Several Standford researchers have decided to conduct a study, “Voices of California”, in Central California in order to fully understand how the community views itself, its region, the rest of the state and how that’s reflected in the way they speak. Penny Eckert, a professor of linguistics and anthropology at Standford University, focused the project primarily on California because of its rich diversity. Several participants were asked basic question about their life, memories and thoughts of Sacramento as well as the pronunciation for several words. The pronunciation would later be analyzed for vowel sound and word choice. Researchers have not yet analyzed all the data but one of the findings has demonstrated that in certain cities people’s pronunciation and word choice were more influenced by the South than those on California’s coast.

Original Article: http://www.mercurynews.com/education/ci_26505503/stanford-speech-study-heads-sacramento