I Was Blown Away by These American Accents 

12:25 The girl singing said "I got a pig at home in a pen and corn to feed him on, all I need is a pretty lil girl to feed him when I'm gone" 😂😂😂 Even though I'm from Boston, my late partner was from the south so I can pick up on various different southern accents pretty well.

Years ago, we moved from Connecticut to Maryland. Our house was being built and the foreman (Billy Ray) was from West Virginia. My wife began talking to the man and he said, "Yalls ferners?" My wife said, "Excuse me?" and he repeated "Yalls ferners?" She said she didn't understand. He took out a piece of paper and wrote, "You all is foreigners?" She said "We're from Connecticut." He replied, "Yep, yalls ferners."

The number one hardest accent for me to understand is Cajun accent. Deep Louisiana

I am an American who lived in The UK in the mid-1980s. I was travelling in the Highlands of Scotland and I had to translate between a New Yorker and a Highlander. They could not understand each other, but they could each understand me.

Now you've hit the nail on the head why American's don't typically learn a lot of foreign languages...we use all of our language energy trying to just understand each other. (Kidding, not kidding.)

14:00 “He didn’t say nothing. He just brought me the whole thing. I don’t eat much of that stuff. I had a little bit for supper, but the rest of it is going to go bad in there.” You are far easier to understand. Your English is outstanding. ❤️

While the 'Southern' accent spans the Southern region of the US, there are 'sub-regions' of dialects that span about 200-300 miles only and change in the next 200-300 miles. These sub-regions are spotted all over the South, and can even be several in a single State...

"southern accent" covers about 12 States. There are about 27 Southern dialects in the US

Appalachian Kentuckian here! Those deep Appalachian accents are something you can only find in the backwoods and hollers. And I'm glad you think our accents is beautiful. 😉

I grew up in and around NYC and went to law school in Boston. I assure you, those accents are utterly and completely different. Your confusing Pittsburgh with Boston is proof that it is indeed hard for a non native speaker to pick up the differences in accents. Could see this when you reacted to the excellent Wired Tour of North American accents with the dialect coach. And yes this should prove to you that we will easily understand you with your accent when you eventually visit the US. Boston is in Massachusetts but Massachusetts is one of the 6 states that make up New England region: Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut.

Enjoying your videos!! I'm a Cajun from the Deep South. I speak English, Cajun French, and Haitian Creole. I never thought I had an accent until I left my state and others would know where I'm from because of it. 😂

And Europeans say Americans are all alike. I'm happy to say I got all but a few of these accents. That's probably because of my profession of many years, listening to people from everywhere. What makes some of them hard is the speed with which they're talking.

Boston is on Massachusetts. But Massachusetts is in the area of the United States called New England

Yeah, they did us dirty for the southern accent. That's WAY too broad to just put under one label. There was a Tennessee or Kentucky accent, an Alabama one, a Georgia one, and a Louisiana one. You cannot just put all southern accents into one category like that. I've never even heard the last two! That was awesome!

After decades in the US west where my god given Boston accent started to slip away, my Mother said "Petah, Petah! It's wicked haad to unnastand yah!" If you want to blend in around Minnesota just reply "no shit, eh" no matter what anyone but a cop says to you.

I'm from South Carolina and we have several accents in the state. Growing up here you can tell whether someone is from a certain part of the state by how they talk.

The first woman talking was doing a TV presenter accent. It's purposefully clear.

The absolute hardest accent is outerbanks off north Carolina. They have preserved 1600s England English. So bizarre! They're descended from sailers and pirates that colonized the islands and have been very isolated for several 100 years. Geechi and gullah are also tough. These are coastal south Carolina and incorporate several African tribal languages and coastal Indians. Tough, very tough.

I am from Alabama and when I was in Europe years back, people thought I was from South Africa or maybe Australia as that is how my accent sounded to them.

I love you my friend. I literally heard that Creole French speaking today in Michigan at a southern style restaurant for the first time. SAME DAY Later I watch you hear it for the firsttime as well. So cool!

The old guy was fussing because someone brought him food that he doesnt care for and brought him this food for his dinner. But he brought too much and now the old man is fussing because the food will go bad before he can eat it all. He obviously hates waste and is upset over the fact that the food will go bad before he can finish it all. It's food he doesn't normally eat because he doesn't like it, and now he has too much food that he doesn't like that will go to waste. For old folks on a budget, this is a major irritation. Wasting money and food and putting him in obligation for food he didn't ask for, doesn't like, and now has to try and get rid of before it goes bad.

