History Main / GoingNative

* In ''Literature/GoodOmens'', Aziraphale and Crowley, an angel and a demon respectively, go native with humans in general.

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* ''Literature/HeartOfDarkness'' by Joseph Conrad (which would later have a famous adaptation in the Vietnam movie ''Film/ApocalypseNow''). Kurtz is sent to Africa as an ivory-procurement agent and suffers a spectacular back story breakdown. The narrative either plays the trope straight or subverts it, depending on the reading, though the latter seems more likely. According to the first reading, Kurtz possibly goes native in horrifying ways, inverting the European life he came from. In the alternate reading, while he has shed his civilized persona, he still hasn't gone native in a meaningful way. Instead, an unnatural and immoral co-dependent relationship has formed, where the natives worship him as a god, while he in return treats them with utter ruthlessness, much like an unloving god would. The title of the paper Kurtz had been working on was "Suppression of Savage Customs": it is ended with the sentence, handwritten at a later date, "Exterminate all the Brutes!" Not quite the typical going native.

->''Si fueris Romae, Romano vivito more; si fueris alibi, vivito sicut ibi.''[[hottip:Lat.:"If you are in Rome, live in the Roman way; if you are elsewhere, live as they do there."]]

* PlayedForLaughs on ''{{MAD TV}}'' when an Arab terrorist sleeper agent ([[CastingGag played by the Jewish Ike Barinholtz]]) becomes completely Americanized to the point of becoming Jewish, speaking with a perfect "Goofy White Guy" American accent and basically living the AmericanDream as just another suburbanite. He's called out on this by his contact...who then [[HeelFaceTurn becomes mesmerized by the vibrating chair, built-in remote and TiVo,]] promptly adopting the same accent and turning his turban into a fruit bowl to become the agent's "old friend."

* ''Literature/HeartOfDarkness'' by Joseph Conrad (which would later have its ultimate adaptation in the Vietnam movie ''Film/ApocalypseNow''). Kurtz is sent to Africa as an ivory-procurement agent and suffers a spectacular back story breakdown. The narrative either plays the trope straight or subverts it, depending on the reading, though the latter seems more likely. According to the first reading, Kurtz possibly goes native in horrifying ways, inverting the European life he came from. In the alternate reading, while he has shed his civilized persona, he still hasn't gone native in a meaningful way. Instead, an unnatural and immoral co-dependent relationship has formed, where the natives worship him as a god, while he in return treats them with utter ruthlessness, much like an unloving god would. The title of the paper Kurtz had been working on was "Suppression of Savage Customs": it is ended with the sentence, handwritten at a later date, "Exterminate all the Brutes!" Not quite the typical going native.

* ''Literature/HeartOfDarkness'' by Joseph Conrad (which would later have its ultimate adaptation in the Vietnam movie ''Film/ApocalypseNow''). Kurtz is sent to Africa as an ivory-procurement agent and suffers a spectacular back story breakdown. The narrative either plays the trope straight or subverts it, depending on the reading, though the latter seems more likely. Kurtz possibly goes native in horrifying ways, inverting the European life he came from. Alternatively, while he has shed his civilized persona, he still hasn't gone native in a meaningful way. Instead, an unnatural and immoral co-dependent relationship has formed, where the natives worship him as a god, while he in return treats them with utter ruthlessness, much like an unloving god would. The title of the paper Kurtz had been working on was "Suppression of Savage Customs": it is ended with the sentence, handwritten at a later date, "Exterminate all the Brutes!" Not quite the typical going native.

* In ''Literature/HeartOfDarkness'' by Joseph Conrad, Kurtz goes into Africa and after a spectacular back story breakdown, goes native in horrifying ways, inverting the European life he came from. This book would later have its ultimate adaptation in the Vietnam movie ''Film/ApocalypseNow''.

* Sully in ''Series/{{DrQuinnMedicineWoman}}'' often seems to relate more to his Native American friends than the white folks in town.

* ''AManCalledHorse'', in which a white man joins the Sioux. It's considerably more honest about less pleasant aspects of Sioux traditional life, such as the torture of captives and ritual self-mutilation, than ''Dances With Wolves''.

