As a native when someone tells me they live in Los Angeles, that means Los Angeles, no one from San Pedro or The Valley would tell you Los Angeles. As a native

As a native when someone tells me they live in Los Angeles, that means Los Angeles, no one from San Pedro or The Valley would tell you Los Angeles. As a native of Los Angeles, when someone tells me Los Angeles, that means they live somewhere south of Ventura and north of San Diego. I've had other SoCal natives tell me LA when they actually live in Pasadena, or Long Beach, or Irvine, or Chino Hills, or Rancho Cucamonga, or a plethora of other cities that aren't even in LA County. LA natives don't usually start with their neighborhood unless it's contextually appropriate to the conversation, such as when talking to another LA native/local who would actually understand the geographic reference. Outside of a few well-known neighborhoods like Hollywood, non-Angelenos wouldn't know what you're talking about if you said "San Pedro" or "Boyle Heights." On a pedantic note, "the Valley" usually refers to San Fernando Valley if you're in LA County, but is also used to refer to Santa Clarita Valley by locals there, and to San Gabriel Valley if you're east of LA in Pasadena, San Bernardino County, or Orange County. In Ventura County, "the Valley" means Simi Valley.In Riverside County, "the Valley" refers to Jurupa Valley and Moreno Valley depending on which side of the county you're in. Using "the Valley" to refer exclusively to San Fernando is a Hollywood thing and signifies that the speaker is either from San Fernando Valley (which is usually already apparent from their accent) or isn't an LA native and doesn't know any better.