Speaking of speaking like a hick...
On a note related to 
trailingvortex's post, I briefly took group Chinese lessons run by a couple of my peers; one, E., grew up speaking Mandarin, the other, L., had learned it as a second language. On the first day, L. began with "我是..." sentences, and pronounced shi as "shr." The next day, E. taught the lesson but said "suh" instead. L. commented that she "talked[sic] like a Southerner." So, is a schwa instead of retroflexion really a Southern thing? Does it carry the same connotations as a southern US accent? What accent/dialect would be the Chinese equivalent of a southern US accent?
trailingvortex's post, I briefly took group Chinese lessons run by a couple of my peers; one, E., grew up speaking Mandarin, the other, L., had learned it as a second language. On the first day, L. began with "我是..." sentences, and pronounced shi as "shr." The next day, E. taught the lesson but said "suh" instead. L. commented that she "talked[sic] like a Southerner." So, is a schwa instead of retroflexion really a Southern thing? Does it carry the same connotations as a southern US accent? What accent/dialect would be the Chinese equivalent of a southern US accent?