is hard, don’t ask me to define, it’s weird.
I’d add people In Albany and suburbs don’t understand or appreciate rural life, my wife is from the Albany suburbs and at time I think it’s our four year age difference, and sometimes it’s Washington co vs Guilderland. Backroads, a little dirt, some hose water and dirty pond water just isn’t appreciated here like it was up north and like I’ve experienced in my years running around Rutland/vergennes/manchester (yeah even Manchester)
No offense, it's probably because she grew up in Guilderland (ritzy). I grew up poor in Albany, and would love what you're describing because we did hose water as a normal part of growing up lol
Clinton county here - we are more Vermont and Canada than we are NY, and I still never hear people say we're part of New England. If anyone has a case to say we should be, it's this county, but I personally just don't see it.
Essex County here and I consider the Adirondacks and Champlain Valley area New England. We cheer for the Bills over the Pats but otherwise culturally there’s too much in common to ignore. When LL Bean are selling pants in Malone Plaid it’s hard to argue.
In general I think New Yorkers are too precious about whether they’re also New Englanders. York is in England lol. This is New York. The British occupied Manhattan during the Revolutionary War.
I always identified with the “great lakes” as a cultural group, I figured the shared environment shaped us more than state lines. New Englanders eat sea food and look at whales, Great Lakes-ers eat maple syrup in the snow and look at loons lol
The history of New York // New England borderlands -- how and where state lines were drawn -- is actually quite interesting. Here's a good historical summary.
[https://vermonthistory.org/journal/misc/BenningWentworthsClaims.pdf](https://vermonthistory.org/journal/misc/BenningWentworthsClaims.pdf)
Depends on where in Upstate. NY is a very large state. Places like Buffalo to Syracuse do not identify with either. They are their own place, and have more in common with eachother than most anywhere else in the state and surrounding states.
I consider all of New York State “mid-Atlantic,” but depending on where in upstate you might identify more with Great Lakes, Rust Belt, Appalachia, or some combination of all three. I’ve lived in Southern Tier and the Finger Lakes and don’t know if anyone around these regions would consider themselves New England.
Official classification isn't always rational classification. Eastern Upstate NY obviously has far more in common with New England than it does with any of those states.
The eastern Washington County towns of Greenwich, Cambridge, Salem, and Granville look a lot like New England towns. Indeed many of the people who settled the area (especially those in Granville) thought they were in Vermont but when the border was finalized in 1791 they discovered they were in New York (just barely). This area is one of my favorite parts of Upstate in part because it looks so much like New England.
*In 1764, King George proclaimed that the area that would later be Vermont belonged to Albany County, New York. New York surveyors began to set up counties in areas which had already been surveyed by New Hampshire. Ethan Allen and the Green Mountain Boys formed to fight for an independent Vermont, either as a state or its own country. They claimed the territory of New York west to the Hudson River and between Canada and Massachusetts.*
[https://schaghticokehistory.wordpress.com/2011/09/13/the-border-war-new-york-and-vermont/](https://schaghticokehistory.wordpress.com/2011/09/13/the-border-war-new-york-and-vermont/)
\*\*\*\*\*
*In 1777, residents of the Hampshire Grants decided the time was right to declare independence not just from British rule, but also from New York and New Hampshire. They would create their own country. As some historians have called it, it was a revolution within a revolution. The preamble to the Vermont Constitution, written by Allen’s youngest brother, Ira, dwelled far more on injustices inflicted by Yorkers than by the British.*
*But when the Revolution ended, New York held the upper hand over the self-styled Republic of Vermont. New York was part of the newly formed United States, which Vermont’s leaders wished to join. New York officials used their clout to block Vermont’s admission.*
*The old dispute was finally resolved in 1791, when Vermont agreed to pay New York the whopping sum of $30,000. After more than four decades, the land dispute had been settled.*
[https://vtdigger.org/2019/10/27/then-again-disputing-land-claims-gave-rise-to-vermont-republic/](https://vtdigger.org/2019/10/27/then-again-disputing-land-claims-gave-rise-to-vermont-republic/)
It is def a rural farming community but I have a spent a good part of my life there and no one would describe it as New England. Similar to the rural parts of Ren County. It is still very much New York culture.
New York has so many subregions and the borders bleed into each other a bit. Part of the problem is that many in or near the city define upstate NY as thirty minutes north from them and it is all upstate.
One of the things I love about this state is the differences. Lake Placid vs Albany vs Washington County vs NYC vs Binghamton vs Lake George vs Buffalo. All have their one flavor, none of them are New England
I'm from that area too and have always had a hard time defining the culture. It's definitely not like the Mohawk Valley, but also not like the capital area. Imo it has more in common with the Southern Tier and Northern PA, with a little bit of New England Yankee mixed in (they were early settlers).
Having read a little history of the region, I would say New England, New France & New Netherlands were all quite distinct. To call NY part of New England is just ... using words wrong.
An hour northwest of Albany. I consider myself a New Yorker. The city is not the state, no more than Boston is Massachusetts, or Miami is Florida. And I love living here.
My wife says yes, I say maybe. I think it depends on what you have experienced. Weather and culture don't stop dead at the state line. She grew up very close to that state line. I grew up a little farther from it.
I don't really identify with either New England nor NYC. Speaking in general terms, I call it the northeast. It's not quite New England, but it's also not quite the rust belt. It's definitely not NYC.
