Where do you start/stop hearing accents??

[OCGuy81]

When you take a road trip, where do you first start to notice regional dialects?

I'm reminded of a trip we took when I was a kid from southeastern Wisconsin (yes, living out west I'm now aware that part of the country has an accent) to see my grandparents who were snowbirds down in Florida.

I think I first started to hear southern accents in and around Louisville....maybe even southern Indiana.

But other parts of the country I'm curious about. For example, how far do you have to drive outside of Boston where it's a "car"  and not a "ka" ?

[Rothman]

Utica, NY

[TheHighwayMan3561]

Kansas City is about where I start to hear Southern accents mixing with Midwestern ones.

[SectorZ]

But other parts of the country I'm curious about. For example, how far do you have to drive outside of Boston where it's a "car"  and not a "ka" ?

Not far, because less than 10% of the people around Boston speak this way.

[JayhawkCO]

Kansas City is about where I start to hear Southern accents mixing with Midwestern ones.

I agree with that line from Minnesota as a native Minnesotan that lived in KC for 11 years. Missouri and Missourah aren't that far away from each other.

Chris

[tolbs17]

Fhank you. Typical African accent

[Bruce]

Flying just about anywhere else.

Or traveling deep enough into the mountains, where you can hear some odd accents due to migration. There's pockets of Appalachia in the Cascades.

[kphoger]

Going to Missouri, there seems to be a huge shift in redneck-iness between Joplin/Springfield and Branson.

[andrepoiy]

When I walk out my front door, someone will speak English with a foreign accent. Haha

[GaryV]

I only have to go about 20 miles to Canada (when allowed) and I'll hear an accent.

Else, the south end of Ohio or the UP.

[webny99]

From Western NY, I notice differences in the accents beyond (a) the Canadian border, (b) Cleveland, (c) Albany, and (d) Scranton.

[hbelkins]

The Ohio River, and the Tennessee state line.

[I-39]

I'm bad at noticing accents unless they are super obvious.

[Stormwalker]

I don't have to go anywhere.  All I have to do is call my sister, across town, or my mother (who only lives about two hours and a half hours away).

I have, and am accustomed to from others, the prototypical "Dallas" accent.  It's a mild Texas accent (but still enough Texas that for the two years I lived in Westchester County, New York, some people up there called me "Cowboy"), with maybe a touch of Midwest in it.  My sister and my Mom both have the rural East Texas accent.  In my Mom's case it's because that's where she's from.  I can only assume my sister got it from her.  It's different enough that people can tell when I've been on the phone with either of them because my accent becomes more pronounced afterward.

That said, sticking to the actual spirit of the question, if I go East on I-20 about 1 to 1.5 hours? I can hear the difference.

[michravera]

Flying just about anywhere else.

Or traveling deep enough into the mountains, where you can hear some odd accents due to migration. There's pockets of Appalachia in the Cascades.

I live in Fremont, CA. So the answer is "less than 10 meters from my front door". My down-one older neighbors barely speak English at all and when they do, it is with a heavy East Asian accent. The younger one there speaks with an East Asian accent. My up-one neighbors, the wife speaks Mexican-influenced English, the husband with a Mexican accent, the girls with a heavy California accent. The same goes for my step-daughter and me. My wife has a West Coast, but not completely Californian (but not completely "Air Force" either) accent. She often does put the "the" in freeway numbers even in Northern California.

I remember Super Bowl Sunday a couple of years ago (within shouting distance of Levi Stadium), when I got to hear the equivalent of "Holy Cow!" (or something just a bit more colorful) in 6 different languages when people saw the length of the queue for self-checkout at the Safeway. Around here, if you are looking for an accent and can't find it, I will maintain it is because you haven't looked very hard.

[Dirt Roads]

Seems to me that the I-85 corridor loses its Southern Access from say Gastonia pretty much all the way to Henderson.  With one big exception, the folks next door in Alamance County seem to have more of an Appalachian dialect (even though they are nowhere near the mountains).  Local history tells us that much of exodus into Tennessee and Kentucky came from "ancient Orange" back in the mid-to-late-1700s, at a time when Orange County was centered in the Haw River area of what's now Alamance County. 

