I’m asking this as an American myself. I just moved out to California from Georgia and when I’ve heard people talk about the “east coast” I respond as if I’m from there because well like…. am I not? They always reply with “no you’re from the south.” Is that just how people out West view the eastern part of the US?
Is the east coast actually just a specific place and not the entire eastern coastline of the United States?
Most of the time they’ll also say “wait is Georgia on the coast?” š© Sometimes I feel that Californians are to America what Americans are to the rest of the world haha
The coast goes all the way down to Florida and I feel like the southern coasts are more visited in the east than the northeastern coasts lol ? Lmk y’all!
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I think it probably depends on context.
> I feel like the southern coasts are more visited in the east than the northeastern coasts lol
I donāt know, there are quite a lot of people living in the Northeast, and there are beaches here too. Maybe they donāt draw as many out-of-state tourists, but there are plenty of locals.
Pretty much. The southeast is just considered the south.
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Whenever I say āeast coastā I mean the east coast. If your state is on the east coast, I consider you āEast Coastā. Even if in Florida on the Atlantic side.
My wife grew up in SC and OH and we now live in the Pacific Northwest. She refers to Cincinnati as “the east coast” which cracks me up.
>I feel like the southern coasts are more visited in the east than the northeastern coasts lol ?
That’s because the northeast is more lived in.
Yes. Colloquially, āthe east coastā is the north east down to Washington DC. People from the Carolinas and Georgia say theyāre from āthe south.ā Florida is its own thing.
Thatās what Iāve always associated that term with. And I grew up in a state that is butted right up to the Atlantic (Virginia) and now live in another one (North Carolina). But Iāve always thought of specifically the DC/Balitmore/Philly/NYC/Boston megalopolis as āthe east coastā and maybe the general coastal areas and marshes/meadowlands.
the names of regions do not necessarily make sense in a literal way. the Midwest, for example, is largely in the eastern half of the contiguous 48 states. and plenty of states that are objectively “south,” like Arizona, are not “the south.” these terms have a lot more to do with history and cultural connotations.
I’d call Georgia the south, or the southeast. and yes, it is on the eastern coast, but it isn’t what most people think of when they say the “East Coast.” that’s usually associated with the northeast.
Pretty much. I think people often use it to mean the region spanning from DC up through New England.
Regionally? Yeah
Anecdotally yes, when I refer to the east coast as a region I usually mean the northeast. Georgia I would consider part of the south regionally. I make a similar distinction between the west coast and the pnw specifically, although I do consider the pnw as also part of the west coast
>Well, East Coast girls are hip
>I really dig those styles they wear
>And the Southern girls with the way they talk
>They knock me out when I’m down there
The Beach Boys clearly distinguish between East Coast girls and Southern girls, and thus clearly distinguish between the East Coast and the South.
Case closed.
To me, East Coast means the literal east coast.
Yeah usually
It’s how people who’ve never been to the East Coast talk about the East Coast.
I lived in Georgia and currently in Maryland. I consider from Maine to Florida to be the East Coast in general. When I’m talking about a certain region then I go North, Mid-Atlantic, South
If someone told me they visited the East Coast I would presume they visited D.C. or north of it – so Mid-Atlantic to Northeast. I would be surprised if they meant Georgia, the Carolinas, etc. For me, those states are more identifiable as āthe southā or southeast – maybe the low country if youāre trying to reference a very specific region. The culture, dialect, food, and more is different in the south from the āEast Coastā.
For context – Iām from the Midwest and have lived in states in the Mid-Atlantic, Southeast, and Northeast.
As a New England transplant to California – if someone says “the east coast” or “back East” I think of the Northeast. But that’s just based on my one personal experience and the assumption that there are more people in California from the Northeast than there are from the Southeast.
But I would never correct anyone – Georgia is the East Coast too.
(And yes, there are many Californians who aren’t great with US geography, though in fairness that doesn’t seem more true here than anywhere else in the country.)
Virginia feels “East Coast,” “Mid-Atlantic,” and “Southern” to me.
I think it means anything from Charleston upwards. A lot of the “southern” coast is just part of the big eastern metro blob.
And no on California. TEXAS is to America what America is to the rest of the world.
Up in the Pacific Northwest, we would consider Georgia “East Coast,” but also part of The South (regions are allowed to overlap.
There are at least three sections of the “East Coast” I’d say: Maine to Rhode Island, Connecticut to Maryland, Virginia to Georgia, and then Florida (if it’s included at all). NYC is also kind of its own, unique thing.
There is a stereotype, even where I live, that Californians are airheads.
With Stanford now being in the Atlantic Coast Conference does it really mean anything anymore?
I think of the east coast as all the states on the coast but Florida.
Yep.
Context matters.
Obviously the Georgia coast is the eastern coast of the US.
It varies depending on context. In terms of time itās another way of saying the eastern time zone.
Yes
As a Georgian, I am both from the South and from the East Coast. I don’t care what someone in California says, though I might kindly clarify for them if I were telling someone while in their area.
no
I live southeast and we just say Gulf Coast, but Georgia is technically still east coast. Most people say east coast when they mean Virginia and up.
When I say āeast coastā I mean from Maine to Florida as thatās what i was taught. But then you break the āeast coastā down to āThe Southā, āMid Atlanticā, or āNew Englandā regions.
It depends on the context.
Anywhere on the east coast qualifies for “east coast.” But I usually only use that term with people from the west coast.
