Where I live, the southern drawl can be so thick that I can’t make out what is being said. It’s part of what I like about the place. In 28 years in NYC I never picked up an accent. There is no Manhattan accent. (Try telling that to a southerner!)

Recently Megan McArdle wondered:

It’s odd that an entire American accent disappeared virtually overnight: the upper class American accent that covered not only the northeastern seaboard, but California as well. Some of my friends parents had it, and a few famous people are still hanging on, like former New Jersey governor Tom Kean. But the accent of the Roosevelts, Julia Child and Katherine Hepburn pretty much up and vanished sometime in the late 1950s. Why did this happen?

While contemplating that, try your hand at this nifty accent game.

Megan via Andrew. Game via Duncan, who also points to How the underwater dive camera works at the Olympics.