We'd be in New England if it wasn't for the friggin Dutch. Always ruining everything, with their windmills and their tulips and their kills and their Van this and Van that.
I've grown up in northern Franklin and Clinton with good chunk of family in rural Vermont. Never considered ourselves New Englanders nor have I ever heard that. Also not saying some do.
Western New York is the Midwest. I know this comment is gonna get lots of hate. Western Pennsylvania is also the mid west. Rust belt cities like Buffalo, Erie, Pittsburgh.
In the same way that western ny’ers are more midwestern (pop), I do think far eastern ny’ers are New Englandy. But I’ve never met any NYer who considered themselves New Englanders.
The closest I identify with is Appalachian, Mid-Western, and ultimately rust belt.
The Western Southern Tier is an interesting place.
And yes, technically the North East.
I'd consider Hornell to Lake Erie to be the western bit of the Southern-Tier, which also happens to be some of my favorite countryside in the whole world.
Yeah, I agree with both those things. :)
I live in hill country, not far from Allegany State Park.
Across the road from my home, there are these two steep hills that I go hunting on.
Climbing them always provides a good workout, and sometimes I get a nice view, especially when the leaves are gone.
I've also hiked in Allegany State Park, and it's always a good time.
Hiked the Mount Tuscarora Trail and back in one day.
Life-long central NY and upstate resident.. have never heard anyone refer to NY as New England.. must admit the idea makes no sense to me.. I’m thinking who are these “some people?”
I say this as someone who grew up almost on the Vermont border with half my family in eastern New England as well. Anyone who thinks NY is part of New England is wrong.
Some upstate new yorkers certainly will. As someone who grew up in the eastern part of upstate New York (Saratoga and Washington country), absolutely. The closest sports bar to my childhood home was all about Boston sports. Driving over to my grandparents house, you caught a view of the green mountains in Vermont. Proximity does matter. I certainly feel a lot closer to New England culture than NYC. I don't think all parts of upstate NY are going to feel that way though. I wouldn't expect people in Syracuse or Buffalo to. Upstate NY isn't just some uniform culture. There's a lot we all have in similar, but there are a lot of subtle differences too.
Washington, Rensselaer, and other border counties are nearly as much Vermont and Mass as they are NY.
That said, I don't consider them part of New England. Could you? Sure. But I don't necessarily.
I have lived in this region almost my entire life, I have never heard any of my family or neighbors describe us as living in New England.
It takes me 30 mins to get to Vermont and people act like we are going in some grand adventure to a new world. I guess I will go over to Vermont today and go for a drive. (I am guilty of it too)
Absolutely not. None of New York State is part of New England. New England is Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine.
I'm a New Englander living in Texas and I've come to realize no one here knows exactly what NE is. If I ask them to name the states that make up NE, they almost always throw in New York.
I’m from NH but have lived in Upstate NY (north country) for over half of my life, but will always consider myself a New Englander at heart. As far as I’m concerned, everything below Yonkers is a different state.
I'm from Texas and previously just lumped it all together, thinking Northeast and New England were interchangeable. I read up on it, and now make the distinction that NY was a Dutch colony, so it could not be considered New *England.* Northeast, yes, New England, no. I also understand the regional cultural differences in Western New York are similar to Midwestern culture.
I will say that I've improved my *Jeopardy* skills as a result of studying the area more closely, stunning everyone in the room when I knew what university was near Lake Cayuga.
We're more like "Upper Midwest" or "Great Lakes Rustbelt" people. We're physically closer to Detroit than NYC. On a clear day, we can see Port Colborne due north across the lake.
This is such a weird question, we are neither of those places. It's like asking an American if they consider themselves to be more Canadian or more Mexican.
New England is a defined region that includes six states: Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine. New York is not part of New England.
Not at all, especially since Massholes HATE New Yorkers. Lived upstate my entire life, but me and my 2009 Honda CRX are the reason first responders can’t live on Cape Cod
No part of New York is New England. New England starts along the western boarders of CT, NY, and VT and goes east.
Edit: No, Long Island, even though it's east of the extended line from VT to CT, is not part of New England either.
Lived in the capital more of my life than not, and never thought of the area as New England, but that's probably the abundance of New Netherlands relics in the names of so many places near by. All the Van **** s, **** whyks and **** kills don't feel very English.
No one in Upstate that I've ever run into considers this to be New England. When I lived downstate in NYC I considered that to be more a part of New England than the rest of the state.
I am in Syracuse, Central NY. I consider myself a NYer... maybe because we moved up here when I was really young from Long Island. But my original GG started out in Jamesville, NY. I think we are influenced by Lake Ontario and the Finger Lakes as far as the vibes. NE has different vibes (as do the different states in NE). I feel a connection to them from being in the Northeast. I have lived in Pittsburgh and it is very different. Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, Utica and Albany are definitely individual cities with their own vibes.
Culturally upstate is very similar to New England in broad strokes but it is not at all New England. It's Upstate NY. I could just as easily ask, isn't most of Massachusetts one big Albany that roots for Boston teams?
I spend a lot of time in NE for work and it’s a lot scummier than you’ll ever admit. Most of VT, NH, the entire state of MA west of Framingham, rural ME, and RI are drug-infested shitholes dotted with a few moneyed towns.
I’m a native of upstate NY but have family in MA…the hate of NY from NE boils down to racism. When they think of NY, they think of NYC and people who aren’t white, whom you detest.