Yea, that Cajun one is rough. I'm pretty good with accents but holy hell that one is tough to understand.

North Carolinian here. Every time I visit the Outer Banks I look forward to hearing someone with this accent. It really is quite striking to hear it in person.

@7:26 to pit it in a European perspective, Texas is just a little bigger than France. Lots of room for variation

I have worked in nationwide call centers for years. There are many difficult accents to interpret, even as a born American English speaker talking to another born American English speaker. Whereas, I have no trouble interpreting your accent.

I speak Engkish and Hillbilly with a northeastern Kentucky twang.

Your face during the southern accents was hysterical! Thank you for the laugh. Hey, I've been speaking American English my whole life and some of those accents I had no idea which region they were or what they were saying. So, you're doing fantastic!

7 lol You are doing just fine. Most Americans don't understand half of what the people in this video said.

Years ago, I would spend hours on the phone with my late father-in-law who was Georgia born and bred. After getting off the phone, it would take me HOURS to shake off that accent and started speaking normally again. Seriously, did you know that the name “Jim” has two syllables? It does in Georgia.

20:02 New England is the region containing Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Connecticut, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts

The best way to handle Massachusetts is to break it into sounds: Mass-Uh-Chew-Sits

Andre, 😂 "corn is the only word I understand " .😅

So, not like a class thing, but about accents. You've got like a business, hospitality, political, academia level of accent, which is regionally characteristic, but fully understandable. But you also have a grocery store, public school, bar and grill, church level of accent, which is deeper and more localized. The ground level local accent includes slang and sayings and unique words or phrasings and in many places becomes more of a dialect. Often when speaking to people with a thick patois there are words that don't strictly convey meaning if you're from another region of the US. Many people ask for clarity, but often you can hook into the gist of what they're saying regardless. And we all know this, so we all just use the words we're comfortable with and everybody rides with it until accuracy becomes necessary. The color variety in the US accents of big cities can be dizzying in places where there's a lot of people from all over. English is a stew.

Don't let it get you down, I have lived here all my life (74 years) and I missed most of them.

Andre, Boston IS in New England. There are six states in New England : Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and Vermont.

The old man clip @ 13:59 is made harder to understand by the fact that the clip starts while he is ending a story it seems - so context clues are just impossible. For anyone interested the man is saying: "She didn't say nothing, she just brought me a whole thing - and I don't eat much of that stuff. I ate a little bit for supper but the rest of that in there is gonna go bad if somebody don't eat." -source: born in the south.

Half of my late husband's family is from the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. They're of Finnish background, and yeah, they sound just like that! I recently moved to Wisconsin and though the accent is a little different, it hits me, an east coast girl, the same way the Yooper accent does. I've been in the Upper Midwest long enough now, I say 'uff da' like a native.

I LOVED this video. As a SOUTHERNER I was in stitches seeing your reaction.

If you want to have a little fun with the U.P. accent, or Yooper accent as the natives call it, check out a movie called "Escanaba In Da Moonlight". It is a comedy about the U.P. of Michigan. And yes, the town of Escanaba is a real place. That movie will make you laugh until your sides hurt. Also check out a singing group called "Da Yoopers". They do comedy songs in the Yooper accent like "The Second Week Of Deer Camp" and "Da Turdy Point Buck". And they lay the accent on thick, so you might have to hear these songs a couple of times before you really understand them.

Those last two and that older gentleman from Appalachia were the most difficult for me. I have the generic American accent (raised in northern California) and could have used subtitles for them. I think you did really well!

Texas is not the only twangy state Andre. You have Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi & Alabama.

I was driving up from Alabama to central Illinois and had my mother with me. We stopped on the side of the road to buy sweet potatoes from this old southern guy. His southern accent was sooo thick. No one could understand this man except my mother who was having an in depth conversation. Note my mother spent her summers in Kentucky with relatives and is where her parents were originally from.

Indigenous Americans have an accent. No matter what part of the country, it's the same. Even Alaskan natives

I hate when people act like there's only one southern accent. The south is the most diverse region in America

My second wife was from Kentucky and my Grandma was definitely a Vermonter. I had to translate between them, because they didn't understand each other.

Andre, I knew as soon as I started watching your channel that you are a kind soul. But calling my native Pittsburgh accent "beautiful" is a stretch, even for me. 💕😃

New England includes Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut. They each have their own accent. Actually, different parts of Boston have different accents.

