While surfing around yesterday, discovered this most interesting and scholarly (don't let that put you off) site on spoken English. It has people speaking many languages and dialects (dozens of English dialects from all over) reading the same nonsense paragraph in English, which was composed to show as much as possible about the speaker's English accent. You choose a language (and a dialect of the language -- in most cases there are more than one choice) and hear how the speaker pronounces the paragraph. Wait for it to download before you try to get it to play.

Comparing the various British speakers is most interesting for a USn, and I imagine the reverse will be true to Brits. I found particularly interesting the speakers of Smith Island English, which is a unique dialect from an isolated island in the middle of Chesapeake Bay with an inbred population which has been there 300 years.

The link is http://classweb.gmu.edu/accent/

I'll be looking for your feedback.

Well, miffed I am! They have two Australian accent samples, misfiled in the English section of all places, and they don't have any NZ accents. I have recorded the sample passage, and uploaded to http://maxqnz.com/sample.mp3 I have also contacted the site to offer them my recording, to correct this egregious oversight.

Kentucky: Sto~wer

Brooklyn: Fwo~er her bwrotha Bwahb… fwahg

Fascinating site, brother Boby! Thanks for highlighting this. I only wish the IPA representation was not just an image file.

Btw, I would never in a million years have placed the woman’s voice as in the same galaxy as Birmingham! And although the Staffs woman has clearly had most of her regional accent ironed out, there are still distinctive traces in words like “ask” which she rhymes with alASKa ~ RP from southern UK is more likely to go for arsk.

Well done, sjmaxq! (if that is your real name).

I love the site, BYB. I "can't wait" 'til it's finished.

For anybody who wants to participate, you can check out this page:
http://snurl.com/1vz3 It is your opportunity to add to the library.

I enjoyed hearing the variety of accents that are recorded. A good range of diversity on the site. What interests me is the number of self-repairs in the speech of the samples. Might these be due to a parsing effect instigated on the subjects by the exigency of reading the passage?

I suspect so, Minz ~ after I'd listened to that bizarre text a number of times I was in need of (liquid) self-repair!

Welcome aBoard, btw - are you Polish, by any chance?