| It was accurate but a bit overgeneralized for me: "You have a Northern accent. That could either be the Chicago/Detroit/Cleveland/Buffalo accent (easily recognizable) or the Western New England accent that news networks go for." Chicago suburban for me. I'm actually southwest of the city, but the NY Times quiz heat map puts me in the Buffalo/Cleveland/Detroit/Chicago zone, quite rightly, but different than the city proper. Before a certain Saturday Night Live sketch, I never said "Da Bears," ever, so I don't have the South Side accent which that parodies. Of course, even in that range there are differences. Most Chicagoans wouldn't know what a "weck" was if it jumped up and bit them (which would be a neat trick, since it's a roast beef sandwich served in the Buffalo area). The NYT quiz has some judgement calls for me, though, since I use a variety of different terms sometimes (highways being a good example). This little bit on the Michigan accent (2002) is spot-on: http://michigannative.com/ma_home.shtml |
But the NYT one had some that I wanted to select multiple for. Such as "service road" & "frontage road". I selected "service road" but I know that in Chicago where I'm from the term "frontage road" is used but I don't think I personally would use it in a sentence since it isn't intuitive to me.
There were other examples where I wanted to select multiple.
Also never been to Buffalo and don't know what a "weck" is.