So you've seen the SNL skit about The Californians. Yet every Californian will argue that we don't have an accent (probably because of California's long-standing influence on mass media). So I decided to dig a bit into it, mostly by watching a bunch of YouTube videos and lots of reddit discussions and more. The core question is: What characterizes a California accent and/or dialect?
I am not a linguist, and this is sourced from various public sources. Feel free to disagree. But here is what I found:
(According to YouTube and reddit)
[more to follow - still doing research]