Mississippi 8

Listen to Mississippi 8, a 90-year-old woman from Clarksdale, Mississippi, and Memphis, Tennessee, United States. Click or tap the triangle-shaped play button to hear the subject.

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BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION

AGE: 90

DATE OF BIRTH (DD/MM/YYYY): 22/01/1926

PLACE OF BIRTH: Helena, Arkansas

GENDER: female

ETHNICITY: Caucasian

OCCUPATION: retired

EDUCATION: BA degree from Ole Miss

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

The subject was raised in Clarksdale, Mississippi, but had been living in Memphis, Tennessee, for 60 years at the time of this recording.

OTHER INFLUENCES ON SPEECH: N/A

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

RECORDED BY: Mendy McMastes

DATE OF RECORDING (DD/MM/YYYY): 02/10/2016

PHONETIC TRANSCRIPTION OF SCRIPTED SPEECH: N/A

TRANSCRIBED BY: N/A

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

ORTHOGRAPHIC TRANSCRIPTION OF UNSCRIPTED SPEECH:

Who in the world wrote that [laughing after commenting on her reading of Comma Gets a Cure]?

Living in Memphis? Well, my children were little; I raised my children there, worked in a doctor’s office, and, uh, I just been living in Memphis. I had two boys; I have one now, lost one to cancer, and he has his own business. He — what should I tell her about Buddy? He has a wife and three children; one of them is a veterinary, veterinary doctor in, uh, Mississippi — Meridian, Mississippi. And, uh, one of them, uh, moving back to Memphis to work with her daddy, and, uh, the boy Rimy’s in St. Petersburg. He has his own business. He, he’s a computer genius.

TRANSCRIBED BY: Mendy McMasters

DATE OF TRANSCRIPTION (DD/MM/YYYY): 06/10/2016

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.