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I definitely don't hear the Boston accent much anymore here in Boston. But I'm not so sure it's because it's fading or because the working class population known for the accent is becoming a smaller percentage of the overall population by the day. I hear it more in some of the working class suburban cities (i.e. Malden, Medford, Everett, but it's fading there too), the Irish Riviera (Hull, Marshfield, etc.), and sporadically elsewhere, but nowhere near as much as I used to.
Rhode Island seems to be going strong though.
I grew up in the western Boston exurbs, and agree with this. In my HS in the 90's, which was a middle/upper-middle class area, I would say that about 30-40% of the students had an accent (and about 75% of my hockey team, ha.) Every time that I go back, I hear it less and less. And it's usually with older people. But I recognize that Metrowest was never ground zero for the Boston accent and I imagine it's much more prevalent on the North & South Shore.
That said, to someone not from the area I imagine that they still hear it quite a bit. But it's slowly being priced out of the urban core and imagine that will only continue.
I noticed that to me at least, distinct accents in the US are not that much of a thing.
I'm a native New Yorker, and nobody here talks like Andrew Dice Clay besides older, white, non-immigrant blue collar people. Even my Irish-American grandfather who was a cab driver and born in the 40s, never spoke with a stereotypical sounding New York accent unless it was tongue in cheek. Most white people have a generic American accent and most black people have the black Northeastern accent that is shared with North Jersey and New England. There are some small differences (regarding the former), such as us pronouncing coffee like "coffee", but other than that I hardly think we sound much different from Midwesterners or West Coast people. I'll post a recording of my voice later if anyone is interested.
Whenever I meet white people from the South, they almost never have Southern sounding accents unless they're from rural areas. Every white person I meet from the urban South has more of a generic American sounding accent.
Black people do seem to have regional accents still (black people from the Northeast sound much different from the South), however that may be fading too.
I'm a black Philadelphian who was raised in West Philly, and I speak with a Philly accent reminiscent of those spoken by white working-class people. My accent is really noticeable when I say "wooder" (water), "cawfee" (coffee), and "beggels" (bagels), among other things. I never really notice my accent until I travel outside of the metro, or until a non-native points out my speech patterns.
In general, it's getting harder to hear a classic Philly accent in the city. You won't really hear it unless you go below Snyder Avenue in South Philly, deep into the River Wards (especially Port Richmond and Kensington), and generally above Cottman Avenue in the Northeast. The classic black Northeastern accents can still be heard in large portions of North and West Philly (though this is decreasing, especially south of Market and east of 54th Street), however. One can hear a classic Philly accent more easily in the surrounding PA suburbs and South Jersey, and decreasingly so in the DE and MD suburbs of Philly.
I grew up in the western Boston exurbs, and agree with this. In my HS in the 90's, which was a middle/upper-middle class area, I would say that about 30-40% of the students had an accent (and about 75% of my hockey team, ha.) Every time that I go back, I hear it less and less. And it's usually with older people. But I recognize that Metrowest was never ground zero for the Boston accent and I imagine it's much more prevalent on the North & South Shore.
That said, to someone not from the area I imagine that they still hear it quite a bit. But it's slowly being priced out of the urban core and imagine that will only continue.
Yeah, I grew up in the inner west Chicago 'burbs in the 2000s-early 2010s. I never thought at the time that we had Chicago accents, but when I look back and remember what my (white) classmates' and teachers' voices sounded like, yeah, a lot of them did, and they still do on the rare occasions I talk to them. Mostly the guys, and mostly the people with... it's hard to describe, maybe more of a local outlook on things than a worldly, social-justice outlook. I don't know if it correlated much with class. I grew up with the accent but not as thick as some people.
But yeah, whenever I've gone back after I graduated and listened to the local kids, and heard interviews with them on local TV, I do think they have more of that urban West Coast sound and less of the Chicago accent, although you can still faintly hear the latter in some kids. I think it's going stronger in the outer suburbs with less exposure to hipster culture from the city.
Boston accent has faded considerably in Boston proper.. However the suburbs have only seen a small decline in wealthier areas and towns. It is still very prevalent in places like Revere, Swampscott, Weymouth and Quincy.
The Cleveland accent is something I've really been picking up on, especially since I listen to sports talk radio to and from work. It's one that I never knew existed until I moved to south Georgia and the natives would ask me where I'm from (knew I was a "yankee" but couldn't put it together). The other transplants from the north would always guess Chicago first, and I would be like close but Cleveland.
It wasn't until I moved back until I really picked up how distinctive the Cleveland accent was (and how irritating it actually is). Though, while I know I have it, I have a deeper voice and it doesn't come off as nasally, so I can see why people would guess Chicago. But a higher pitched nasally Cleveland accent to me is just as now recognizable as a New York or Boston accent. The deeper voiced people do come across more like Chicago though we still hit certain words that you would know "that's Cleveland".
Going back to sports radio, the accent is definitely something that is most pronounced from those in the 30 to 50 year age group. The older callers seem to have a mix of accents (probably because a lot of first generation Americans or southern blacks who migrated north) in that group. the second generation people (30 to 50) really started to establish it. I can also pick up on it from some of the younger callers but doesn't seem as distinctive. And it definitely seems to be a second generation accent that crosses over racial lines, especially westside and Lorain County, where blacks and Puerto Ricans have it as well, though not as pronounced.
And its definitely a Cleveland specific accent. Akron (35 miles south) and Canton (60 miles south) have the traditional interior MW accent. ... though some of the slavic second generation south Akron people have it as well as those in the northern Summit County, Cleveland/Akron middle areas. Then Youngstown (60 miles east) has more of the Pittsburgh accent ... another one that I can easily pick up on.
Last edited by ClevelandBrown; 06-17-2019 at 06:55 PM..
I live in the Charlotte area and the Southern accent is still here, but not as much as before 1990. You hear it more in the suburbs, but still hear it in Charlotte too. In the South in general, the accent is still pretty revailant.
My in-laws live in Cape Cod, MA and lived in the Boston metro area before retirement. My FIL and BIL have a VERY pronounced Boston accent. My MIL and nephews accents are slightly Northeastern and more neutral. Around Cape Cod and metro Boston, I noticed when we lived there for a year and a half recently that there was a pretty even mix of Boston Irish and the more neutral NE; just like with my in-laws, lol. I really love accents in general here in America. I find them very interesting!
Only hear the Maine accents in downeast Maine among the older people but I think TV was the biggest factor to eliminate regional accents, a lot of areas in Maine only had Canadian TV so I was never able to watch All In The Family at my grandparents house.
I definitely don't hear the Boston accent much anymore here in Boston. But I'm not so sure it's because it's fading or because the working class population known for the accent is becoming a smaller percentage of the overall population by the day. I hear it more in some of the working class suburban cities (i.e. Malden, Medford, Everett, but it's fading there too), the Irish Riviera (Hull, Marshfield, etc.), and sporadically elsewhere, but nowhere near as much as I used to.
Rhode Island seems to be going strong though.
Aw c’mon. You used to live around New Bedford. (Pronounced New BehFuh). Regional accent is tied to socioeconomic class. Working class cities and towns have the accent. White collar places don’t. You now live in a place where the white collar people have displaced the working class. I remember the Slumerville of 1980. It’s now the high rent district. You don’t have to go far to find the non-gentrified parts of Boston with the thick accent.
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