Via the New York Times, the way I pronounce words and the vocabulary I use puts me in these areas of the country:
That’s a pretty good fit.
The View From North Central Idaho
Ramblings on explosives, guns, politics, and sex by a redneck Idaho farm boy who became a software engineer living near Seattle.
I got the exact same results… And I’m also from Idaho and have spent the last 8 years in Seattle (and back to Idaho as of July). Perhaps this test is pretty accurate.
Mine was funny. I got Baton Rouge, Birmingham AL, and Jackson MS. I don’t believe I’ve been to any of those cities unless we were just passing through when I was little.
Looking closer at my results, it appears it picked two of those places because I chose “18-wheeler” as my answer to “large truck that carries freight.”
My mother is from PA, my father from NC. I grew up thinking cabbage rolls were Southern food, and not knowing how to pronounce the word “pecan.”
Now this test tells me I speak like folks from Albuquerque to Lubbock, where I have only been while driving through to Colorado.
My words are confused.
Yup. I’m “All of the South & Most of the Midwest.” with Georgia (where I grew up) as red as it gets.
The interesting thing is this is ‘choice of words’ more than dialect. When it came to “How do you pronounce XYZ”, my choices predominantly were Midwestern. I have been told I have no discernible *accent* but that my word choices always point to me growing up in the south.
Because, dammit – if it’s carbonated soda, it’s a Coke.
Put me in MS where I have never lived. Nor have I lived anywhere else in the South. Unless you count Delaware as the South. I moved from there before I learned to talk. I just assumed it was normal NYT accuracy.