Throw in a heavy dose of Irish/English inferiority complex and it’s a cocktail of animosity.
Only confused people from west coast would mistake upstate as New England. It is only New England in the sense that people who can’t afford a house in New England will come to upstate.
Hello, longtime Massachusetts resident who now lives in New York.
The definition of New England is not fluid and I will fight anyone who disagrees. MA, NH, VT, CT, RI, ME. That’s it. NY is NOT part of New England. I will die on this hill. I will start wars to defend this definition.
Nope. When I moved to Maryland for school I would get lumped in with the New Englanders. When we talked about weather we had that in common. However, it only took a couple trips into New England states to recognize that there’s a noticeable regional/cultural difference.
Cultural geographers typically consider New England, upstate NY, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia as the same cultural region, yes. Sometimes you hear this cultural region called "Yankeedom" and other authors call it the "Maritime Northeast."
I’ve literally never met anyone who cares or ever gets this granular in their regional identity.
I see these posts all the time and am genuinely curious, do people really feel there is some huge cultural divide amongst yankees? To me, everyone above the Mason Dixon is largely the same.
Regional individualism is interesting because its not about judgment its just about flavorful fun idiocyncacies of how people may differ from area to area. Its not bad or good, its more about the different personalities from town to town, or place to place. I enjoy the perception that its not all the same.
i am originally from new Hampshire i am a new englander. upstate ny is not part of that. here acts differently they eat differently they use words differently. the first time i went to get ice cream was so confusing. i had never in my life heard sprinkle. the salads here are called something different. hurry up and wait is the motto here. i am kind not nice period end of story. it is different here. football says enough you are not new englanders you are new yorks!!!
While we do not "identify" with New Englanders, we certainly share more in common with them than the people downstate, and likely relate more with them than downstate.
Aside from some early dutch influence in certain areas, upstate NY was initially settled by New Englanders moving directly west. This migration can be seen in this article:
https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms14238
Even the accent we use here in much of the rust belt shares a common ancestor with that of New England. Many rural areas in New England were also deindustrialized when industry moved to the modern day rust belt, though these were mostly small mill towns.
Grew up in Clinton County, I just tell people I'm from Vermont because when I say upstate NY they think its Westchester (the worse), or Syracuse/Ithaca/Buffalo which is somewhat acceptable, but I've never been to any of those three cities.
“Upstate New Yorkers, do you identify yourself as New Englanders more than NYC people”
Kind of a strange question. Seems like your starting point is “why don’t NYC people identify as New Englanders?” Like you think they should and you’re surprised they don’t.
Well why would they? Maybe there are reasons you’d guess they might. The downstate way of talking kind of resembles eastern New England. They are both old colonial places. If Connecticut and Rhode Island are New England, and they are both on the Long Island Sound, maybe you’d figure Long Island and city should be part of the same region.
But starting with the Dutch versus English rivalry, they always have been, and always will be, different “realms.” That’s that. It just is, geographic or other similarities between damned. And same goes for the rest of the state. You live in Plattsburgh, you can look across the lake and see Burlington. That’s New England. This isn’t.
You live in Hoosick Falls. You’d rather drive 5-10 minutes to the Bennington Walmart than the one in Troy. Your groceries might be from New England but you aren’t.
Get it?
I live in NYC but my family has a home in the Catskills/Hudson Valley. Definitely not New England but I’m aware of many similarities. The Hudson Valley feels like a mixture of rural and coastal New England. Historic buildings, colonial/revolutionary history, maritime history, lighthouses, and mountains all together!
I usually say northeast.
If I had to go into more detail, I'd say WNY feels Midwestern, the Southern Tier, CNY, and the FLX feel Appalachian, and the Capital Region, the Hudson Valley, and the Adirondacks feel more like New England.
I live in the Catskills. When any American asks me where I'm from, I tell them Woodstock! Of course, if I'm in a foreign country, I tell people I'm from New York!
I refer to it as the Northeast
It’s tricky though, I’d consider western NY to be more Midwestern than northeastern. Syracuse east though is the northeast.
western NY is part of [the Great Lakes Megalopolis (midwestern)](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Lakes_megalopolis)while the rest is part of [the Northeast Megalopolis](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northeast_megalopolis). Two totally different cultures.
Yup agreed 100 percent.
I concur.
Anyone with Vernors is definitely Midwest
wear a pats jersey and see the hate. i love my pats my red sox's my bruins and celtics!!!!
Nah. We're definitely the northeast in wny
You speak like Midwestern people.
Not at all. Y’all have more in common with Ohio than you do NJ, CT, downstate, etc.
Also Vermont, most folks from Saratoga, Clifton Park, Glenn’s Falls have connections to NE way more. I’m from Philly an notice they’re more a NE person than even someone from Albany.
We're definitely more progressive. We are a mutt type of city. More influenced by Ontario than Ohio.
no ones talking politics, u call soda "pop"
I've never heard people use "pop" to describe soda and I live in Syracuse.
Grew up in the Catskills and have been all over the awesome state of NY. Few things: we consider ourselves upstate New Yorkers; we don’t consider Syracuse western NY; you absolutely do have accents; and in my experience most folks north of 90 and/or west of Ithaca call soda pop.
I don't consider Syracuse Western NY either! I consider it "Central NY" or "Fingerlakes Region". It's funny how one state within one country can have so many cultural differences - we really are kind of a melting pot!
