Erie, Pennsylvania
The Erie Accent
Erie sits inside the Chicago dialect area, which covers Chicago, Detroit, Cleveland and Buffalo, United States. The nearest other area is Canadian, about 116km away.
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What people in Erie sound like
- Raised “trap” vowel — “cat” towards “kee-at”.
- Fronted “lot” vowel — “block” towards “black”.
- “Cot” and “caught” stay distinct.
- Chicago-specific vocabulary: “gym shoes”, “pop”, “the expressway”.
These are the markers of the Chicago accent as a whole. No survey claims every speaker in Erie has all of them — the full Chicago profile sets out where the region varies.
Erie against Canadian
Erie is close enough to the Canadian area that the two get confused. These are the questions where the survey expects a different answer on each side.
| Question | Erie | Canadian |
|---|---|---|
| Do “cot” and “caught” rhyme in your natural accent? | “cot” and “caught” stay distinct | “cot” and “caught” rhyme |
How Pennsylvania answered the Harvard Dialect Survey
The Harvard Dialect Survey, collected by Bert Vaux and Scott Golder in 2002–2003, recorded how respondents in every US state answered the same questions. These are Pennsylvania’s answers, most common first.
| Question | Answers in Pennsylvania |
|---|---|
| Soda, Pop or Coke? The Map of How America Orders a Fizzy Drink | soda 74% · pop 20% · coke 2% |
| Traffic Circle, Roundabout or Rotary? | traffic circle 48% · roundabout 11% · rotary 6% |
| Water Fountain, Drinking Fountain or Bubbler? | water fountain 86% · drinking fountain 12% · bubbler 0% |
| Lightning Bug or Firefly? | lightning bug 60% · firefly 5% |
| Crawfish, Crawdad or Crayfish? | crayfish 58% · crawfish 30% · crawdad 4% |
| You Guys, Y'all or You All? | you guys 43% · you all 11% · y'all 4% |
| Kitty-Corner or Catty-Corner? | catty-corner 61% · kitty-corner 19% |
| Garage Sale or Yard Sale? | yard sale 60% · garage sale 34% |
| Tennis Shoes or Sneakers? | sneakers 81% · tennis shoes 13% |
| Trash Can or Garbage Can? | trash can 42% · garbage can 21% |
| Frosting or Icing? | icing 50% · frosting 12% |
| Scratch Paper or Scrap Paper? | scrap paper 41% · scratch paper 24% |
| Frontage Road, Service Road or Access Road? | service road 28% · access road 25% · frontage road 9% |
| Does “Route” Rhyme With “Out” or “Hoot”? | rhymes with "hoot" 48% · rhymes with "out" 9% |
| Caramel: Two Syllables or Three? | with 2 syllables ("car-ml") 47% · with 3 syllables ("carra-mel") 28% |
| Mischievous or Mischievious? | mischievous (3 syllables) 43% · mischievious (4 syllables) 31% |
| Rubber Band, Hair Tie or Elastic? | rubber band 32% · hair tie 21% · (hair) elastic 7% |
Data from the Harvard Dialect Survey (Bert Vaux and Scott Golder, 2002–2003), used under the CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 licence. A self-selected sample from two decades ago: how people spoke then, not a census.
Dialect areas near Erie
Is your accent from Erie?
There is no way to answer that from a description. The test asks 29 questions about the words you use and how you say them, scores your answers against the Chicago / Inland North English profile and every other profile in the survey, and shows you where people who answer the way you do actually live.