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I come from a town of (then) about 350 people in California. After living in Europe for a while I started calling it a village. Americans always look at me fu

by biztos 6y ago

I come from a town of (then) about 350 people in California. After living in Europe for a while I started calling it a village. Americans always look at me funny... but there's a town of 3,000 nearby that calls itself a "small town" and the town next to that, with 13,000, also calls itself a "small town," so how are we supposed to differentiate? So hunch is that some people think of "town" as covering anything from 1-250,000 people (arbitrary upper bound mine) and think "village" is something foreigners have instead of towns. That said, it's absurd to call Wuppertal a village, the pictures are obviously not of a village, and Schweben is not Fliegen! :-)

fatnoah 6y ago
Where I'm from, Northeast US, town vs. city is a matter of how the government is organized. I grew up in a city of 10k people, and later lived in a town of 50k. Here, at least, a village is a designation often used to indicate the "town center" or more densely developed areas of otherwise fairly spread out towns.
- Semaphor 6y ago
  It’s legislated in Germany ;) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_town_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_town_law https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stadtrecht https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stadtrecht
  - Freak_NL 6y ago
    The Stadtrecht phenomenon is what makes people call Dutch cities cities too. Legally, the term 'city' ('stad') doesn't even exist nowadays here, so it mostly a term used intuitively and according to historical legacy. Interestingly, the Dutch province of Frisia famously features eleven cities (all historically holders of Dutch stadsrechten) of which the smallest has just over 700 inhabitants, whilst the biggest 'village' in the province boasts over 45,000.
- brendoelfrendo 6y ago
  It's worth noting that, if you're in New England, "town" carries a different meaning than in much of the rest of the country: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_England_town https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_England_town
- plutonic 6y ago
  I spent a lot of time in New England. There, it tends to be all municipalities are legally designated towns, and if the town has a certain minimum population, it can choose to reorganize as a city. The two differ primarily in style of government: towns are run by boards of selectmen (or aldermen or selectperson .. there are many terms for the same thing) via the town meeting, whereas cities are run by a mayor (which may or may not also have a council which runs similarly to the board of selectmen). Town and city are the only legal designation, and things like village and hamlet carry no such ramifications. “Village” might simply be part of the name of a municipality (e.g. Sturbridge Village), or it may refer to a particular neighborhood within a larger municipality [0]. We sometimes call small municipalities by the ocean a fishing village, but again village has no legal meaning there. [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_villages_in_Massachusetts https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_villages_in_Massachu...
rconti 6y ago
Perhaps calling a foreign place a village is a way of downplaying it, so that the listener does not feel that they were expected to know the place by name, perhaps?

by biztos 6y ago

fatnoah 6y ago

Where I'm from, Northeast US, town vs. city is a matter of how the government is organized. I grew up in a city of 10k people, and later lived in a town of 50k. Here, at least, a village is a designation often used to indicate the "town center" or more densely developed areas of otherwise fairly spread out towns.

Semaphor 6y ago
It’s legislated in Germany ;) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_town_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_town_law https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stadtrecht https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stadtrecht
- Freak_NL 6y ago
  The Stadtrecht phenomenon is what makes people call Dutch cities cities too. Legally, the term 'city' ('stad') doesn't even exist nowadays here, so it mostly a term used intuitively and according to historical legacy. Interestingly, the Dutch province of Frisia famously features eleven cities (all historically holders of Dutch stadsrechten) of which the smallest has just over 700 inhabitants, whilst the biggest 'village' in the province boasts over 45,000.
brendoelfrendo 6y ago
It's worth noting that, if you're in New England, "town" carries a different meaning than in much of the rest of the country: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_England_town https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_England_town
plutonic 6y ago
I spent a lot of time in New England. There, it tends to be all municipalities are legally designated towns, and if the town has a certain minimum population, it can choose to reorganize as a city. The two differ primarily in style of government: towns are run by boards of selectmen (or aldermen or selectperson .. there are many terms for the same thing) via the town meeting, whereas cities are run by a mayor (which may or may not also have a council which runs similarly to the board of selectmen). Town and city are the only legal designation, and things like village and hamlet carry no such ramifications. “Village” might simply be part of the name of a municipality (e.g. Sturbridge Village), or it may refer to a particular neighborhood within a larger municipality [0]. We sometimes call small municipalities by the ocean a fishing village, but again village has no legal meaning there. [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_villages_in_Massachusetts https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_villages_in_Massachu...

rconti 6y ago

Perhaps calling a foreign place a village is a way of downplaying it, so that the listener does not feel that they were expected to know the place by name, perhaps?