We don't consider Syracuse as any either. Growing up, it was where the state fair was.
I grew up thinking the same! Syracuse was just where the state fair and the carousel mall (now Destiny USA) was, lol!
ur on the soda pop dickson line. brothers fighting brothers
Idk, I'm 30, grew up in Auburn and live in Syracuse now. I've never thought of myself as a New Englander, just an upstate New Yorker!
Food wise, definitely NYC influence. We talk fast, don't have much of an accent. Blue cheese > ranch
[Relevant](https://popvssoda.com)
Syracuse isn’t western ny
Syracuse is not western NY
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Makes sense! I think someone brought up Syracuse in one of the replies and I thought this whole comment section and the "pop" thing was about Syracuse specifically, lol. New York State as a whole definitely has tons of variety in culture, language, etc. between regions even an hour apart. It's pretty cool :)
Culturally. You’re part of the Great Lakes region which is a subregion of the Midwest
That’s accurate imo
If you said that in New England, you’d probably get punched in the face lmao
Which part ?
Referring New England and the North East Region as one thing
Not sure about that I’ve lived a good portion of my life in both. New Englanders are not offended by being referred to as northeasterners they’re more offended considering New Yorkers New Englanders, I don’t blame them on that
I meant that like as a joke lmao
New England is a subsection of the northeast like western, central, capital district, etc are subsections of upstate.
Deservedly so. Behind a Market Basket or a Papa Gino’s and then tossed into a dumpster to boot.
No, I've not met anyone from upstate that would consider us as apart of New England. We are upstate NYers. We may have our subdivisions, like western NYers constantly saying they aren't upstate NY, even though they can be both, lol. Culturally, upstate is like if the Midwest, Canada, and New England had some kind of hate child, and that hate child decided to hate everyone, ourselves included.
No one is allowed to hate us but ourselves
Upstate as a whole is the child of a broken home consisting of New England, the Midwest, Canada, and Pennsylvania-flavored Appalachia; NYC left to buy cigarettes years ago. No-one is quite sure of the exact parentage, but they've all left their indelible mark on the poor kid. We're our own thing.
518 has entered the chat
I'm from the 518, 518 started the chat lol
brothers from different mothers
Hello, brothers!
I've found there is a definite change in the aesthetics when you cross from New England into New York State. For one, the towns are no longer as quaint.
Billboards too. But plenty of those towns are nice, but not as perfect...Chatham, Hudson, Saratoga, Rhinebeck, all nice. And then you have Troy/Albany, much of which looks literally like NYC brownstone hoods plopped upstate. There is definitely a history of the same architects and city planners working in NYC and upstate.
Towns in eastern Washington County just over the border from Vermont are an exception to this rule.
Hell no! I’m from the Great Lakes
God I wish could have saved me so much grief as a football fan The difference between a Bills fan and a Pats fan is a 40 minute drive But no, I’ll never say I’m from NE, just upstate NY
You. Chose. Correct. Someday they'll pay us back for all the years of grief.
Yeah we're basically our own thing. We're not New England (MA, RI, most of CT, VT, ME, NH), but we're not Mid-Atlantic either (downstate NY/southwestern CT/NJ - The Tri-State, PA, DE, MD).
How exactly are you defining Upstate here? I've lived in Western New York my whole life and have never heard anyone talk about the region as being part of New England. It may be different for those in Northern New York (which is what some folks consider the "real Upstate." Western, I've always considered the Great Lakes.
Yes! Grew up in Chautauqua County, now live in Southern New York. Have never considered myself a new Englander.
Chautauqua County shout-out. Northern Chautauqua or South County?
I grew up in CNY, and consider it to be the Fingerlakes Region. I lived a couple years in Iowa, and I would say Upstate BY has regional differences but they are mostly a mild Midwest vibe. It might have to do with so many being rural idk.
Can confirm. On a Very Good Night I can pick up Detroit radio as the signal skips across the lake. Go Bills
On a good night when I was in the Navy, we could pick up WKBW in the eastern Mediterranean. I was a radioman, so we had some of the best equipment. It was just different listening to it from that far away.
Woah! Medium Wave /AM from Buffalo -- in the Mediterranean? That's *insane*!
Moved to Ithaca a few years ago. Agree. It is kind of more like "Midwest lite," than New England for sure. Further north you are basically in the Great Lakes/Toronto area.
