[petercooper]

I think it's an overstatement to suggest mutual unintelligibility but they can be extremely distinctive though.

I don't know if this happens in the US, but in the UK it's not uncommon to adopt the accent of an area. I had a cockney accent as a child but now live in the north with a softer, hybrid northern accent. I tend to switch back when I am in London.

I am also familiar with people who have moved to places like Newcastle and Liverpool and picked up the accent to some extent. I even know a guy who has an Australian wife and some of his vowels slide into the Australian accent despite having never lived there. Not to mention all the young British techies who've spent more than 2 seconds in the US and start dropping their "t"s to "d"s.

[lordnacho]

Distinctive for sure. Here's a story about me at uni:

Me: how about that Steve guy, eh? He's somehow overcome his speech impediment to become a professor of engineering at this world class uni.

Friend: oh yeah he's Brummy

Me: never heard of it, is it some sort of palsy?

Friend: no it means he's from Birmingham

Me: what's that's got to do with how he talks?

Oh.