Accordingly, the Southern accent picks up again along when you hit the northern tier counties of North Carolina (west of I-85) and bleeds over into Virginia and West Virginia.

[I-55]

The Ohio River, and the Tennessee state line.

The only consistency in Kentucky I've had is "y'all."

Otherwise it varies by trip. Tennessee is solid southern, Indiana is solid midwestern. Kentucky gradually changes as you go north but you can find either accent just about anywhere along I-65.

[SSOWorld]

You'll have to watch it to notice.

[Ned Weasel]

Kansas City is about where I start to hear Southern accents mixing with Midwestern ones.

I agree with that line from Minnesota as a native Minnesotan that lived in KC for 11 years. Missouri and Missourah aren't that far away from each other.

Chris

People in the Kansas City area frequently ask me where I'm from because of my "accent."  I was born in this area, grew up here, and lived in this area almost my entire life.  One person even thought I was British.  Frankly, I don't think I could fake a British accent very convincingly even if I tried.

[jp the roadgeek]

But other parts of the country I'm curious about. For example, how far do you have to drive outside of Boston where it's a "car"  and not a "ka" ?

Not far, because less than 10% of the people around Boston speak this way.

I've heard it as far west as Sturbridge (been to a Dunkin there and it was a mixed bag).  It's totally gone by the time you reach Springfield or head down 84 into CT.

[Rothman]

But other parts of the country I'm curious about. For example, how far do you have to drive outside of Boston where it's a "car"  and not a "ka" ?

Not far, because less than 10% of the people around Boston speak this way.

I've heard it as far west as Sturbridge (been to a Dunkin there and it was a mixed bag).  It's totally gone by the time you reach Springfield or head down 84 into CT.

Worcester County has a much harsher accent than Boston in my experience -- having grown up in MA.  Boston's accent has a "smoothness" or flow as the Rs are dropped off.  Worcester just sounds like a bunch of longshoremen to me in comparison.

It's not a huge difference, but it is significant.

[SectorZ]

But other parts of the country I'm curious about. For example, how far do you have to drive outside of Boston where it's a "car"  and not a "ka" ?

Not far, because less than 10% of the people around Boston speak this way.

I've heard it as far west as Sturbridge (been to a Dunkin there and it was a mixed bag).  It's totally gone by the time you reach Springfield or head down 84 into CT.

Worcester County has a much harsher accent than Boston in my experience -- having grown up in MA.  Boston's accent has a "smoothness" or flow as the Rs are dropped off.  Worcester just sounds like a bunch of longshoremen to me in comparison.

It's not a huge difference, but it is significant.

Working and living in Worcester county for a decade allows me to concur with this.

It's a weird variant of the Providence accent, which is a weird, geographically isolated NY accent.

[Scott5114]

Going to Missouri, there seems to be a huge shift in redneck-iness between Joplin/Springfield and Branson.

Probably at about the Greene—Christian county line if I had to guess. One thing that I learned from the year I lived in Springfield is that Springfieldians love to take the piss out of Branson. "Going down to Branson? Gonna visit Steal Your Dollar City?"

I think a similar divide probably exists around the Greene—Webster county line too, going east on US-60. There was sort of a general expectation that Springfield was the "civilization" that people from back up in the Ozarks would come visit when they were in need of "civilization". Like doing Christmas shopping, for instance.

[vdeane]

But other parts of the country I'm curious about. For example, how far do you have to drive outside of Boston where it's a "car"  and not a "ka" ?

Not far, because less than 10% of the people around Boston speak this way.

That explains why on a family vacation to Boston I didn't hear even one person speak that way.  I wondered what the heck my parents were talking about regarding the accent.

I did hear someone talk that way on a school field trip to Cape Cod, though.

[Dirt Roads]

Eastern North Carolina is home to the "Hoi Toider" dialect.  Centered on the island of Ocracoke, the accent/dialect is also common east of the Neuse River in Carteret County as well as in certain communities along both the Outer Banks and Inner Banks.  This seems particularly prevalent for folks living along of the US-70 tailhook and along the US-264 circumference around Lake Mattamuskeet.  There are some related dialects on islands in the Chesapeake Bay.