Lmao @ the instinctive "Hell yeah, brother".

I am from Pittsburgh. The accent they did was the working class accent in Pittsburgh. It actually covers the entire region that includes Western & Central Pennsylvania, Northern West Virginia &, part of Eastern Ohio.

The gentleman at 14:45 said "He didn't say nothing but done brought me a whole thing and I don't eat that much of that stuff. I will be eaten it come supper cuz if I don't get eating it, it's gonna go bad." (that's a little paraphrased but I'm having trouble hearing today- trigeminal neuralgia). The gentleman at 29:56 said "Now we didn't have any electricity, ain't had no oil, no running water either. We got it out the spring! But they eventually got the electricity up through here." Both are among my favorite accents 😄

Dude got one thing wrong. Black American vernacular does not say "dat" among other things, because of some fault of their native language. The accepted explanation is now that the blacks learned their English from uneducated Englanders specifically from the north of England that brought peculiar English pronunciations with them. "Ax" for ask. "Dat and "dis" for that and this, etc etc etc.

The kid on the last Texas accent plays Georgie on Young Sheldon. And yes he is from Texas.

Texas here, and yes some of us have NO accent....my youngest can speak any language she wants. She took Spanish I and II at the same time. The teacher asked her if we spoke Spanish at home? To which she replied, " my mother doesn't even speak English'. I admit to speaking TEXAN.

Mom's from Boston, Dad's from Iowa, grew up in Arizona with the influence of Southern California. I have words and speech patterns from all over. Most Arizonans do because most of us are from somewhere else!

My second ex-husband was from Georgia, and he could tell which county in the state people were from based upon their accent. He had an uncle whose name was “Dale” but which for years I thought was “Dell”. I am from NorCal so, of course, I have no accent. (Actually, years of studying Spanish, Russian and French, plus throw in some Japanese and years of listening primarily to the BBC, have given me an accent and vocabulary that no one seems to be able to figure out.)

I visited Richmond Virginia, got lost and asked for directions. It's the only time I absolutely couldn't understand a word the man said, and I know he was speaking English. I just shook my head as if I understood perfectly and went on my way, totally lost. Never did get to my destination.

Don't worry, English isn't my first language either, I speak American.

I always admire people who speak more than one language. We met my daughters new boy friend who speaks, fluently, 9 different languages. I think if I tried that my brain will explod! 😂😂😂❤❤❤

I grew up in Montana but now live in Denver. My accent, somewhat like the movie Fargo, comes out after a beer or two

I'm from East TN (Cumberland Plateau accent). I don't think anyone outside of Louisiana can understand the Cajuns when they start Cajuning. The Outer Banks people aren't too hard to understand for me, though. Some of their speech is Appalachian dialect (of which Cumberland Plateau is a sub-type). The lady talking about ironing a dress sounds a lot like my mother's mother. She had that really deep dialect, where fire = far, iron = orn, etc. My mother's accent is probably about half her mother's level and mine is about half of hers. For instance, my grandmother would say "yeller," my mother "yella" and me "yellow." I still have just as much drawl as they have, but my pronunciation of the words themselves is closer to the way they're actually spelled.

I haven't watched yet and I'm thinking a Cajun accent may just be the hardest to understand. Watched it. Oddly enough, I'm Canadian, from Alberta, and have often been asked if I'm from Minnesota when I'm stateside. I don't hear it.

I’m from Tampa bay, Fl, I have a general American accent. However, my husband’s entire family has been in Georgia for generations, and I adore their slow drawl southern accent. It is so comforting.

I'm from Minnesota and I do NOT sound like that! That's more Northern Minnesota

I'm a life long Pittsburgher. I can turn the accent on and off like a light. Professionally I am fine wit General American, but if I am out locally I can turn the Pittsburghese, as we call it, on. My wife, who was born in London, UK, but grew up all over the US, thinks it's hilarious.

the problem with understanding northeastern accents/dialects like the Boston one and the NY one aren’t so much the sounds(though they can be difficult for certain non english speakers to understand)it is more so how idiom and slang heavy regular conversation is amongst them relative to other american accents/dialects. For example, with the Boston accent in the video the man says “I’ve, been walking around town, my dogs are barking”. To someone not from the area this sounds like he was walking his dogs, but in actuality he is saying he was walking a lot and now his feet hurt. If you aren’t familiar with the dialect/local slang of the region this isn’t necessarily intuitive. North Eastern Americans tend to not switch to a neutral accent/dialect as there isn’t as much historical stigma around the accents/dialects from their regions in media or anything, so they use these idioms or slang phrases assuming others will understand them as well when that’s not always the case, especially abroad with non native speakers.

