Stereotypes in the deep south

The Office is a great TV show that was very popular when it first started. What made it so popular is the relaxed atmosphere of the business world at a paper company Dunder Mifflin. In season 6, there is an episode called "Murder" where the people in the Office have to act out a Southern accent, thus the idea of the representation of the South is extremely fresh and present in these scenarios. I found two video clips of Pam trying to do a Savannah accent after which Andy ends up saying that she is actually doing a Florida pan handle accent, quickly followed by Andy's attempt at a Savannah accent. The second clip is of Oscar trying to do a southern accent which is absolutely hilarious. Notice the reference to Forest Gump when Pam is imitating a southerner. Forest Gump is definitely remembered for his long drawn out accent in the movie "Forest Gump." These videos are categorically stereotypes of the South. One cannot imitate a Southerner without trying to speak in a southern accent!

Now the question is whether these video clips are good representations of the South. In other words, do these stereotypes still hold today? I was born in California, grew up in Washington state, and i moved to Georgia in 2000. I have to say that since moving to Georgia, the Southern accent has slowly been dying out. Right now, I do not even notice on a daily basis that the Southern accent exists. This is probably because most people that live in the South have a weak southern accent. Whenever family comes and visits us from Washington state, they say that I have a Southern accent, but when I asked my physics lab partner the other day, he said that I did not have one! I feel as if I do not have a Southern accent, but maybe the truth is that I have a very faint one. So the question still remains, "Are the video clips representing the South accurately?". If one takes into the rhetorical context of the media, one notices that these video clips are not made for historical accuracy or to inform, but are aimed to entertain. Thus, I must conclude that this is not an accurate representation of the South; rather, the video clips are playing on a reality of once was and not is. Experientially, looking over my ten years of living in the deep South, I have to admit that a deep Southern accent was definitely an exception and not the norm! I guess this is because of the globalization of the South and the great influx of various people to the South, like myself!