Most of the time I use smaller regional terms that are more meaningful than the more generic east cost.
New England
Northeast (New England + NY, NJ, and the eastern half of PA)
Mid Atlantic (DE, MD, VA)
Southeast (VA, NC, SC, and eastern parts of GA)
South (TN, AL, MS, and western parts of GA)
Florida
These labels tend to better identify the regions more than the geneic east coast label.
I mean we don’t mean Florida but Virginia and Carolinas count depending who you ask.
To me, East Coast means the whole eastern seaboard. But in the case of GA, it’s secondary to being part of the South. Same with New England. Boston is east coast, but it’s New England first in my mind.
The fact that Atlanta isn’t a coastal city maybe also plays into it, since a lot of the rest of well-known cities in the coastal states are coastal.
The east coast of the US goes from northern Maine to southern Florida. I don’t know exactly where it ends, maybe Biscayne Bay or the keys.
The thing about Georgia is that although it is obviously on the east coast, it’s more of an inland state. Its coastline is short relative to its area and most of the population lives inland. With a population of nearly 12 million, the coastal metro areas are Savannah (430k) and Brunswick (113k).
>Sometimes I feel that Californians are to America what Americans are to the rest of the world haha
I’ve heard Californians adamantly insist that Colorado and even Idaho are Midwestern, so that tracks.
Iāve always considered myself to be from the east coast as being from Georgia. Now Iām also Southern. Just as you have New England, the mid Atlantic region and the southeast. Most, if not all states in those regions belong to the east coast
I don’t. I live in SC and occasionally just say I live on the East Coast. You can distinguish between the northeast and the southeast, which is not the same as the south. The south includes the Gulf Coast and several landlocked states.
In Florida, we use “east coast” primarily to distinguish between the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf coast. We have more of the east coast than any other state. I wonder, do they call it the south coast? I mean, in the decades long proverbial east coast/ west coast rapper feud, east coast means specifically New York, but that’s the only context I can think of in which I’ve ever heard “east coast” mean anything specific to the northeast.
I live up and down the coast from Canada border to Atlanta…i say I’m from the east Coast.
I think of myself, in North Carolina, as on the east coast and in the south. People up north are in the northeast.
as a very literal person I’ve always meant it to mean the entire East Coast but I have been corrected so many times. so no it’s just down to DC š
From NC and I feel the same way you do lol. I would say the northeast to mean what some folks are calling the east coast. I guess in some way it makes sense, after DC most major cities are pretty inland till you hit Florida, so the cities are maybe less coastal than NYC, Boston, etc.
On another note, I had a remote manager in the bay. He was an immigrant but had been in Cali for over 10 years. When I told him I was going to the beach in NC he was surprised and didnāt know we had them. I know NC is less relevant than like most of the northeast, but was also have a longer coast than like any other state on the east coast outside Florida.
As someone who lives in a county Georgia refers to as the coastal plain and has access to the Atlantic, most people here are factually wrong. I understand the cultural and historic distinctions, What the faucet hasn’t really been the South for a good long while.As new people move to the area and redefine its culture
Georgia has a coastline on the east so it technically east coast. But so does Florida and we just say Florida.
Most of Georgia population is not coastal. If I am talking about coastal Georgia Iād just say Savannah.
Actually that goes for all of the states when youāre from the east coast. Maybe itās just a west coast thing to lump it all together?
The entire Atlantic coast of the U.S. is the East Coast.Ā
Most of the time when I use the term East Coast, Iām talking about Florida to Maine and everything in between that makes up the eastern coast of the United States.
Iām not using it to refer to a specific defined region as much as I am the place on the opposite side of the country from me. Itās the opposite of the West Coast, which goes from the Mexican to the Canadian border along the Pacific coast.
I am aware that itās also frequently used by folks to refer to a specific region that goes from somewhere in Maryland up through New England. I can usually tell from context which way someone is using it
I know exactly what you mean, as a Georgia girl myself. I had no idea that the rest of the country has such a limited idea of what the east coast is until I moved away.
I think so. I recently heard someone refer to Florida as the east coast and I was surprised. Then I thought about it a little and obviously it is on the East Coast.
I’m going to go against the grain here and make a distinction. People keep saying that the southern states (NC, SC, GA, FL) are not “the east coast” but rather “the south.” I agree that those states make up the south, but I think they are also part of the east coast — they are not mutually exclusive. I’ve lived in Michigan, Florida, Virginia, and Colorado, and this is my perception.
When I say East Coast, i mean most of the eastern time zone.
Iām a CA native and I consider GA east coast. The fact that so many people in the comments agree that the east coast is only the Northeast is news to me.
I think the East Coast is used in different contexts than the South. The East Coast is more geographic, while the South is more cultural. So the two terms can interact.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Coast_of_the_United_States#/media/File:Eastcoastmapallstates.svg
Iām from GA and have always assumed GA was considered part of the east coast as it is literally part of the east coast
When I would tell Californians I was from Maryland it was not uncommon for them to ask, āwhatās that near?ā
I see “East Coast” covering basically anything in the Eastern time zone.
To me, Georgia counts as both “East Coast” and “The South”
When i say the east coast, I mean the whole dam coast.
I’m from Virginia. The east coast is the entire coast to me and that’s how I’ve always referred to it.
The east coast is the entire Atlantic coastline, with the south, mid-Atlantic, and northeast being subregions within it