Pronunciation - All Groups

There has been a lot of discussion on the internet concerning the accent of Kathy Bates' character in American Horror Story: Freak Show, currently screening on Tuesday nights on Sky. On the link below you will find an interview with linguist, Kara Becker, who identifies the accent as from Baltimore, Maryland. Becker notes though that Bates is putting on the accent and is not a native speaker as she is exaggerating some features. One of those features is fronting back vowels - i.e. pronouncing vowel sounds like /ʊː/ /ɔː/ and /ɒ/ further forward in the mouth (if you are unsure of which are the front, middle and back vowels have a look at the chart here). Becker also talks about regional changes in accent,  the influence of social class and how accents change over time and will often differ between generations from the same place.

What different accents can you differentiate?
How are the vowel sounds different? Where are they being made?
Which actors do you think are good at accents? (e.g. can you think of any non-Neapolitan actors who can convincingly speak with an accent from Naples?)

To read the article and listen to examples click here: http://www.vox.com/2014/10/22/7031005/kathy-bates-american-horror-story-accent-baltimore

It just goes to show, you can learn a lot by watching TV.