England 36

Listen to England 36, a 76-year-old woman from Torrington, Devon, in southwest England. Click or tap the triangle-shaped play button to hear the subject.

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BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION

AGE: 76

DATE OF BIRTH (DD/MM/YYYY): 1925

PLACE OF BIRTH: Torrington, Devon

GENDER: female

ETHNICITY: white

OCCUPATION: housewife, mother, volunteer

EDUCATION: convent education

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

The subject was convent-educated in Ilfracombe, Devon, but, apart from a brief wartime stint in Crewkerne, is a lifelong resident of Torrington.

OTHER INFLUENCES ON SPEECH: N/A

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

RECORDED BY: Paul Meier

DATE OF RECORDING (DD/MM/YYYY): 2001

PHONETIC TRANSCRIPTION OF SCRIPTED SPEECH: N/A

TRANSCRIBED BY: N/A

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

ORTHOGRAPHIC TRANSCRIPTION OF UNSCRIPTED SPEECH:

My mother was Irish, and I’ve lived here most of my life, which is a wonderful place. [unclear] Torrington is now Great Torrington, and I would never leave here, even, and it would have to be in a box. But, what else can I say about my life? I’ve done everything I could to help the town. Um, Muriel and I have received a silver plate for the *voluntary works that we did for the town. And we’ve got to the age now where we think we must hang up our hats, or whatever you say in Canada. Went to a convent in Ilfracombe, which were *French nuns there, and *they were wonderful, and at one time I thought of becoming a nun, because I thought that was the only life that I ever knew. But *once I left, I came back and I worked in the chemist’s here, at Boots, and, um, I was called up into a factory during the war, and had a lovely time really, with all the troops. American troops, might I add. Lots of dancings and all that, and then I came back and got married and had one son. Oh, yes, I was making valves for radio location. And I went to a place called Crewkerne, which is ten miles from Yeovil. And, um, I cried when I had to go, leaving Torrington, but when I got there I really enjoyed it. Well, all I remember really was being at boarding school, you see, and *you know about every three months we came home for a weekend, and then we went back again. But *it was a beautiful place, and the nuns were beauti- wonderfully, and they were so good looking. And, you know, that they wore, I, I don’t know what it would be in English, but they wore a coiffe. And, you see, the little curls used to poke out sometimes and we used to say, you know, “Your curls are showing” and they’d go [makes gesture] like this, because it was against their religion, you see. I’m a Catholic. So it was against their religion to shove any vanity or anything like that. But, um, it was a wonderful place, and I’ve, like I said, I thought I should have been a nun, but here I am: none of this, none of that, and none of the other.
[* = vocalic pause]

TRANSCRIBED BY: Kevin Flynn

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:

A housewife and mother of one, subject is an ardent volunteer for all kinds of civic work in Great Torrington, as it is now known. Her dialect has some traditional West Country sounds, such as the occasional dropped “h” and some r-colored vowels here and there. The subject reminisces about the World War 2 years and her fraternization with the American troops stationed nearby. For more information on British dialects, visit PaulMeier.com.

COMMENTARY BY: Paul Meier

DATE OF COMMENTARY (DD/MM/YYYY): 2001

The archive provides:

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• 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).

 

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