City slicker

For other meanings see City slicker (disambiguation).

City slicker is an idiomatic expression for someone accustomed to a city or urban lifestyle and unsuited to life in the country. The term was typically used as a term of derision by rural Americans who regarded them with amusement. It may mean "fop", or it may be a derogatory term for a man in a city-type business suit and businessman-type personal attitude in areas where such attitude to life is unwelcome.

City slicker was derisively given to these Easterners for their assumption that their "book-learnin' " gave them superior intelligence. Nineteenth- and twentieth-century Westerners, particularly cowboys, used the Easterners' perceived snobbish attitudes as justification for playing tricks—sometimes violent tricks—on them.^{[citation needed]}

City slickers appeared often as deceitful characters in U.S. comic strips and movies before the middle of the 20th century, but usually to be "outsmarted" by the native wisdom and common sense of the locals or to somehow otherwise get their just deserts in the end.^[1]

The archetypal city slicker is depicted as a spoiled selfish lazy rich person who considers people living on farms to be poor and ignorant. They are depicted as being unaccustomed to hard labour and as a result, tire very easily and complain when working.

The term is still used in rural areas today.

References

1. ^ Cf. Mickey Mouse comic Mr.Slicker and the Egg Robbers (1930).