I’d take it as a synonym for stuffing. (It wouldn’t occur to me to make the inside-the-bird vs. outside-the-bird distinction, although now that someone’s mentioned it, it makes sense.)
In the context of Thanksgiving I’d assume you were talking about stuffing but I never use the term myself.
If you said you were making chicken with dressing for Tuesday dinner, I’d assume you meant you were marinating your chicken breasts in Wishbone.
I’d know what you meant since I’ve heard people use both that and stuffing with about equal frequency. I hate it myself but I think I’d call it stuffing were I ever to speak about it.
I’d assume it was the gray mushy cornbread heaven my grandmother always served with the turkey.
I’ve never just called salad dressing “dressing” though.
I agree with this. Interesting.
And this.
I’ve always used the term “stuffing”, but I think my grandmother said “dressing”.
No southern connection. Wisconsin Danish background.
Never been “South” and I’d know exactly what you were talking about.
So many mixed answers. :S
Our preferred term is stuffing, but we recognize dresssing as an alternative version.
Heck, “Pops” Mercotan always called it wadding! I’ve tried to instill that usage into my kids too. Not sure if it took, tho. elfbabe?
Oh, you just reminded me of my first Thanksgiving with my then boyfriend, now husband. After that meal, I knew I had to break it off with him. If he grew up thinking it normal for the wife, (his mother) to make a meal that had pans of oyster dressing, along with the crouton stuffing, along with the gravy with hard boiled eggs, and the gravy without eggs, and two kinds of green beans, some with ham and onions, some with just ham, and two cranberry things, biscuits with honey, biscuits without, tossed salad with tomatos, tossed salad without tomatos, pies with nutmeg, pies without nutmeg, hashbrowns with cheese, hashbrows without cheese, corn pudding with something, corn pudding without something, even two turkeys, one basted with one thing, one basted with another thing…
Every part of the meal had a separately cooked twin, for a picky eater. Just one version of her Thanksgiving meal was the end all meal. But she cooked two versions of everything. She started in September I was told.
My California mom’s version of Thanksgiving was a Turkey Loaf thing, canned green beans, and frozen pumpkin pie. My idea of Thanksgiving was to go out, let someone else mess with all that. Bless the good women who enjoy cooking and treating their families to a feast. I can love and appreciate them, but I am not going to be one of them.
So I had a heart to heart with the man of my dreams. I would never be capable of what his mother did. I had no desire to do it, wouldn’t do it, and if that was an expectation of his, let’s just call the whole thing off now.
So 15 years later, we will be happily having pizza for dinner tomorrow night. 
Born and raised in Florida by parents who were from North Carolina - it was dressing.
Here in NJ - it’s stuffing.
VCNJ~
To me (raised in TN), dressing is stuffing, BUT it is cooked outside the bird - stuffing is what it becomes when it’s cooked inside the bird, but if you don’t want to cook it inside the bird, it’s dressing.
If you weren’t asking this around Thanksgiving, I would have assumed salad dressing. But today being what it is, I assumed you meant my first reaction.
What he said.
I was born and raised in North Florida. My family always has both: bread stuffing, made with shredded white bread, chicken broth, and sauteed onions and celery, which is mooshed together and shoved inside the bird (may not sound like it, but it is AWESOME), then a pan of cornbread dressing with boiled eggs and other goodies baked inside.
This time of year I would assume that you were talking about cornbread dressing.
I would be thinking of what to wear to dinner. Something stylish but not too dressy.
This is how it’s been at Chez Ruby for as long as I can remember. (Born and raised in the Midwest) For the most part, though, the terms are used synonomously with my family and friends.
I’m a mid-40’s native of California, now in the Midwest. My parents and their ancestors for a cople generations were from the Chicago / So. Wisconsin area.
Just what Ruby & Chefguy said.
In a non-feast context I’d probably assume “dressing” meant sauce for a salad. But in any context involving roast poultry, “dressing” would be bread & savory stuff cooked outside the bird & served as a starch course with the bird & gravy.
Should be obvious, when you consider the shortcut “Stove Top Dressing” 
I would think of cornbread dressing. Generally, I refer to it as “dressing” if it’s prepared outside the turkey, and “stuffing” if it’s prepared inside the turkey. The defacto term around here is “stuffing,” although around African-Americans I’ve generally heard “dressing” more often.
Ditto. I grew up in CA, for what it’s worth.
Dressing, to me, is what goes on a salad. Stuffing is what you have with roasties.