South Africa 8

Listen to South Africa 8, a 17-year-old girl from Meadowlands, South Africa. Click or tap the triangle-shaped play button to hear the subject.

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BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION

AGE: 17

DATE OF BIRTH (DD/MM/YYYY): 1984

PLACE OF BIRTH: Meadowlands, a suburb of Johannesburg

GENDER: female

ETHNICITY: Zulu

OCCUPATION: student

EDUCATION: studying drama

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

Subject has lived in and around Johannesburg her entire life, sometimes in Soweto.

OTHER INFLUENCES ON SPEECH: N/A

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

RECORDED BY: Yvette Hardie

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:

I am 17 years old.  I am currently doing my matric and I’m at the National School of the Arts.  I stay in Meadowlands with my grandmother, my grandfather, two cousins and my mother.  Um, I’ve been in Meadowlands ever since I was young; I was born there.  Um, for my primary school I went to Tembaletu  Primary School, which is a school in Soweto.  Then I moved on to St. Joseph Limmer [spelling?].  It’s in Diepkloof and it’s a convent.  It was very hard for me there, then I had to adjust when I came to the National School of the Arts in standard six.  And I started doing drama then.  All my life I’ve been, um, dreaming of being a teacher or something like that, but now I’ve currently been changing my mind because I think there’s a lot of things to do apart from being a teacher or a nurse, as those with the most important careers long ago.  However things have changed now and there are a lot of opportunities for black people.  But I’m not saying that there has never been opportunities, or there hasn’t been.  It’s just that, um, we were a bit oppressed, stuff like that.  So now I just need to realize that, you know, I’m capable of doing whatever I want to do as a black person and as a female as well, and I’m actually looking forward to growing up and doing everything that I’ve been dreaming of ever since I was young.

TRANSCRIBED BY: Lynn Baker

DATE OF TRANSCRIPTION (DD/MM/YYYY): 25/02/2008

PHONETIC TRANSCRIPTION OF UNSCRIPTED SPEECH: N/A

TRANSCRIBED BY: N/A

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

SCHOLARLY COMMENTARY:

The subject reads the “Comma” text with a slightly heavier accent than the one in which she generally speaks. The “oo” in book becomes “oo” as in “pool”; the “er” becomes a lengthened “e” as in “bed” (confirmed); the “ah” becomes a short “u” as in “run” (palm; father); the “e” is lengthened; all the syllables in words like “suffering” and “normally” are articulated; the mispronunication of “unsanitary” is due to the fact that the word is not known by the speaker; the “a” as in “cat” becomes an “e” as in bed; the “ey” becomes a lengthened “e”; in words such as “Force,” there is no r-coloring at all; and the “i” is also typical.

COMMENTARY BY: Yvette Hardie

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

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.