Your Speech is in Your Roots

 Santa Rosa, Modesto, and Reno.  Those are the cities that represent my dialect.

The "hot spots" are places my speech is most similar, and vice-versa.  I got this map from a really fun, introspective quiz called "How Y'all, Youse and You Guys Talk."  It's on the Sunday Review page, and was making it's rounds on FaceBook last Christmas.

This quiz is based on the results of the Harvard Dialect Survey back in 2002, which only has 25 questions.  The original Harvard Dialect Survey had a total of 122 questions.  You can go to the page and click on each question to see full, illustrated results.  It's a lot of fun poking around, comparing answers to locations. 

Here's one of the questions: "What do you call it when rain falls while the sun is shining?"  I've Honestly never heard of this phenomenon having a word.  I've always looked outside and admired how beautiful it is, opening the door and running into the rain to go rainbow chasing.  Some places call this a "Sunshower," "Pineapple Rain," or "Liquid Sun."  I like liquid sun.  That's what I'll call it from now on.

Also, thanks to this quiz, I've finally figured out the difference between a Highway and a Freeway.  Yes, I'm 31 and I've seen the light.  I realized it's because I grew up in Porterville, which is far from major Freeways.  Highways connect everything there, the major Highway, the All American City Highway, connecting Linday, Porterville, and Bakersfield, received this name after 1995 when Lindsay earned the award. Porterville earned the All-American-City award a year earlier in 1994.  It was a HUGE deal.  Anyways, where I grew up all the cities connected via Highway, wrapping around agriculture and cow farms.

I thought it would be fun to have my family take this quiz.

The three cities my Mom got: Reno, Santa Rosa, and Oceanside.

My Dad: Stockton, Fresno, and Modesto.

Steven, like me: Santa Rosa, Reno, and Modesto.

Robbie: San Jose, Corona, and Denver.  (I'm still trying to figure this out.)

Michael: Santa Rosa, Salt Lake, and some place back East (probably because he served his mission in South Chicago.)

I can't remember everywhere my Sister-in-law Krista got, but Salt Lake was one, as was a city in Idaho where her Grandfather is from.  Krista's Sister, Erin, got Salt Lake, Fresno, and Bakersfield, which I find particularly amusing because she's never been to central California, and I grew up between those last two cities.

So if you're curious, and have some time on your hands, I recommend taking the How Y'all, Youse and You Guys Talk quiz.  It's pretty fun.