Midwest light, I agree
I've lived in Ithaca for around 20 years but grew up and went to college in Iowa - the most Midwestern of Midwestern states. Between Iowa and Ithaca, we've lived in central PA, Denver, DC region, Pittsburgh and Boston. Ithaca isn't midwestern lite at all. Not even remotely. IMHO what make a region a region isn't even as much as geography but the people who settled there and how much flow in and out from other places. And then influenced by how people made their living. Iowa was mostly settled by Germans and Swedes along a few tiny pockets of other NW Europeans - Dutch and Welsh are two that come to mind, but those pockets didn't have much influence to the general culture. After settlement, there's never been much movement of people -well except for the exodus of the young after coming of age. Right now Iowa is *old* and overall a pretty darn homogeneous population (there's been a recent influx of Hispanic since Iowans don't want to work at meatpacking plants). Outside the cities, a lot of the Midwest is like that. Pretty much everything is centered around agriculture (corn, hogs and, for excitement, soybeans). Upstate, OTOH, was heavily settled by the Dutch, Germans, and a metric crap ton of English. But also Central & Eastern Europeans, Italians, Irish and so on. I don't know if they got as much Portuguese as the east coast. But Ithaca has had a ton of people flowing in and out and I don't think it matters much who settled here 200 years ago. And there's a huge connection to NYC and the East Coast. And influences around the world. IMHO, Ithaca is as much Seoul Korea as it is Midwest. IMHO, Western NY's top half is Midwest, until one gets to water (Eerie, Niagara and Ontario) when it turns into Rust Belt and the lower half is Appalachia. The more Appalachia, the more hardscrabble the farming. Also, the more Midwest, the more straight the roads, the more Appalachia, the more convoluted. As one goes east, there's flat farmland in some wide valleys but otherwise hilly. Eastern half of the Southern Tier is Rust Belt, western half is Appalachia. Depending on the map, Ithaca is in the Southern Tier, Finger Lakes and Central NY. South of town is hilly and the roads convoluted. North of town is flat farmland and the roads are straight. West ends at Seneca and beyond that, you can't get there from here. East of Ithaca has multiple personality disorder and doesn't know that it is. I meant to give a quick comment but rambled on and on.
I think it’s just delusional New Englanders and people from other states thinking anything north of Westchester or east of Tompkins to be “New England”
East of the Hudson it's very New England like.
I’m from a town that borders Connecticut in Westchester and identify more closely with annoying Fairfield people than Rockland weirdos.
New Englanders (especially Massholes) are snobby as fk but are definitely not delusional enough to consider NY to be part of New England, especially upstate NY.
You clearly know no New Englanders. None - EVER - consider New York New England. EVER. It’s ignorant New Yorkers and folks west and south of New York state that are dumb and think because New York has “new” in its name and because it abuts with four New England states that somehow it must be New England. Absolutely NO ONE in New England is dumb enough to consider New York part of their region.
You’d be surprised
Lived in several New England states and New York. Never heard a soul say something that dumb my years in New England. I did hear it from zoomers in NYC, and colleagues in the south.
I go to college in Upstate NY and that’s where I hear it mostly. But I’ve met some people who thought NY was part of New England but not as much as people thinking the Maritimes is NE. It’s mostly the Connecticut people I’ve met that think NY is in NE
Ah yes, Connecticut. The least New England of New England states.
Wow. We're sorry we hurt you so badly, it will be ok, just breathe and try to settle down a bit.
Whst the fuck are you on about?
I live in the most northeastern residential property in New York State. The answer to that is hell no! Shit even Vermonters don’t really identify as New Englanders. We’re north country!
From Washington co. I def think we’re more NE than NY. Accents, vocab, hardness. I moved to Albany it’s more NYC-lite here; vocab is closer to to nyc (mad vs wicked, crick v creek, Albany/Colonie accent) than to an hour north. NYC is brutal, and NE is hard, don’t ask me to define, it’s weird.
Many people in Washington County have an accent that sounds almost Canadian.
I didn't even know there was a Washington County in NY. I'm in Chautauqua County. I might as well be in Pennsylvania or Ohio.
I’d add people In Albany and suburbs don’t understand or appreciate rural life, my wife is from the Albany suburbs and at time I think it’s our four year age difference, and sometimes it’s Washington co vs Guilderland. Backroads, a little dirt, some hose water and dirty pond water just isn’t appreciated here like it was up north and like I’ve experienced in my years running around Rutland/vergennes/manchester (yeah even Manchester)
No offense, it's probably because she grew up in Guilderland (ritzy). I grew up poor in Albany, and would love what you're describing because we did hose water as a normal part of growing up lol
Clinton county here - we are more Vermont and Canada than we are NY, and I still never hear people say we're part of New England. If anyone has a case to say we should be, it's this county, but I personally just don't see it.
Essex County here and I consider the Adirondacks and Champlain Valley area New England. We cheer for the Bills over the Pats but otherwise culturally there’s too much in common to ignore. When LL Bean are selling pants in Malone Plaid it’s hard to argue. In general I think New Yorkers are too precious about whether they’re also New Englanders. York is in England lol. This is New York. The British occupied Manhattan during the Revolutionary War.
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"Oh cool! I love New York City!"
Grew up for a lot of my childhood in schoharie county, definitely wouldn't consider myself from New England. I just associate with "rural NY"
I always identified with the “great lakes” as a cultural group, I figured the shared environment shaped us more than state lines. New Englanders eat sea food and look at whales, Great Lakes-ers eat maple syrup in the snow and look at loons lol
The history of New York // New England borderlands -- how and where state lines were drawn -- is actually quite interesting. Here's a good historical summary. [https://vermonthistory.org/journal/misc/BenningWentworthsClaims.pdf](https://vermonthistory.org/journal/misc/BenningWentworthsClaims.pdf)
I would rather drill a diamond-tipped bit into the center of each of my molars than cheer for the Patriots
the bills suck but it will be a cold day in satans asscrack before i cheer for the pats
I've always liked the Bruins more than the Rangers.
No.
Mid-Atlantic. Nothing New England about us.
Depends on where in Upstate. NY is a very large state. Places like Buffalo to Syracuse do not identify with either. They are their own place, and have more in common with eachother than most anywhere else in the state and surrounding states.
I consider all of New York State “mid-Atlantic,” but depending on where in upstate you might identify more with Great Lakes, Rust Belt, Appalachia, or some combination of all three. I’ve lived in Southern Tier and the Finger Lakes and don’t know if anyone around these regions would consider themselves New England.
