Accent quiz!

[profbutters]

What American accent do you have? Your Result: Philadelphia   Your accent is as Philadelphian as a cheesesteak! If you're not from Philadelphia, then you're from someplace near there like south Jersey, Baltimore, or Wilmington. if you've ever journeyed to some far off place where people don't know that Philly has an accent, someone may have thought you talked a little weird even though they didn't have a clue what accent it was they heard.
The Midland
The South
The Inland North
The Northeast
The West
Boston
North Central
What American accent do you have? Quiz Created on GoToQuiz

I took this one ages ago.  I just recently ran across it again and took it again, and guess what, same results.  I found out later that some people think Philadelphia has one of the ugliest accents in the whole country.  Yeah?  Oh, yeah?  You know what I think of that?

It's originally South Jersey, actually, though my mom and grandfather were from Philadelphia.  After a lot of work in speech and theater, most people probably don't recognize the Philadelphia accent on me, but being absolutely honest, if I don't think about it, I WILL pronounce "Mary" and "merry" identically, and--something that doesn't come up in the quiz--I will say "waDer" instead of "water."  

I'm enjoying hearing Joe Biden these days.  I'm guessing that we probably sound pretty similar, though I understand he also started out with a heavy stutter, but that is what happens when you have a grating Philadelphia/South Jersey/Wilmington accent and beat it up until it submits.  

Incidentally, I've been very amused about all the posts on ontd_political  about Joe Biden.  All the "oooo!  ooo!  Joey the Shark!  Silver fox!  He is so hot!"  and my favorite: "Joe Biden:  Smart!  Funny!  Attractive to lesbians!"  I passed this along to my Dad.  Unsurprisingly, Dad is ALSO from New Jersey.

Me:  So, Dad, all these young women really seem to like Joe Biden.  Is that hilarious or what?

Dad:  Hee, hee!  Yeah, I remember when MY Dad was talking about him and saying he'd be a great President.  [NB: Grandpa died in 1989.]

Me:  No, they actually seem to have crushes on Biden.

Dad:  Hee, hee.  No, seriously.   Biden's older than me!  And I've got more hair!  And. . . hmmmm.

Mom:  You put that phone down right now, you hear?

PB

Comments

[swhedonberry.livejournal.com]

I came up Midlands, but I'm pretty sure that my Southern heritage creeps in a bit. A few weekends ago in SC, my maid of honor said that watching me talk and interact with the people I grew up around was like watching Steel Magnolias. Apparently, I said something like, "Well, he best learn how 'cause Ah'm not fixin' t'do any of that." It startled her because she's used to my theatre "non-accent".

I'm surprised that the quiz didn't include "how many syllables" questions. I know a lot of people who pronounce the word "that" as "theyat". Also, whether or not you say "fixing to" instead of "preparing to" would be a good question.

[ndainye.livejournal.com]

Mine came up Midlands with South second. The longer I live in Tennessee the more the south creeps in and people that don't know me love my southern accent. I went to school with people from the Northeast and after a good amount of kidding I finally dropped the r from wash.

[zazazuabubu.livejournal.com]

Mine says I have Midland. Pretty much everyone who knows me would disagree. I'm a mesh between Indiana, Chicago, and West Virginian, with a greater emphasis on the West Virginian (and yes, Northern Indiana accent is very different from Chicago, even though your average Chicagoan doesn't talk like the guys from the SNL sketches). When I'm mad, it's all West Virginian. Linguistically, I play with my O and Ooo sounds a lot...I draw them out. I don't do any of that silly R addition (warsh for wash) like my father.

[profbutters.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure, because I can't hear myself when I'm mad, but I always imagine I sound a bit like Lena LaMont from *Singin' In the Rain*" "Saaaay, whaadya think I yam. . . dumb'er sumthin'?" Only since I'm from New Jersey, there would be a LOT more of the F word mixed in. Some stereotypes are true.

[marla2007wapi.livejournal.com]

Your father makes me laugh...

Seriously. :D

[profbutters.livejournal.com]

Me too.

[smoothiesims.livejournal.com]

I came up as North Central, which I think is hilarious considering I've never been in that area of the U.S., but West, where I'm actually from, was pretty high on the list. It's an interesting quiz. I never realized how I pronounced certain words until I had to think about it.

[profbutters.livejournal.com]

Tough, isn't it? I went with the way I'd talk if I was very relaxed and not thinking about it and visiting at home. Even more when my maternal grandparents were alive and I'd visit South Jersey more frequently. Besides, even if what you say is fairly grammatical, it might not sound like that: "I'm going down to the Acme Market"= "Imo an down anna Acame Market." ("Acme," BTW, has three syllables in it. "AC-a-mee.")

[docnerd.livejournal.com]

Inland North, aka Upper Midwest. Grew up near Detroit, so, yup, that's pretty much me to a "T." My inclination absolutely is to call non-alcoholic carbonated beverages "pop," although after six years in New England, I've been known to have the "fish or cut bait" dilemma in that regard. "Pop? Soda? Pop? Soda? Pop? Soda? Screw it, I'll have a beer."

