Dialect quiz

[tmthforu94]

It got me spot on - I was raised in southern Kansas, so it would make more sense for me to be similar to Oklahoma than the KC area. I've taken it three times and have generally had the same results, most likely do to a couple quirks I was raised with, such as "crawdad", crayon pronounced as crown, and lawyer with the first syllable rhyming with "paw".

Top 3:
- Tulsa
- Amarillo
- Lubbock

Bottom 3:
- Milwaukee
- Detroit
- Providence

[free my dawg]

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2013/12/20/sunday-review/dialect-quiz-map.html?r=j0214090480010200j8200j000404004800jj10020020l0000

What a surprise, Boston. Weirdly enough I got Arlington/Washington DC too.

[DINGO Joe]

Top 3--New Orleans, Madison, Aurora,IL

Bottom 3--Chattanooga,Louisville,Pittsburgh

Makes sense, my parents are from NE Iowa and I've been in NOLA for 25 years.  Poor boys and neutral ground are distinctly NOLA while much of my pronunciation is upper midwest.  My wife claims that when I'm around relatives, I get a "Fargo" accent going.  I will use the phrase "Oh jeez, y'all" anywhere.

[All Along The Watchtower]

Arizona/Nevada area, so close.

[Tender Branson]

[Tender Branson]

This is weird, because my American-English is definitely NOT Southern.

[Associate Justice PiT]

     Top three are Yonkers, New York, and Long Beach. Bottom three are Little Rock, Des Moines, and Pittsburgh. It's interesting since dialect quizzes usually stick me in the Midwest. I think it is because other quizzes I have seen focus on pronunciation whereas this one deals in usage as well.

[RedSLC]

Most similar:

1. Lincoln, NE
2. Fresno, CA
3. Bakersfield, CA

Makes sense, I guess, since I am originally from the mid-west (I believe California's central valley was settled by a lot of mid-westerners during the great depression, which would explain Fresno and Bakersfield.)

Least Similar:

1. Shreveport, LA
2. Houston, TX
3. Little Rock, AR

So southern accents are the least similar to mine. Go figure.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Well, I suppose a better way to say it is that people talk like who they would like to be their peers.  And, of course, sometimes one's peers sound like one's parents, and so one comes to talk like one's parents through one's peers.  That better?

It would certainly cover more people. I seem to have made an effort as a small boy to avoid sounding like the farmer's children, and so I don't have a Shropshire accent.

[minionofmidas]

Show us your result, then.

[bore]

Yep!  People talk like their peers, not like their parents; just look at the children of immigrants, or, in all probability, every single person who responds here (e.g., I look like a Minnesotan and not like a Michigander).

This is not actually true of everybody...

Yeah. I lived for the first 8 or so years of my life in the South East and then after that in Edinburgh, and have neither a Scottish nor a southern accent but, weirdly, a sort of Mancunian accent, because my Mum's from there.

[bore]

[opebo]

This is weird, because my American-English is definitely NOT Southern.

This isn't about accent but about dialect.  I think its not the same thing.

[MaxQue]

Again, we have a proof than this is not so good for foreigners, since it's apparently placing me in Louisiana (perhaps they are detecting some French influence).

Top 3:
Baton Rouge, LA
New Orleans, LA
New York, NY

Bottom 3:
Akron, OH
Pittsburgh, PA
Phoenix, AZ



I did the test 5 times and everytime, Louisiana was bright red and Pennsylvania deep blue.

Top:
Baton Rouge, LA (3 times)
New Orleans, LA (2 times)
New York, NY (2 times)
Jackson, MS (1 time)
Aurora, IL (1 time)
Rockford, IL (1 time)
Madison, WI (1 time)
Mobile, AL (1 time)
Seattle, WA (1 time)
Tacoma, WA (1 time)
Honolulu, HI (1 time)

Bottom:
Phoenix, AZ (1 time)
Cleveland, OH (1 time)
Des Moines, IA (1 time)
Tulsa, OK (1 time)
Philadelphia, PA (3 times)
Akron, OH (3 times)
Pittsburgh, PA (5 times)

[Foucaulf]

I have moved around a lot since birth (and technically not a native English speaker), so you see me adopting dialects from the Pacific Northwest, Chicago and Boston. Pleasantly surprised by the Minnesotan-ness, though; maybe it's due to my attempts at vowel raising

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

1. Augusta, GA
2. Jackson, MS
3. Washington, DC

I can understand Washington as my mom was from Baltimore.  Sort of surprised that Detroit is so dark blue since that is where dad was raised, but then again, it was seven decades ago that he lived there, well before the Northern Cities Vowel Shift began.

[AkSaber]

Top 3:
Salt Lake City
Anchorage
Madison

Bottom 3:
New Orleans
Baton Rouge
Shreveport

[politicallefty]

I tried the quiz again and got a very similar map, but with different cities:



Top:
Fresno
Bakersfield
Modesto

Bottom:
New Orleans
Philadelphia
Jersey City

The drive-through liquor store is what set my top cities from the rest. I've never heard of such a thing. I didn't get the question the first time, which is probably why the Arizona cities dropped off my list. As for the sandwich, I always call it a sub. Even though I say soda, the Northeast has far too many oddities. My only real exception was with caramel, which I pronounce with three syllables, like the Northeast and South (and, according to the map, some in San Francisco and Los Angeles).

For some reason, Fresno is always on the list (usually at the top). I've never lived there and I haven't been there since I was very young. My dad had a very similar result as mine, with Bakersfield at the top. My brother got Phoenix as his top result, with the other two being Las Vegas suburbs. I have yet to get my mom to take the test, though I have my expectations as she was born and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area.

[they don't love you like i love you]

I found this thanks to reading opebo's history, and finally took. The result is not surprising:

http://nyti.ms/1rwMMpT

Please note not only is Minneapolis/St. Paul one of the top cities, but also what states are colored darker than this area...

[they don't love you like i love you]

Perhaps the most distinctive answer: Rummage sale. I was surprised to see the pattern for this, it's most common in eastern Wisconsin, but is also relatively common in the Dakotas (hence where I got it from)...but not common in Minnesota. I don't think I've ever heard my mom who has them all the time call them anything else, but she's from Minnesota originally.

Something I've noticed where North Dakota is different from everywhere else: Graham crackers are not pronounced as "gram crackers", it's a two syllable word with the h barely there or totally silent but still two syllables (like "gruh-am"). Most people in Minnesota think this is quite weird and I've found even Fargoans aren't familiar with it, meaning it's most likely a western Dakota thing, or possibly even exclusive to the Bismarck metro.

[memphis]

Granted, the Southern accent also has its eccentricities, but the Great Lakes vowel shift strikes me as intensely strange. People go around talking like that all the time?

[they don't love you like i love you]

I think people tend to misunderstand. Look up a video of Amy Klobuchar speaking. That's what we sound like. Not Sarah Palin.

[Flake]

Decided to do this again:

[IceSpear]

[Frodo]

I am very much an East Coaster, my three main cities being Arlington (VA), New York, and Boston.  Makes sense, though, since I have lived here in this area for about twenty years now, I speak like a local.