* ''DancesWithWolves'', in which a Union officer joins the Sioux and ultimately fights with them against the Union army.

* Blueberry (a french cowboy comic) goes to live with the Indians who rescue him after an accident, tries to marry the chief's daughter, and helps the tribe escape from the US Army. It is worth noting that it was hard for him to get back to his people, since he was (falsely) accused of stealing $ 500.000 and trying to kill President Grant.

* One of the ''NightHuntress'' books has a minor example. [[spoiler:A friend of Cat's asks her to find out what happened to a reporter of his that was investigating the existence of vampires. Turned out the woman in question had found a vampire, and subsequently fallen in love and was living with her.]]

--> When last seen, he was living high up in the mountains of Haiti, wearing only a singlet, dirty white-drill trousers, grass sandals, and a long tan beard; very healthy and happy, occupying a one-room hut with a lovely native girl, practicing modern medicine and studying ancient voodoo.

* During [[ResurrectiveImmortality her previous life in the body of Curzon]], Dax in ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'' was one of the early Federation diplomats to start friendly relations with the [[ProudWarriorRaceGuy Klingons]]. Being already kind of a boisterous hothead, he gained their respect and trust by becoming deeply involved in Klingon culture, learning their language and martial arts, as well as comming to highly appreciate their music and [[ForeignQueasine cuisine]]. Eventually one of his Klingon friends even named his son after him, and Dax was part of the group of warriors who swore a blood oath to avenge the murder of their child, no matter how long it would take to find him. His connection to the Klingons was so strong that even when his body died and his mind added to that a young female scientist, it became a very major part of her new personalty. To the extend that [[spoiler:when she meets the only Klingon in the Federation as he takes down a group of bullies with his martial arts skills, she immediately gets very interested in him and eventually ends up as his wife a few years later.]]

GoingNative is not restricted to known traditional cultures. It might involve characters involved with aliens, orcs, mobsters,... you name it. Overlaps may occur with BecomingTheMask. Oddly, it is almost never used in cases where it is the audience's group being joined by a more advanced figure, such as the Fifth Column in ''{{V}}''.

* Harvey Keitel's character shows signs of this in ''ThePiano''.

* In the BelisariusSeries Damodara begins to adopt Rajput ways in the realization that they were the best warriors that the Malwa Empire could field (except for the Kushans with whom they were roughly equal) and flattering them was a way to gain military success and not coincidentally gain the throne.

* William Adams also known as Miura Anjin, an English ship's pilot working for the Dutch who eventually became an adviser to Tokugawa Ieyasu and was responsible for setting up Dutch and English trading houses in Japan. He also served as the inspiration for the Blackthorne character in {{Shogun}}.

* John Blackthorne from James Clavell's ''{{Shogun}}'' is an English sailor shipwrecked in old Japan. Unlike his shipmates, he decides to learn the language and cultural skills needed to fit into the unfamiliar society, and eventually decides that it's preferable to the society he came from in a number of ways. He's no MightyWhitey: he has a ''lot'' of difficulty learning the new ways, becomes only moderately competent, does not impress people, and is usually irrelevant.

* The movie ''BattleForTerra''.

* In Creator/JRRTolkien's ''LordOfTheRings'' {{backstory}}, the Black Numenoreans who escaped the destruction of the island-realm often ended up living in cultures loyal to Mordor, and becoming their leaders. At least some of the Nazgûl belonged to this group of people, as did the Mouth of Sauron. [[note]]Black is used in the BlackMagic sense, not a racial sense.[[/note]]

** Neta Efheny, in [[StarTrekTyphonPact ''Brinkmanship'']], a Cardassian spy inserted into the Tzenkethi Department of the Outside as a low-grade worker. She comes to prefer the certainty that comes with knowing your place and your function, worrying about nothing but how to perform that function, free from the need to face any of the complications regarding identity or responsibility. She eventually accepts the mind-numbing contentment of a low-grade Tzenkethi and allows herself to be fully subsumed into their society.