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Ohio has a pretty big difference between Cleveland and the rest of the state.
The northern tiers of counties in Ohio are impacted by the NCVS. This can extend as far south as Columbus. The Midland (flat accent) covers most of central Ohio. Southern Ohio has a mixture of Midland with upland southern influences from the states adjacent to it. The same goes for Appalachian SE Ohio.
We relocated from CA to the Upper Midwest last year. It was amazing to see how quickly our 4 year old's accent changed. Within just a couple months, she sounded like she was born here. It's clear in her pronunciation and some word choices. I'm not from this region, so I still notice it on a daily basis
We relocated from CA to the Upper Midwest last year. It was amazing to see how quickly our 4 year old's accent changed. Within just a couple months, she sounded like she was born here. It's clear in her pronunciation and some word choices. I'm not from this region, so I still notice it on a daily basis
Neutral You`re not Northern, Southern, or Western, you`re just plain -American-. Your national identity is more important than your local identity, because you don`t really have a local identity. You might be from the region in that map, which is defined by this kind of accent, but you could easily not be. Or maybe you just moved around a lot growing up.
I was born in 1987 in the Bronx. No accent. My parents(from the Carib) didn't have one nor did most of the people I was around. When I was 11 I moved to ATL where I been ever since. People always get it wrong where I'm from or what accent I have. Never NY. Well one guy said "no you are from Jersey". People thought I was from Oregon, Cali, TX, Michigan, Ohio, and my girlfriend(WV with a very noticeable accent) swears I have a southern accent. My very calm, laid back vibe and the way I talk I guess throws people off. Taking that test I thought I would end up with the "neutral" results. Lol the test got it way wrong!!! It said I had a North central accent which you find in ND, northern MN, far north WI, and the UP of MI. Yeah I don't sound like that at all, funny.
This is a funny topic to me. I live in DFW, Texas and my wife and I often notice how when you're on the Dallas side of the metro, you almost never hear any Texas/Southern accents, and most people's accents sound very neutral (most people under about 50 years old, anyway). But as soon as you go over to the Fort Worth side where there are a lot less transplants and more Native Texans, the Texas accents get thick as molasses. It's funny how the accents can be so different in two cities that are only about 30 or 40 minutes apart.
A lot of people don't have regional accents in high school and college but it somewhat develops after they get out of educational institutions. That's why the people that generally don't have them are college aged while you notice it more with people over age 22.
Considering most people on this board fall into the 18-24 age range, most of you guys probably won't notice the accents with your age group, even in the South.
Level of class and education definitely factor into accents. Even when you go to places known for having distinctive accents like NYC or Boston, you will notice that even when it comes to people born and raised there, most of the more educated people or the people who live in more well off areas have a much more neutral accent than the average working class Joe.
Another way that the level of class and education affecting accents becomes noticeable is for those who have ever learned a second language. I became fluent in Spanish as a young adult, so I'm not a native speaker. However, some types of Spanish accents and dialects---like any type of Caribbean Spanish (Puerto Rican, Dominican, Cuban) where they talk as fast as a machine gun shoots bullets and drop practically all the ending syllables and letters off their words---can be a challenge to understand, even to native Spanish speakers from other countries like Mexico or Peru where the accent is slower and all the syllables are pronounced. But I notice that the more educated a native speaker is or depending on what social class they are from, it doesn't matter if they are from Puerto Rico, Mexico, Argentina, or Spain, because they will tend to speak much more slowly and clearly with a lot better diction and their accent becomes a lot more neutral as a result.
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