Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2020/10/28/listen-to-6-american-regional-accents-as-they-were-spoken-in-1958.html
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Waddaya talk?
Wow; this guy could put a coked-out weasel (e.g. Donald Trump, Jr.) to sleep in 3 seconds flat =x.
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Could we just get Noam Chomsky to sum it up in 5 minutes or less? 
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I want to hear the 80’s version with super localized “accents” like “Ca Valley Girl”, “Ca DudeSurfer”, “Brooklyn mobster wannabe”, “midwest all hat no cattle “cowboy”” etc…
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They should have done Boston too. It’s the way the other half of Massachusetts talks.
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I was hoping for Baltimore
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Where’s the 6th accent from?
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I find it fascinating, but wish they had another speaker from the southern portion of the Great Lakes. The area was just in the middle of the Northern Cities chain shift that altered a lot of the vowels. I’d love to know where a Cleveland, Toledo, Detroit, or Milwaukee accent was in that process.
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Wheredayagitit?
I have just one question: Why the tribal drum music at the start?
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I would have liked to see the Transatlantic accent covered, because I find it fascinating. It was an entirely invented accent intended to convey status (rather like the British “posh” accent, perhaps). It was the standard for newscasters and radio personalities, hence why old news reels have that distinct narration that sounds “old timey” to us now.
The worst half…
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@SeamusAMurphy OG Bostonians can turn it off and on if they concentrate. I guess it depends on the social situation.
Where is William Labov when we need him?
I always find fascinating how English spelling, like French, is quite a messy, clunky animal.
Every language has dialects, even when the number of speakers is quite low, American English has not lost all of its regional variants and that is a good thing. Or should I say… thang?
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