Chile 2

Listen to Chile 2, a woman in her 40s from Santiago, Chile. 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: 40s

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

PLACE OF BIRTH: Santiago, Chile

GENDER: female

ETHNICITY: white Hispanic of German ancestry

OCCUPATION: library assistant

EDUCATION: undergraduate degree in German

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

At the time of the interview, the subject had been living in the United States for 10 years. She also lived in Berlin, Germany, for six years.

OTHER INFLUENCES ON SPEECH:

She is of German ancestry and attended a German private school in Chile. All subjects were in German for the first five years, and then she was required to learn Spanish and English. Subject is fluent in English and has a mild accent.

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

RECORDED BY: Daydrie Hague

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

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 was born and raised in Chile.  Chile’s a long country located in South America.  Santiago is located in the valley between the Andes Mountains and the Costa Mountains.  (Um) Chile has about 13 million people, of them, five million live in Santiago.  (Um) I went to a private school, a German private school.  (Um) The first five years, in that school, you learn every subject in German, except for Spanish, of course.  (Um) After that, everything is in Spanish except for German. We wore uniforms, usually it was a blue jacket an’ a white blouse, an’ blue socks wi-with (um)– with black shoes.  Ev’rybody, actually, in Chile, has to wear uniforms.  The only thing that differs is a little insignia that says (um) what school you’re from.  Tests are usually not the multiple-choice, so you really have to know what, what you’re doing.  I mean, you really have to study, unlike here, where I see m– my children not studying.  I mean, we really, t(h)ruly had to study.  We went to school from eight to twelve.  Most of the schools were from eight to twelve.  In high school, maybe, it would be from eight to one, but for that you had to — you had (um) a lot of homework in the afternoon, a lot of homework.  (Um) We– we had to learn at least two– two languages besides Spanish.  That meant in my school there was German an’ English.  English– I– I– We started English in seventh grade, an’ (um). Well, Spanish an’ German were from Kindergarten, an’ English from seventh grade to the end of high school.  We usually celebrate Christmas on the 24th, maybe because it is (um) the– the– the different seasons we have.  In Chile we celebrate Christmas in– in the summertime, an’ here, it’s winter.  (Um) We usually re– I mean, we usually eat aroun’ nine p.m. an’ then open the presents around eleven p.m.  I mean, when you’re littler you open them a little earlier. An’ usually also, the Christmas tree is not done until that day.  It’s usually hidden until — I mean — until after dinner, where you see it for the first time.  It’s usually decora– I mean, well, no… My house, it was usually decorated with — with (um) — with real candles, with real red candles.  In other houses it’s done with lights, just like here.  We have a j– in our house it was a German tradition to do that.  Okay, about food;  we– Chileans don’ eat that much junk food. [Laughter] (Uh) We have several traditional dishes.  One, one is empanada; it’s kind of like a turnover filled with meat, or with cheese, an’ then it’s fried.  The one with cheese is fried, an’ the other one is ba– The one with meat is baked.  We have another one, called humitas that’s (um) similar to tamales, to the Mexican tamales.  A little m– with mo– more moisture.  We use a lot of corn in our dishes.  We do not have– I mean, our food is not as– spicy like in Mexic– it’s very similar to the United States.  The only thing is that we use more corn than– than the Americans do.  (Um) Our tradition, I mean they’re very similar to the United States, actually.  We’re not that very different.  We’re just — I consider Chileans a little more f– open, friendlier.  They like to get together; I mean, at any time to– for a drink, no– I mean, for a drink, for a dinner, for after dinner, for dessert, after lunch.  We jus’, we, we get together for any reason.

TRANSCRIBED BY: Jacqueline Baker

DATE OF TRANSCRIPTION (DD/MM/YYYY): 24/07/2008

PHONETIC TRANSCRIPTION OF UNSCRIPTED SPEECH: N/A

TRANSCRIBED BY: N/A

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

SCHOLARLY COMMENTARY:

Of particular note in her speech is the lack of voiced consonants. For example, z is sounded as s, v is sounded as f, and for zh you will hear sh as in “meashured” for measured. You will hear a dentalized voiced th sound, variable pronunciations of the short a vowel, a relatively pure o vowel, and the substitution of the long e vowel for the short i vowel as in “senteemental” for sentimental. This often happens in Latin-based words that sound much the same in Spanish as they do in English.

COMMENTARY BY: Daydrie Hague

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.