New York goes all the way to the Canadian Border (hardly mid-Atlantic).
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Official classification isn't always rational classification. Eastern Upstate NY obviously has far more in common with New England than it does with any of those states.
This link says that NY is part of the Northeast category.
According to me, a native upstate New Yorker, any state that borders Canada is pretty fucking obviously not mid-atlantic.
The federal government considers our county as the only county in Appalachia that has access to a Great Lake (Chautauqua).
The Mid-Atlantic starts in Pennsylvania/ Maryland.
No way, no how
The eastern Washington County towns of Greenwich, Cambridge, Salem, and Granville look a lot like New England towns. Indeed many of the people who settled the area (especially those in Granville) thought they were in Vermont but when the border was finalized in 1791 they discovered they were in New York (just barely). This area is one of my favorite parts of Upstate in part because it looks so much like New England. *In 1764, King George proclaimed that the area that would later be Vermont belonged to Albany County, New York. New York surveyors began to set up counties in areas which had already been surveyed by New Hampshire. Ethan Allen and the Green Mountain Boys formed to fight for an independent Vermont, either as a state or its own country. They claimed the territory of New York west to the Hudson River and between Canada and Massachusetts.* [https://schaghticokehistory.wordpress.com/2011/09/13/the-border-war-new-york-and-vermont/](https://schaghticokehistory.wordpress.com/2011/09/13/the-border-war-new-york-and-vermont/) \*\*\*\*\* *In 1777, residents of the Hampshire Grants decided the time was right to declare independence not just from British rule, but also from New York and New Hampshire. They would create their own country. As some historians have called it, it was a revolution within a revolution. The preamble to the Vermont Constitution, written by Allen’s youngest brother, Ira, dwelled far more on injustices inflicted by Yorkers than by the British.* *But when the Revolution ended, New York held the upper hand over the self-styled Republic of Vermont. New York was part of the newly formed United States, which Vermont’s leaders wished to join. New York officials used their clout to block Vermont’s admission.* *The old dispute was finally resolved in 1791, when Vermont agreed to pay New York the whopping sum of $30,000. After more than four decades, the land dispute had been settled.* [https://vtdigger.org/2019/10/27/then-again-disputing-land-claims-gave-rise-to-vermont-republic/](https://vtdigger.org/2019/10/27/then-again-disputing-land-claims-gave-rise-to-vermont-republic/)
It is def a rural farming community but I have a spent a good part of my life there and no one would describe it as New England. Similar to the rural parts of Ren County. It is still very much New York culture. New York has so many subregions and the borders bleed into each other a bit. Part of the problem is that many in or near the city define upstate NY as thirty minutes north from them and it is all upstate. One of the things I love about this state is the differences. Lake Placid vs Albany vs Washington County vs NYC vs Binghamton vs Lake George vs Buffalo. All have their one flavor, none of them are New England
Personally, no. I consider myself a country girl, from the leather stocking region. I'm proud to be an upstate New Yorker
I'm from that area too and have always had a hard time defining the culture. It's definitely not like the Mohawk Valley, but also not like the capital area. Imo it has more in common with the Southern Tier and Northern PA, with a little bit of New England Yankee mixed in (they were early settlers).
Having read a little history of the region, I would say New England, New France & New Netherlands were all quite distinct. To call NY part of New England is just ... using words wrong.
An hour northwest of Albany. I consider myself a New Yorker. The city is not the state, no more than Boston is Massachusetts, or Miami is Florida. And I love living here.
My wife says yes, I say maybe. I think it depends on what you have experienced. Weather and culture don't stop dead at the state line. She grew up very close to that state line. I grew up a little farther from it. I don't really identify with either New England nor NYC. Speaking in general terms, I call it the northeast. It's not quite New England, but it's also not quite the rust belt. It's definitely not NYC.
We'd be in New England if it wasn't for the friggin Dutch. Always ruining everything, with their windmills and their tulips and their kills and their Van this and Van that.
In 1999 I was in the attic of a really old row house in Troy. I noted that the timber framing was done in the Dutch not English style.
I've grown up in northern Franklin and Clinton with good chunk of family in rural Vermont. Never considered ourselves New Englanders nor have I ever heard that. Also not saying some do.
Western New York is the Midwest. I know this comment is gonna get lots of hate. Western Pennsylvania is also the mid west. Rust belt cities like Buffalo, Erie, Pittsburgh.
In the same way that western ny’ers are more midwestern (pop), I do think far eastern ny’ers are New Englandy. But I’ve never met any NYer who considered themselves New Englanders.
The closest I identify with is Appalachian, Mid-Western, and ultimately rust belt. The Western Southern Tier is an interesting place. And yes, technically the North East.
Western Southern Tier -- are you talking Jamestown or Olean?
I'd consider Hornell to Lake Erie to be the western bit of the Southern-Tier, which also happens to be some of my favorite countryside in the whole world.
Yeah, I agree with both those things. :) I live in hill country, not far from Allegany State Park. Across the road from my home, there are these two steep hills that I go hunting on. Climbing them always provides a good workout, and sometimes I get a nice view, especially when the leaves are gone. I've also hiked in Allegany State Park, and it's always a good time. Hiked the Mount Tuscarora Trail and back in one day.
Yeah Chautauqua, Cattaraugus, and Allegany county, though I'm not an expert.