I lived in Arizona till 1999. Yes the Grand Canyon is awe inspiring. I got to see it from a helicopter and that was SPECTACULAR!

BRUH there is a youtube channel called Sleeper dude and the wife has a Tennessee accent that is soo thick the husband types it on the screen and leaves it to you to try and figure it out🤣

Hi Andre, I watch your videos everyday and I always look forward to you uploading. You are my favorite reaction youtuber. I love your interest and enthusiasm about the US. I hope you can visit one day❤ Also you're almost at 100k!

I am from the piney woods part of Texas. Y’all need to come visit sometime.

I'm from NC and the man is saying somebody brought something over there to eat; he ate a little bit with supper. He doesn't eat much of that kind of stuff. He put it in the kitchen and somebody else needs to eat it before it goes bad.

Southern accents are all sooooo different though! The girl in the camo was alabama but the woman talking about having hate in her heart for this man was from Louisiana.😂 And the girl left in the woods was mississippi. And as for Pittsburg,I recognize it because my family is from PA and I was born there, but I would argue that a lot of Americans wouldn't be able to recognize or understand a PA (pronounced pee-ayy 😉) accent, so don't feel bad!

When I used to work in a business-to-business help desk, I spoke to people all over the country. I started to notice that different southern states have different accents. I would say there's quite a bit of variation in the way the southern states talk. I wouldn't struggle to understand them because of the accent but because of how they talk slowly. I'm from a part of the country where they talk fast. And when you change the pace it would make it hard for me to pay attention so I would have to concentrate extra hard when I was talking to someone from the south because it was too slow for me sometimes. I found that if I didn't concentrate I would space out and have trouble paying attention. I was really impressed with people from Alabama in general. Not always. It makes me want to visit Alabama. I can't explain it they are on a different level. They are raised really well down there. The manners are next level.

Back around the time I was born (1950s), the accents in New York City were so distinct that a knowledgeable person could determine not only which borough you came from (New York is made up of 5 boroughs: Manhattan, Bronx, Brooklyn, Staten Island, and Queens), but also which neighborhood in that borough you were likely hailed from. In modern times, I think the influence of modern media has blurred the lines so it isn't quite as cut-and-dried as it once was. In truth, there is no one "New York City accent", but there are several distinct accents across the city with a significant number of variations within each.

You actually did very well. New England is a tough one. I have lived in Massachusetts, Georgia, New York, California, Tennessee, and now I live in Minnesota. 😊

I would guess Creole is the hardest.

I was born in Gloucester, Massachusetts and moved away at 6 years old. I still have my accent after 60 years on certain words. My father explained our accent as being frugal. We save letters to use on other words. We take the R from car, Harvard, yard, water and give them to Warshington and even names. We pronounce Linda as Linder, Mercer as Mersa and so on. By the way, my home town Gloucester is pronounced Glawstah.😊

Yup, s. Cali accent is for real dude. 😂.. we do speak, like you know? Kind'a valley. Lol!

👋🏼 Hi, I’m Texan born & raised. Yes, we are extremely proud of our great state. The “Piney Woods” usually refers to southeast Texas between Houston & Louisiana. This is where both my parents were from. I’m 450 miles north, northwest of there. It’s also 120 miles from Dallas & Fort Worth. I’m really enjoying your videos. I really hope you get the opportunity to visit Texas. You’d be very welcome here! 🇺🇸

#7, it’s all difficult for me too but I’m a Michigan girl. Northern accents SO much easier to understand, my opinion, southern, difficult, the hardest is almost the whole state of Louisiana!!

I am from the south, and I can say there are different dialects from county to county. Some times even from town to town. You can travel 50 miles away from home and it sounds like you're in a different country. I live in central Arkansas, and 50 miles to the south in the flats and swamps you start hearing some cajun accents, but 50 miles to the north there are more Appalachian sounding dialects in the hills and mountains. Where I live we still have a southern accent, but it sounds more like a cross/mix between Texas and Tennessee dialects.

