Hickory, North Carolina
The Hickory Accent
Hickory sits inside the Southern Appalachian dialect area, which covers Tennessee, Kentucky, western North Carolina and West Virginia, United States. No other dialect area in the survey comes close to it.
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What people in Hickory sound like
- Monophthongal “price”: “ride” as “rahd”, “time” as “tahm”.
- The pin–pen merger — “pin” and “pen” sound the same.
- “Y’all” for a group, and “all y’all” for emphasis.
- Double modals: “might could”, “used to could”.
These are the markers of the Southern Appalachian accent as a whole. No survey claims every speaker in Hickory has all of them — the full Southern Appalachian profile sets out where the region varies.
How North Carolina 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 North Carolina’s answers, most common first.
| Question | Answers in North Carolina |
|---|---|
| Soda, Pop or Coke? The Map of How America Orders a Fizzy Drink | soda 38% · coke 26% · pop 4% |
| Traffic Circle, Roundabout or Rotary? | traffic circle 60% · roundabout 22% · rotary 4% |
| Water Fountain, Drinking Fountain or Bubbler? | water fountain 96% · drinking fountain 4% · bubbler 0% |
| Lightning Bug or Firefly? | lightning bug 51% · firefly 6% |
| Crawfish, Crawdad or Crayfish? | crawfish 48% · crawdad 26% · crayfish 16% |
| Roly Poly or Potato Bug? | roly poly 65% · potato bug 3% |
| You Guys, Y'all or You All? | y'all 66% · you guys 14% · you all 11% |
| Kitty-Corner or Catty-Corner? | catty-corner 53% · kitty-corner 22% |
| Garage Sale or Yard Sale? | yard sale 81% · garage sale 17% |
| Tennis Shoes or Sneakers? | tennis shoes 58% · sneakers 33% |
| Trash Can or Garbage Can? | trash can 59% · garbage can 12% |
| Frontage Road, Service Road or Access Road? | service road 56% · access road 17% · frontage road 11% |
| Does “Route” Rhyme With “Out” or “Hoot”? | rhymes with "out" 29% · rhymes with "hoot" 28% |
| Caramel: Two Syllables or Three? | with 3 syllables ("carra-mel") 59% · with 2 syllables ("car-ml") 20% |
| Mischievous or Mischievious? | mischievous (3 syllables) 45% · mischievious (4 syllables) 29% |
| Rubber Band, Hair Tie or Elastic? | rubber band 37% · hair tie 16% · (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.
Is your accent from Hickory?
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 Southern Appalachian English profile and every other profile in the survey, and shows you where people who answer the way you do actually live.