Think you know your accents? The BBC has a nifty language lab where you can listen to people’s speech and try to identify their regional accents or the language they’re speaking. (This being the Beeb, "regional" refers to the UK.)

In three attempts (ten questions each), I scored 70%, 80%, and 70%. I apparently have an ear for the Swansea accent, since I got it right both times it came up (and I’ve not been to Wales). Actually, I’d never heard a lot of accents that came up as a choice…e.g. I’d never heard a Bradford accent before (not that I know of, anyway), so I missed that one. And, like The Fat Man of Criticise.me (from whom I found out about this quiz — cheers), I apparently found it difficult to identify Turkish.

I love British accents, and always enjoy learning more of their characteristics. So it was a treat listening to the sound clips and answering the questions. It was also cool listening to people speak in Irish (Gaeilge) and Welsh. One of the choices I saw was Gaelic (which I’m guessing was Scottish Gaelic). I was curious to see how I might do if it came up as a sound clip (I’m more familiar with the Irish Gaelic)…alas, it didn’t.

On a side note, it was also interesting to listen to the content of the speeches. My favorite one was a boy discussing poetry (I won’t mention his accent, in case you take the quiz and get the same sound clip).