Southern vs Northern Words Quiz
How the Scales are Structured
Who Usually Takes This Test?
See How You Compare
Below is a preview of how scores are typically distributed across each scale.
Example Questions From the Test
- All y’all
- Youse
- You guys
- Yinz
- Rock lobster
- Prawn
- Crawfish
- Crayfish
- A traffic circle
- A highway interchange
- A toll plaza
- A movable bridge
Southern vs Northern Words Quiz - Description and methodology of the test
Curious about how American English changes across regions? The Southern vs Northern Words Quiz is designed for anyone who wants to test recognition of everyday terms linked with Southern, Northern, Midwestern, and New England speech. It returns a regional-vocabulary knowledge result based on the terms you recognize. As a regional vocabulary assessment, it focuses on recognition rather than pronunciation.
What This Assessment Explores
Regional vocabulary recognition is the focus. Items ask about plural forms of “you,” regional names for drinks and sandwiches, shopping terms, winter clothing, road features, weather expressions, and phrases such as “fixing to.” This tests whether you can connect a word or expression with a region, while recognizing that usage crosses state and dialect boundaries.
The result uses the Southern vs Northern Words Knowledge scale, which counts correct identifications. Its bands describe performance on these contrasts:
- Regional Vocabulary Starter (0-6) indicates recognition of some expressions with room to explore regional meaning shifts.
- Developing Dialect Knowledge (7-12) shows understanding of many terms and several uses in context.
- Strong Dialect Knowledge (13-16) shows broad command of the regional words covered here.
The result cannot classify someone as Southern or Northern; this regional vocabulary quiz reports familiarity with tested terms.
Methodology and Scientific Basis
Each item offers four answer choices built around a regional word, phrase, or short situation. The questions cover pronouns, food and shopping vocabulary, transportation terms, weather expressions, household language, and everyday descriptions. The result is calculated from the number of correct answers, with the displayed bands describing the distinctions recognized.
Conceptually, the content is consistent with Harvard Dialect Survey (Vaux & Golder, 2003), which records regional choices in American English. It also fits Hall’s 2013 contrastive regional mapping work and the word-geography approach associated with Carver (1987). The quiz is not an adaptation or standardized administration of any one of those works; they provide context for why particular terms are regionally associated.
Interpret the outcome as performance on this selected vocabulary set. The score on this regional vocabulary knowledge test can reflect family speech, travel, media exposure, and residence as much as current location. Terms vary by state, community, generation, and speaker, so vocabulary recognition cannot establish a person’s regional identity. The result helps you notice language patterns and choose expressions to explore further.
- Vaux, Bert, and Scott A. Golder. The Harvard Dialect Survey. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Linguistics Department, 2003.
- Hall, Joan Houston, chief editor, with Luanne von Schneidemesser, senior editor. Dictionary of American Regional English, Volume VI: Contrastive Maps, Index to Entry Labels, Questionnaire, and Fieldwork Data. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2013.
- Carver, Craig M. American Regional Dialects: A Word Geography. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1987. 10.3998/mpub.12484
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