Loading... Create an account or log in to take the quiz and share your results. Continue Your last answer Least similar Most similar Next You’re viewing another reader’s map. Click here to take the quiz and see your own. Your Map See the pattern of your dialect in the map below. Three of the most similar cities are shown. These maps show your
most distinctive answer for each of these cities. About This Quiz The data for the quiz and maps shown here come from over 350,000 survey responses collected from August to October 2013 by Josh Katz, a graphics editor for the New York Times who developed this quiz and has since written “Speaking American,” a visual exploration of American regional dialects. Most of the questions
used in this quiz are based on those in the Harvard Dialect Survey, a linguistics project begun in 2002 by Bert Vaux and Scott Golder. The original questions and results for that survey can be found on Dr. Vaux’s current website. The colors on the large heat map correspond to the probability that a randomly selected person in that
location would respond to a randomly selected survey question the same way that you did. The three smaller maps show which answer most contributed to those cities being named the most (or least) similar to you.
More on NYTimes.com
Have you ever told someone to "shut the lights"?I'm Gonna Ask You 40 Questions About How You Speak — Then I'll Guess Exactly Where You Live
SO, I'm pretty confident I can guess where you live...
The goal of these surveys was to take stock of the differences in language, pronunciation, and word choice in different regions, big and small, across the United States.
The takeaway: Even the simplest, everyday things might be called something completely different just miles from where you live. So I wanted to see if I could take some of the data collected from these surveys and try to guess where YOU live.
It'll take 40 questions, but I think I can do it — oh, and don't forget: There are no right or wrong answers. The only requirement is honesty.
Are you ready?
There are a number of factors that affect the way you talk — age, race, class, gender and more — but perhaps the most significant is geography. Regional dialect differences in the United States are a source of endless fascination. You might ask people from other parts of the country, “How do you pronounce caramel?” or “Do you say soda or pop?” It can be fun to examine these differences, and it gives us a sense of identity and regional pride. Using some simplified versions of these variations on the English language, we’ve created an American dialect quiz to see if we can guess which region you’re from based on how you pronounce certain words and which words you use for common things.
Simply choose the answer that most closely represents what you would say in normal conversation. If you tend to alternate, choose the one you’d say most of the time. Take the American dialect quiz below!
If you want to learn more about the way Americans talk, check out our series all about the different dialects and accents from around the United States. (And if you’re confused about accents and dialects, watch the video at the top of this article.)
Note: This quiz relies on research by Bert Vaux and Scott Golder did in 2003. Americans change the way they talk all the time, so you can find out more about Vaux’s current research here.
If you’re feeling particularly nationalistic, or just want to see how consistently you speak like your friends and neighbors, here are all the dialect quizzes that I could find. Find out what your dialect most resembles, and, in many cases, help science at the same time!
1. How Y’all, Youse and You Guys Talk: Your Personal Dialect as a Heat Map
Definitely the best-known recent dialect survey, it’s from the New York Times and based on visualizations by Joshua Katz of a survey from linguists Bert Vaux and Scott Golder that’s actually about a decade old. The results are based mostly on words and pronunciations, although there are a few questions about sentences, and are confined to the lower 48 United States.
2. The Cambridge Online Survey of World Englishes
This is the more up-to-date version of the Vaux survey that the heat map above was based on. It’s also more international, and the survey results go back into creating more advanced maps, although the visualizations are admittedly less pretty. If you already did the previous survey, check this one out to see what’s changed since the early aughts.
3. Which English? The Guess Your English Quiz
“Which English” determines your dialect based entirely on your rating of particular sentences, not on words or pronunciations like the two above. You’ll see two results: your top three potential native English dialects (such as American English or New Zealand English) as well as your top three potential first languages that aren’t English, such as Norwegian or Spanish.
4. Test Your Vocab
This isn’t a dialect quiz per se, but it will estimate how many words you know. If you want to know how they get the estimates or how you compare to other people with your age or reading habits or SAT score, also check out the results on their blog. These researchers are especially interested in getting more results from children at the moment, so try it a second time with any kids you have in your life!
5. Specific accent quizzes
Have you always wondered whether your accent was more similar to a Southerner or a Yankee? How well do you know words associated with British English, Scottish English, Northern Irish English, Canadian English, Montreal English, Australian English, or New Zealand English? If you’re wondering what someone from these places sounds like, here’s a list of hundreds of YouTube videos, sorted by location, of people recording their accents as part of the “Regional Dialect Meme.”
6. Do You Speak American?
Now it’s your turn to be quizzed: This quiz based on the PBS documentary of the same name plays you 12 audio files to match with the approximate region that the speaker is from. Even if you just end up guessing, it’ll tell you the answers and what to listen for after you click “submit.” For another challenge, try matching these British speakers to where they’re from on a map.
7. The Great English Dialect Quiz
A quiz list isn’t complete without a BuzzFeed quiz. I can’t promise this one is backed by science, and it seems that the only results are types of British English, but if you’ve always wondered which British accent yours is least dissimilar to, it might be fun.
Know of any language quizzes that we’ve missed? Let us know on Twitter or in the comments.