Illinois 31

Listen to Illinois 31, a 47-year-old woman from Chicago, Illinois, United States. Click or tap the triangle-shaped play button to hear the subject.

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BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION

AGE: 47

DATE OF BIRTH (DD/MM/YYYY): 26/10/1976

PLACE OF BIRTH: Chicago, Illinois

GENDER: female

ETHNICITY: Japanese-American

OCCUPATION: arts administrator

EDUCATION: master’s degree

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

The subject lived in Edinburgh, Scotland, during graduate school and a short time after, and then lived a short time in Madrid, Spain.

OTHER INFLUENCES ON SPEECH:

She grew up with a father who speaks Japanese. Her first language is English, but she speaks some Japanese as well.

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): 09/10/2024

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 dad used to be a chef, right? So I thought I could learn a lot of cooking from him. So I did try one time, uh, when he would drive over to come see me sometimes. Uh, we — I said, “Dad, why don’t you, uh, why don’t we cook together? We’ll make something. It’ll be fun.” And so we were making a chocolate souffle, which is a very “chefy-chef” kind of thing to make. But, I love chocolate. So it turned out where I was trying to do it together with my dad. But then he just sort of took over ‘cause he’s not really a teacher. He’s a doer, and it was hard for him to get me involved in it [laughs], essentially. So I ended up writing notes, uh, of the recipe. And he made it, and it was delicious.

Um, so now, as — he’s an older man — he’s retired, he doesn’t leave the house very much. He doesn’t come see me in Chicago anymore. He’s very much home based, and he spends a lot of time watching Japanese TV. So, his heart is really back in Japan. And I feel like, um, he would only be happiest if he were there.

TRANSCRIBED BY: Tanera Marshall

DATE OF TRANSCRIPTION (DD/MM/YYYY): 09/10/2024

PHONETIC TRANSCRIPTION OF UNSCRIPTED SPEECH: N/A

TRANSCRIBED BY: N/A

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

SCHOLARLY COMMENTARY:

The subject’s accent and oral posture reflect some Midwestern pronunciations/resonance characteristics; note slight lip spread and raised tongue, heard specifically on LOT, TRAP, and START words (lot, Comma, back in Japan, can’t imagine, dad, hard) and several R-vowel words (her, rare, Sarah, retired).

COMMENTARY BY: Tanera Marshall

DATE OF COMMENTARY (DD/MM/YYYY): 13/11/2024

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.