England 48

Listen to England 48, a 25-year-old man from Huntingdon and Buckden, Cambridgeshire, England. Click or tap the triangle-shaped play button to hear the subject.

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BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION

AGE: 25

DATE OF BIRTH (DD/MM/YYYY): 1976

PLACE OF BIRTH: Huntingdon, Cambridgeshire

GENDER: male

ETHNICITY: white

OCCUPATION: student

EDUCATION: university, studying psychology and sports science

AREA(S) OF RESIDENCE OUTSIDE REPRESENTATIVE REGION FOR LONGER THAN SIX MONTHS:

The subject went to the University of Birmingham at age 18; lived in Belfast, Northern Ireland, for two years; and was recorded while at the University of Kansas in Lawrence, Kansas, United States, where he lived for two years.

OTHER INFLUENCES ON SPEECH:

The subject went to school in Buckden Church of England primary school (5-11) and then went to Hinchingbrooke secondary school (11-18).

The text used in our recordings of scripted speech can be found by clicking here.

RECORDED BY: Wendy Casebier (under the supervision of Paul Meier)

DATE OF RECORDING (DD/MM/YYYY): 19/04/2002

PHONETIC TRANSCRIPTION OF SCRIPTED SPEECH: N/A

TRANSCRIBED BY: N/A

DATE OF TRANSCRIPTION (DD/MM/YYYY): N/A

ORTHOGRAPHIC TRANSCRIPTION OF UNSCRIPTED SPEECH:

Uh, I was born in Huntington, in Cambridgeshire, umm, very close to where my family still live, and, um, it’s probably about five miles from a small village called Buckden, um, where my mother and step-father live right now. And I went to school, um, in, at Henshebrook [spelling?] school which was right in Huntington, and, and to University in Birmingham, umm, for three years before getting a scholarship to go to Lawrence, Kansas. And, uh, this is my second home now really. I, uh, was here for, in Lawrence, for two years and then moved back to the UK, where I lived in Birmingham and floated around. Uh, most of my friends now live in London, so that’s where I like to go back to, but it’s far too expensive to uh, to live there. So, uh, I have a girlfriend from Ireland, and uh, moved to Belfast, lived in Belfast for quite a long time, which is a very interesting experience. I love the Irish culture, um, very, very good people, uh, a lot of fun, um, but I think America is somewhere I’d like to, to, uh, live for a while, and I like the, the atmosphere, the climate and the lifestyle. Ha. Huntington, as a region of Cambridgeshire, has a, a mix of accents. I went to a state comprehensive school; umm, a lot, Huntington has a lot of people who move from London, umm, uh, to the, so they can still commute to London, um, it’s like a, a new town almost, so there are a lot of people with London or very broad accents and uh, I think mine’s not, not really like that, it’s, it’s sort of, I’d say it’s kind of, uh, a kind of a middle-class, umm, not really region specific; it’s not a very local or rural Cambridgeshire accent, like you can get, but there’s definitely a difference between a Bedfordshire and Cambridgeshire; you know just surrounding areas, but it‘s … I think I’ve got a fairly general English accent, it’s, it would be hard to pinpoint my accent to any area.

TRANSCRIBED BY: Megan Smith

DATE OF TRANSCRIPTION (DD/MM/YYYY): 11/02/2008

PHONETIC TRANSCRIPTION OF UNSCRIPTED SPEECH: N/A

TRANSCRIBED BY: N/A

DATE OF TRANSCRIPTION (DD/MM/YYYY): N/A

SCHOLARLY COMMENTARY:

This subject’s most distinct sounds are his R’s. His R’s are either silent or hyper-corrected. In the word “year,” he does not sound the R; instead he drops it as if were not there. Other words he has been found to do this on are “hour,” “our,” and “Birmingham.” When he hyper-corrects his R’s, it’s usually when the R’s are at the beginning of the word or in a part of the word where it would not be understandable if one did not pronounce the R. Some examples of this are “Frankie,” “Sarah Perry,” “territory,” and “America.” Also notice the vowel in the words “work,” “bird,” and “superb.” In addition, every now and then the speaker strongly enunuciates his T’s, as in “water” and “ninety.” For more information on British dialects, visit PaulMeier.com.

COMMENTARY BY: Wendy Casebier (under the supervision of Paul Meier)

DATE OF COMMENTARY (DD/MM/YYYY): 19/04/2002

The archive provides:

• Recordings of accent/dialect speakers from the region you select.
• Text of the speakers’ biographical details.
• Scholarly commentary and analysis in some cases.
• In most cases, an orthographic transcription of the speakers’ unscripted speech.  In a small number of cases, you will also find a narrow phonetic transcription of the sample (see Phonetic Transcriptions for a complete list).  The recordings average four minutes in length and feature both the reading of one of two standard passages, and some unscripted speech. The two passages are Comma Gets a Cure (currently our standard passage) and The Rainbow Passage (used in our earliest recordings).

 

For instructional materials or coaching in the accents and dialects represented here, please go to Other Dialect Services.