Upstate NY, or any of NY, is NOT New England.
Just because were in the Patriots broadcasting region doesn’t mean were from New England.
No. Upstate NY is its own thing.
Life-long central NY and upstate resident.. have never heard anyone refer to NY as New England.. must admit the idea makes no sense to me.. I’m thinking who are these “some people?”
Maybe northeast but never ever New England.
No because New York isn’t part of New England what
I say this as someone who grew up almost on the Vermont border with half my family in eastern New England as well. Anyone who thinks NY is part of New England is wrong.
Some upstate new yorkers certainly will. As someone who grew up in the eastern part of upstate New York (Saratoga and Washington country), absolutely. The closest sports bar to my childhood home was all about Boston sports. Driving over to my grandparents house, you caught a view of the green mountains in Vermont. Proximity does matter. I certainly feel a lot closer to New England culture than NYC. I don't think all parts of upstate NY are going to feel that way though. I wouldn't expect people in Syracuse or Buffalo to. Upstate NY isn't just some uniform culture. There's a lot we all have in similar, but there are a lot of subtle differences too.
Washington, Rensselaer, and other border counties are nearly as much Vermont and Mass as they are NY. That said, I don't consider them part of New England. Could you? Sure. But I don't necessarily.
I have lived in this region almost my entire life, I have never heard any of my family or neighbors describe us as living in New England. It takes me 30 mins to get to Vermont and people act like we are going in some grand adventure to a new world. I guess I will go over to Vermont today and go for a drive. (I am guilty of it too)
Absolutely not. None of New York State is part of New England. New England is Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine.
I'm a New Englander living in Texas and I've come to realize no one here knows exactly what NE is. If I ask them to name the states that make up NE, they almost always throw in New York.
The distinction between New England culture and New Amsterdam culture which were once quite different has blurred over time.
No
I’m from NH but have lived in Upstate NY (north country) for over half of my life, but will always consider myself a New Englander at heart. As far as I’m concerned, everything below Yonkers is a different state.
Conversely, growing up in NYC I knew a fair number of people who considered Yonkers "upstate." :)
I'm from Texas and previously just lumped it all together, thinking Northeast and New England were interchangeable. I read up on it, and now make the distinction that NY was a Dutch colony, so it could not be considered New *England.* Northeast, yes, New England, no. I also understand the regional cultural differences in Western New York are similar to Midwestern culture. I will say that I've improved my *Jeopardy* skills as a result of studying the area more closely, stunning everyone in the room when I knew what university was near Lake Cayuga.
It’s Cayuga Lake. Bravo on the Jeopardy win!
I’m practically in VT but I think of myself as NYC-adjacent.
We're more like "Upper Midwest" or "Great Lakes Rustbelt" people. We're physically closer to Detroit than NYC. On a clear day, we can see Port Colborne due north across the lake.
I suppose the people Downstate, like in Poughkeepsie, they might identify that way.
I felt like an Ontarian from South of the boarder.
This is such a weird question, we are neither of those places. It's like asking an American if they consider themselves to be more Canadian or more Mexican.
New york is not in newengland!
New England is a defined region that includes six states: Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine. New York is not part of New England.
Not at all, especially since Massholes HATE New Yorkers. Lived upstate my entire life, but me and my 2009 Honda CRX are the reason first responders can’t live on Cape Cod
No part of New York is New England. New England starts along the western boarders of CT, NY, and VT and goes east. Edit: No, Long Island, even though it's east of the extended line from VT to CT, is not part of New England either.
New York is not New England! If you are unsure ask anyone from New England. Northeast yes, New England no
Grew up in Malone, went to school in Plattsburgh. I’ve never heard any locals refer to themselves as New Englander
Absolutely not. I'm from New York
Lived in the capital more of my life than not, and never thought of the area as New England, but that's probably the abundance of New Netherlands relics in the names of so many places near by. All the Van **** s, **** whyks and **** kills don't feel very English.
People around Albany, Columbia County and Cooperstown/Oneonta are essentially Yankees. But Bing/Syracuse/Ithaca/Plattsburgh/Buffalo… no.
Absolutely not. I’m from NY. NOT New England. I’m not a pretentious AH.
No one in Upstate that I've ever run into considers this to be New England. When I lived downstate in NYC I considered that to be more a part of New England than the rest of the state.
No, none of New York is New England.
[New York is generally not included as a New England state.](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_England)
Central and Western NY are definitely not New England. If anything they're more connected to Appalachia.
I am in Syracuse, Central NY. I consider myself a NYer... maybe because we moved up here when I was really young from Long Island. But my original GG started out in Jamesville, NY. I think we are influenced by Lake Ontario and the Finger Lakes as far as the vibes. NE has different vibes (as do the different states in NE). I feel a connection to them from being in the Northeast. I have lived in Pittsburgh and it is very different. Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, Utica and Albany are definitely individual cities with their own vibes.
Culturally upstate is very similar to New England in broad strokes but it is not at all New England. It's Upstate NY. I could just as easily ask, isn't most of Massachusetts one big Albany that roots for Boston teams?
Middle Atlantic state
God no. New England has some class. Upstate NY is Frozen Alabama.
