People in Liverpool have many different ways to define a Scouser. For some, the best test is based on the colour of your wheelie bin, for others it’s defined by postcode and for some it’s a matter of accent.

According to the Cambridge Dictionary, the term Scouser means “a person who comes from the Liverpool area in North West England”. The crucial word there is “area”, suggesting you do not necessarily have to live within the Liverpool city limits to be a Scouser, just the area.

For example, places like Bootle, Crosby, Kirkby and Huyton are technically not in Liverpool. The city of Liverpool, defined by the area governed by Liverpool City Council, does not stretch to those places.

It means the aforementioned towns do not have purple wheelie bins. For Bootle and Crosby - as they are in the borough of Sefton - their general waste is collected in grey bins. In the Knowsley towns of Kirkby and Huyton, the bins are maroon.

You would, however, have a hard task telling someone from Bootle that they are not a Scouser. But if you are from Merseyside and you’re not a Scouser, what does that make you?

Some people might class you as a wool (short for woolyback, for the non-initiated). But again, wool is a rather contested - and usually a pejorative term. There is some dispute as to whether it is more likely to relate to people from rugby league town of St Helens, as well as our Cheshire neighbours of Warrington and Widnes, or can it also be applied to people from Knowsley, Sefton or Wirral?

One man is making the argument that a catch-all term could solve these many problems of defining identity. Writer Richie Wright, 44, believes the term ‘Liverpolitan’ should apply to anyone from the Liverpool City Region (LCR) - the combined authority led by Metro Mayor Steve Rotheram, covering Liverpool, Wirral, Knowsley, Sefton, St Helens and the Cheshire borough of Halton.

  • ᴇᴍᴘᴇʀᴏʀ 帝@feddit.ukOPM
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    1 month ago

    You would, however, have a hard task telling someone from Bootle that they are not a Scouser.

    You’d have a fun time going down Marsh Lane telling people they are Liverpolitans too.

    It is interesting though as I’ve never known what label to use - I wasn’t born here (or in the UK) but my Dad was and I’ve lived here most of my life. Scouser might work as shorthand outside of Liverpool but people can really split hairs within Liverpool so I’d avoid saying I was here.