Andre, you need a reality check. Portugal occupies only 35,320 square miles. There are different regional accents in Portugal, aren't there ? Texas occupies 268,820 square miles which makes it more than seven times as large as Portugal. Why are you surprised that there are many different regional accents ?

7, Believe me, many of these accents are difficult for Americans to understand. I once lived in Asheville, North Carolina up on the Blue Ridge Mountain for just about 10 months. The old couple who'd lived across the street from us who'd never left that county once in their lives were very kind, very friendly and I stopped by one day after eating lunch. I had a conversation with them which I'm sad to admit I understood not a single word. I kept smiling and nodding my head up and down in agreement as I didn't know what else to do. Before I knew it, the woman was setting the table and pulling out a chair for me and serving me up lunch! : ) I had somehow managed to agree to eat lunch with them. : ) Lovely people, but I had no idea of what they were saying. Absolutely clueless!

Andre- YOUR accent, facial expressions and reactions are hilarious and adorable!

7. Loved this video and learned a lot myself. Always enjoy your videos. Thank you! Can't wait for your beautiful family to come visit America!!

I am native US, born in Los Angeles. I had exactly the same reaction as you did. I could easily understand the first 3 or 4 examples, but many of the others were barely recognizable as American English. There are probably videos here on RU-vid showing various accents/dialects of British English. And people in the UK claim to be able to tell where people are from by their accent. They even Standardized/Nornalized British English with an accent called "Received Pronunciation". Best example seems to be presenters on the BBC Radio. I heard from a UK source that many TV viewers in the UK turn on subtitles to be able to understand difficult accents (including American accents)! The automatic speech recognition and subtitles here on RU-vid are pretty amazing, but every now and again it turns out some really hilarious words 🙂 Native speakers of Spanish, French, Italian and German (etc.) likely recognize regional accents of their national languages as well.

Even born Americans have trouble with other accents. We were in the South at a restaurant, and before we were led to our table, the hostess tried to say "We're having a special tonight: buy one, get one free." What she said was "Bow on, get on free." My husband was utterly confused and thought she was asking him to bow to her, so he gave her a deep bow from the waist. 😂

It’s awesome that a foreigner describes American accents as beautiful. Some of it becomes a bit blind to me, traveling over the states. Btw your accent is beautiful.

Honestly just being aware of how thick some of these accents can be you can ask people to write down what they are saying when asking for directions somewhere the gps isn’t working.

I moved to North Carolina from the west coast. Some of the folks are from communities deep in the mountains. Semi-isolated for generations. It’s where the term Hill Billy came from. Nicest people you’ll ever meet.

sudden accent is the oldest form of English spoken in the world is the traditional English language for what it was in the 16 1700s

I've worked many customer service jobs for companies that have customers nationwide, and sometimes it's so hard to understand people, especially over the phone. I feel so bad when I have to ask people to repeat themselves multiple times.

This was funny! My own accent is Southern Appalachian. I understand you better than many of my own countrymen.

I am an American and I can't speak more than a couple words of Russian. I dated a girl from the UK and we were in Boston and no one could understand her. She told me once someone heard her accent and asked her where she was from in the US. She said the UK and they said, wow you speak English very well. lol

Being an acadian from northern Maine i fully understand my southern cajun cousins , It's almost the same french that we speak up here.

I'm impressed, you did very well, much better than I would have expected! (Howdy, from Tennessee)

My mom was from eastern Canada and my dad was from central Texas. I don't recall either of them having any accent, but that's how it goes when you grown up around accented people. Most people don't know they have an accent. When I was in the army I served with people from all over the US and elsewhere. The only accent I really had a hard time understanding was that of the Florida panhandle.

7! Yes, you would be a good person to react to that video. It's nice to see you say so many positive things about America. Also, you're super likable and your reactions are fun to watch! Oh and I live in Massachusetts. I'm from here but I have more of the generalized American accent from number one. A lot of people in my generation around here do (I am in my 30s). That being said, I definitely run into a lot of people with a New England accent!

7!!!!! Ahhh!!! I'm so happy you're reacting to this video! (And yes, you do sound Russian) *I have a mostly southern accent (more like the first girl in the Camo hat with a dash of Chicago).

My son went to Bar Harbor, Maine a couple months ago. We're from Pittsburgh, but he has an unrecognizable accent that nobody knew where he is from.

29:56 "now we didn't have electricity, no ?? oil, no running water either. We'd run it outta the, got it outta the spring. But, tey ventyully got te lectricity up yer."