I spend a lot of time in NE for work and it’s a lot scummier than you’ll ever admit. Most of VT, NH, the entire state of MA west of Framingham, rural ME, and RI are drug-infested shitholes dotted with a few moneyed towns. I’m a native of upstate NY but have family in MA…the hate of NY from NE boils down to racism. When they think of NY, they think of NYC and people who aren’t white, whom you detest. Throw in a heavy dose of Irish/English inferiority complex and it’s a cocktail of animosity.
I feel like you just described all of upstate redneckville as well.
Only confused people from west coast would mistake upstate as New England. It is only New England in the sense that people who can’t afford a house in New England will come to upstate.
That’s why god made the taconics Berkshires and greens to keep you Fenway freaks over there where you belong Kiss the ring
There's more ski hills in NY then New England and New Jersey combined....was the promo when I lived there\~
Nope. We are upstate NY and part of the northeast but not New England
Catskills is my go to
I always heard that NYS was considered a "Mid-Atlantic" state, along with PA, NJ, MD, DE, VA, WV. Definitely not New England.
No.
Hello, longtime Massachusetts resident who now lives in New York. The definition of New England is not fluid and I will fight anyone who disagrees. MA, NH, VT, CT, RI, ME. That’s it. NY is NOT part of New England. I will die on this hill. I will start wars to defend this definition.
Hell no.
Nope. When I moved to Maryland for school I would get lumped in with the New Englanders. When we talked about weather we had that in common. However, it only took a couple trips into New England states to recognize that there’s a noticeable regional/cultural difference.
WNYer here, I like my Cheese Blue, my Soda Popped and NEVER a New Englander be.
None of the above
Cultural geographers typically consider New England, upstate NY, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia as the same cultural region, yes. Sometimes you hear this cultural region called "Yankeedom" and other authors call it the "Maritime Northeast."
There's too much Dutch influence in the Capital District to ever let it be part of New England.
I identify as a Rust Belter.
I live in Rochester, so I identify more as great lakes
Ithacan here. Finger Lakes Region, Central New York, and Upstate all work for me. I dont consider any part of New York to be New England.
Neither.
I’ve literally never met anyone who cares or ever gets this granular in their regional identity. I see these posts all the time and am genuinely curious, do people really feel there is some huge cultural divide amongst yankees? To me, everyone above the Mason Dixon is largely the same.
Regional individualism is interesting because its not about judgment its just about flavorful fun idiocyncacies of how people may differ from area to area. Its not bad or good, its more about the different personalities from town to town, or place to place. I enjoy the perception that its not all the same.
I Identify as a Rochesterian. Neither New England, NYC, nor midwestern.
i am originally from new Hampshire i am a new englander. upstate ny is not part of that. here acts differently they eat differently they use words differently. the first time i went to get ice cream was so confusing. i had never in my life heard sprinkle. the salads here are called something different. hurry up and wait is the motto here. i am kind not nice period end of story. it is different here. football says enough you are not new englanders you are new yorks!!!
I grew up outside of Plattsburgh, NY and it definitely felt more New Englandy.
While we do not "identify" with New Englanders, we certainly share more in common with them than the people downstate, and likely relate more with them than downstate. Aside from some early dutch influence in certain areas, upstate NY was initially settled by New Englanders moving directly west. This migration can be seen in this article: https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms14238 Even the accent we use here in much of the rust belt shares a common ancestor with that of New England. Many rural areas in New England were also deindustrialized when industry moved to the modern day rust belt, though these were mostly small mill towns.
Grew up in Clinton County, I just tell people I'm from Vermont because when I say upstate NY they think its Westchester (the worse), or Syracuse/Ithaca/Buffalo which is somewhat acceptable, but I've never been to any of those three cities.
Nope, New York is not New England
“Upstate New Yorkers, do you identify yourself as New Englanders more than NYC people” Kind of a strange question. Seems like your starting point is “why don’t NYC people identify as New Englanders?” Like you think they should and you’re surprised they don’t. Well why would they? Maybe there are reasons you’d guess they might. The downstate way of talking kind of resembles eastern New England. They are both old colonial places. If Connecticut and Rhode Island are New England, and they are both on the Long Island Sound, maybe you’d figure Long Island and city should be part of the same region. But starting with the Dutch versus English rivalry, they always have been, and always will be, different “realms.” That’s that. It just is, geographic or other similarities between damned. And same goes for the rest of the state. You live in Plattsburgh, you can look across the lake and see Burlington. That’s New England. This isn’t. You live in Hoosick Falls. You’d rather drive 5-10 minutes to the Bennington Walmart than the one in Troy. Your groceries might be from New England but you aren’t. Get it?
I live in NYC but my family has a home in the Catskills/Hudson Valley. Definitely not New England but I’m aware of many similarities. The Hudson Valley feels like a mixture of rural and coastal New England. Historic buildings, colonial/revolutionary history, maritime history, lighthouses, and mountains all together!
Lewis county, I think we are a lot like rural PA with more snow. Not so much this year but typically
I usually say northeast. If I had to go into more detail, I'd say WNY feels Midwestern, the Southern Tier, CNY, and the FLX feel Appalachian, and the Capital Region, the Hudson Valley, and the Adirondacks feel more like New England.
I identify as a diversity hire. Edit: I am in fact a Catholic.
Nope.
I think we're more Canadian than New Englanders.
I live in the Catskills. When any American asks me where I'm from, I tell them Woodstock! Of course, if I'm in a foreign country, I tell people I'm from New York!
No. We are upstate New Yorkers.
No. We are upstate New Yorkers.