New York 25

Listen to New York 25, a 26-year-old man from Bellport, Long Island, New York, 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): 29/04/1988

PLACE OF BIRTH: Bellport, New York (on Long Island)

GENDER: male

ETHNICITY: Italian (with some Irish and German)

OCCUPATION: medical student

EDUCATION: BA in English and MS in biology

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

The subject was born and raised in Bellport, New York, until age 18 but attended college in South Bend, Indiana, from ages 18 to 25.

OTHER INFLUENCES ON SPEECH: N/A

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

RECORDED BY: David Nevell

DATE OF RECORDING (DD/MM/YYYY): 07/03/2014

PHONETIC TRANSCRIPTION OF SCRIPTED SPEECH: N/A

TRANSCRIBED BY: N/A

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

ORTHOGRAPHIC TRANSCRIPTION OF UNSCRIPTED SPEECH:

Um, it’s kind of an interesting place. It is — there is a nice rich area of the village, and then there’s a pretty lower-class area and everyone goes to the same school, so it’s kind of unique to Long Island, where it’s not a whole bunch of rich white kids. Um, so “water” was a big one, “water,” and I still can’t say “golf” the right way; uh, like, to go golfing, and then, um, “coffee” I don’t — see now I’m like, thinking about it — “coffee.” Or, and then “orange” instead of “orange”; that was a big one. Long Island — long — it’s all ow’s. Um, so I think those were the big words … I guess … and then talking too fast [laughs], that was one of the things. There’s someone at my school right now who — it’s not so much cocky people, it’s someone who has to add to every conversation with what happened in their own life, like, so, I guess that pisses me off.

I like movies. I’m a big, yeah. If I weren’t going to do — if I wasn’t doing med school, I would do film school. My favorite movie is “Jurassic Park.” I don’t know if that’s necessarily the best movie ever made, but that’s my favorite. I think, um, one of my favorites that I think is also really good is “Life is Beautiful.” Um, I think that was probably the first — it’s kind of the “Star Wars” for my generation, so that was like the first time that I had gone to a movie and was completely in awe and thought that I was going to get eaten by a dinosaur, and I think — I love Steven Spielberg in general. I like that, uh, he can take, like, small things and make them into big events, like just the idea of that stupid car coming down the tree was a huge set piece, and if you thought about that before you made the movie, you wouldn’t think that they would make a whole scene out of that, so, I thought, that, that was kind of cool. Things like that. Um, it was the first movie that I cried for like, three days, ‘cause I didn’t really know about the Holocaust when it came out, so that’s like, when I learned about that, and, um, I don’t know, I just — it was just — it’s a very — it’s interesting how you can find beauty in the most horrible situation, I guess. So it was like very thoughtful.

My mom was born in the Bronx, and my dad was born in Jersey, but they moved to Long Island — my dad moved to Levittown, actually, very early, and my mom, I think, moved to Long Island when she was like, 11 or 12? So I’m, I’m actually — I may not even be Italian. It’s a — my grandpa was adopted, and they think he’s Italian, and my grandma was German, but both her parents died when she was very young, and she was raised by the Italians in the Bronx, so we have a very Italian heritage even though we might not actually be Italian at all, [laughs] so it’s kind of interesting but that’s like the most — where I would say most of our culture comes from is the Italian side. And then my dad’s side is Irish-German, but it’s not really …

TRANSCRIBED BY: Shawnia Keith (under supervision of David Nevell)

DATE OF TRANSCRIPTION (DD/MM/YYYY): 03/05/2014

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.