California 8

Listen to California 8, a 26-year-old man from Watts, Los Angeles, California, United States. Click or tap the triangle-shaped play button to hear the subject.

Both as a courtesy and to comply with copyright law, please remember to credit IDEA for direct or indirect use of samples. IDEA is a free resource; please consider supporting us.

BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION

AGE: 26

DATE OF BIRTH (DD/MM/YYYY): 22/05/1988

PLACE OF BIRTH: Los Angeles (Watts)

GENDER: male

ETHNICITY: Native American (Tohono O’odham) & black

OCCUPATION: youth coordinator

EDUCATION: student at CBD College in Los Angeles

AREAS OF RESIDENCE OUTSIDE REPRESENTATIVE REGION FOR LONGER THAN SIX MONTHS:

The subject lived in Las Vegas for two years.

OTHER INFLUENCES ON SPEECH:

Mother is full Tohono O’odham. Father is African-American.

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

RECORDED BY: Tanera Marshall

DATE OF RECORDING (DD/MM/YYYY): 08/04/2015

PHONETIC TRANSCRIPTION OF SCRIPTED SPEECH: N/A

TRANSCRIBED BY: N/A

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

ORTHOGRAPHIC TRANSCRIPTION OF UNSCRIPTED SPEECH:

I am a child of eight. I am the fourth oldest, and I have two sisters and six brothers. [laughs] I’m counting foster children too, now. I keep forgetting! We have one foster brother, so that’s what makes it six [boys], I’m sorry — I can count! [laughs] I grew up in Watts, California. I was born in Martin Luther King Hospital, and at a young age I experienced a whole lot. It was a lot for a 5-year-old to take in, and as I grew up I didn’t really have much of a childhood as far as just doin’ the stuff that normal 5-year-olds would do — would go play outside and you know have fun — play on their Big Wheel. Me, I was trying to tag along behind my brothers. They were always hanging out with these big groups of people that always wear the same color, so I thought it was fun hangin’ with those guys! So, when I was 9, in order to hang with those guys, I had to prove myself. They didn’t want me to be no punks, they didn’t want no busters, they didn’t want no marks, they didn’t want nothin’. So, I had to prove to them that I wasn’t either one of those, so it was an initiation: Hold Your Own, which meant can you withstand a beating. And, at 9 yours old (I didn’t know what I was doing), I did it! I thought it was just like a regular thing, you know. I was like “OK” …

TRANSCRIBED BY: Tanera Marshall

DATE OF TRANSCRIPTION (DD/MM/YYYY): 14/04/2015

PHONETIC TRANSCRIPTION OF UNSCRIPTED SPEECH: N/A

TRANSCRIBED BY: N/A

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

SCHOLARLY COMMENTARY: N/A

COMMENTARY BY: N/A

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

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.