No one's ever asked me if I was from Wisconsin or Chicago. It's not like I speak like an extra from "Fargo" or anything (although I can; yoopers FTW). I have that utterly bland "newscaster" accent; it's more the slang that pegs me as being Midwestern, although after Massachusetts, I do tend to use "wicked" as an all-purpose adjective and can do a convincing "Bawst'n" accent.

[profbutters.livejournal.com]

Something these quizzes don't account for is the way you adjust when you move. For example, I was born in South Jersey, so I was originally taught that the colored things you put on ice cream cones are called "jimmies." But after a while, you get tired of seeing the "Duh. . WUH?" expression on people's faces, so you *learn* to call them sprinkles. The "pop/soda" thing is probably much the same.

[docnerd.livejournal.com]

There's another variant of that quiz that I've seen that actually pegs me as being from southeast Michigan because of my slang (probably because I call October 30th "Devil's Night," which I've never heard outside of metro-Detroit). The quiz seems to have disappeared, though.

"Sweeper" for "vacuum cleaner" was always the one that tripped me up. I worked the reception desks at the dorms in college, and we rented out vacuums, brooms, stuff like that, to the residents. And a non-native would come down and ask for a "sweeper" and get all mad when I gave them a broom. I mean, really, isn't "sweeper" as a term for "broom" so much more sensical than "sweeper" for "vacuum cleaner?"

It did take me a while to stop saying "pop" when I moved, but the mocking laughter of my peers was pretty good motivation. After six years, I still called carbonated beverage vending machines "pop machines" because for some reason, "soda" didn't carry over to that.

[zazazuabubu.livejournal.com]

I say "sweeper" for "vaccuum". My parents and grandparents said it as well, but I don't believe that other people in my hometown did. I've never had someone think that meant "broom" until I just asked someone now. Weird. Is "sweeper" perhaps more of a Southern thing? It's possible that's another WV thing I picked up spending all my summers there and having both sides of my family come from there.

And seriously. Pop is pop (or pawwwp with my accent). Two cans of pop is pop. Signs that say "Pops" crack me up. Saying "soda" will get you smacked around here.

[profbutters.livejournal.com]

Dunno. My grandmother also said "sweeper," as in "run the sweeper." She was from East-Central Pennsylvania.

I ran across a web page with a dictionary of CoalSpeak. That's Philadelphia into the coal country of PA, but for all I know, it might connect to WV.

[docnerd.livejournal.com]

I think "sweeper" is more of a Southern thing. I'd never met anyone who called a vacuum a "sweeper" until I started working the reception desks, and since the school was in the Midwest, most of the residents were from the Midwest, and it was only the few odd transplants that called it a "sweeper." That bit of dialect threw some of the other receptionists for a loop, too, so it wasn't just me.

...People used to mock me for saying "pop," I used to mock them for saying "soder." "Ah hah, you're from Boston, there is no 'r' in that word!"

[fireflowersims.livejournal.com]

I've never heard the term 'sweeper', and I'm in the South now. Also, I rarely ever actually hear people say 'pop'. Just the idea makes me lol.

[swhedonberry.livejournal.com]

I use slang from all over the place, "wicked" being my most used.

The pop/soda thing is like a freakin' code word. Have you ever been to any of the places that call all kinds of sodas "cokes"? As in, I'd like an orange coke or the grape coke.

[docnerd.livejournal.com]

My dad and I ran into "orange coke" in the South when we were driving out to California.

Because of where I was in Massachusetts, most of the people had no accent (or at least, they had the newscaster accent like I do) aside from the people from the Boston area or from out of the country, so the "pop" thing was really the only hint that I wasn't a native.

[lauriempress.livejournal.com]

Well mine said Midlands which is sort of funny because my accent is really much more southern than that. However, my mother and her family is from Iowa and Nebraska, so I have had exposure to it. I think sylables would have been a good thing to have in, and slang, but I also think that vowel length would have too. Dawn and Don sound different to me when I say it because I take longer to say Dawn. And Dog should be said with the same vowel pot, not awww, no matter what my fellow southerners might say. ;) Of course I wonder how much influence my study of languages, and my love of amature theatre plays on my accent. I'm sure I'm a veritable mix of different influences between family friends, education, and now living in San Diego.

I don't babble much do I. :P

Lauri

[profbutters.livejournal.com]

Two years--actually, three--living in England probably changed the way I speak forever, though I found myself trying to resist it. In fact, I found myself trying to sound more "American," if possible. I never said "boy howdy!" until I lived in Cambridge, but I couldn't resist it. Everyone seemed to expect it, and it made people so HAPPY.

[fireflowersims.livejournal.com]

Oh my god, ontd_political's collective Biden crush makes my life.

[profbutters.livejournal.com]

It totally cracks me up. I bet it would crack Biden up, if he knew. Somebody ought to send him a Tshirt, and put an extra one in for Jill.