Episode 74 (Folk Linguistics)

Dennis Preston

Welcome to the March 2024 episode of In a Manner of Speaking, in which Paul discusses folk linguistics with dialectologist Dennis Preston, professor emeritus at Oklahoma State University and former president of the American Dialect Society.

Often defined as the study or examination of language from a non-professional, non-academic, or uninformed perspective, folk linguistics can yield fascinating insights into how the average person perceives language, dialects, and accents. Paul and Dennis discuss this topic in detail, including the truths, misconceptions, and fallacies related to our understanding of the spoken word and regional speech.

Dennis Preston is an adjunct professor of linguistics at the University of Kentucky; regents professor emeritus at Oklahoma State University, where he was director of research on the dialects of English in Oklahoma and co-director of the Center for Oklahoma Studies; and distinguished professor emeritus at Michigan State University. He has been a visiting scholar at Osaka Shoin Women’s College and the universities of Canterbury (New Zealand), Hawaii, Arizona, Michigan, Copenhagen, Colorado, Indiana University Southeast, SUNY Oswego, Berkeley, Chicago, Kentucky, UC Davis, and UMass Amherst. He was Fulbright researcher in Poland and Brazil.

Dennis was director of the 2003 Linguistic Society of America Institute and president of the American Dialect Society, and has served on the executive boards of those societies and others, as well as the editorial boards of numerous journals and panels of granting agencies. He is a member of the advisory committees of several international research projects and is invited frequently for presentations in both academic and popular venues.

Professor Preston’s work focuses on sociolinguistics and dialectology, including four recent NSF grants, two in folk linguistics and two in language variation and change. His most recent book-length publications are Folk Linguistics (2000) with Nancy Niedzielski,  A Handbook of Perceptual Dialectology, Volume II (2002) with Daniel Long, Needed Research in American Dialects (2003), Linguistic Diversity in Michigan and Ohio (2005) with Brian Joseph and Carol G. Preston, Variation in Indigenous Languages (2009) with James Stanford, A Reader in Sociophonetics (2010) with Nancy Niedzielski, Responses to Language Varieties (2015) with Alexei Prikhodkine, and Changing Perceptions of Southernness (American Speech 93:3&4, Fall-Winter 2018) with Jennifer Cramer.

He is an Erskine Fellow of the University of Canterbury (New Zealand) and a fellow of the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science and the Linguistic Society of America, and he was awarded the Officer’s Cross of the Order of Merit of the Polish Republic in 2004.

For a fascinating collection of Dennis Preston’s interviews, go here. And visit OKState.edu.

More with Professor Preston:

 

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) is courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

 

Episode 73 (The American Dialect Society)

Betsy Evans

The February 2024 episode of In a Manner of Speaking is all about the American Dialect Society, which was founded in 1889 to study English and other languages in North America. Paul’s guest is Betsy Evans, the new executive director of the society and associate professor of linguistics at the University of Washington in Seattle.

Paul and Betsy discuss the history and mission of the ADS and explore the latest trends in accents, dialects, and vocabulary of the United States.

Betsy’s research concentrates on perceptual dialectology and draws heavily on perceptions and attitudes to language variation with an aim to explore how language variation relates to the function of language in marking identity, status, group solidarity, and cultural values. She is also director of the Folk Linguistics Online Mapping (FLOM) project, which works on developing a free, open-source, online tool for conducting perceptual dialect research. She is a co-founder of the Linguistic Bias Working group at the University of Washington and the executive director of the American Dialect Society.

For more information on the American Dialect Society, visit AmericanDialect.org.

Check out the videos below for further discussions of topics related to this podcast:

For further discussion of Amy Stoller’s question about “milk/melk,” visit  A Way with Words.

Betsy Evans’ selected research:

Evans, Betsy, PI. Seattle to Spokane: Mapping English in Washington State.

Evans, B. E., Benson, E. J., & Stanford, J. (Eds.). (2018) Language Regard: Methods, Variation and Change. Cambridge University Press.

Fridland, Beckford Wassink, Kendall & Evans (eds.). (2017) Speech in the Western States, Volume 2. Publication of the American Dialect Society (PADS) 77:1.

Fridland, V., Kendall, T., Evans, B., & Wassink, A. B. (2016) Speech of the Western States. Vol. 1, The Coastal States. Publication of the American Dialect Society, 101.

Mooney, Annabelle & Evans, Betsy. Language, Society & Power. 6th edition. London: Routledge.

 

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) is courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 72 (The Word: an Illusive Concept)

Victor Boucher
Victor Boucher

Paul begins 2024 with a discussion about the fundamental nature of the core topic of this podcast: the word. Specifically, he discusses the concept of the word itself, with Victor Boucher, professor of linguistics at the University of Montreal.

Piggybacking on last last month’s episode, which discussed spaces between words,  Victor and Paul focus on the definition of a word and how words are viewed, written, and spoken in various languages.

Victor is a senior professor of speech science at the Université de Montréal. The focus of his research has been the sensorimotor systems that underlie speech processing, with applications extending to the processing of voices, chunking, speech breathing, and verbal memory. This work has led him to examine the writing bias in the study of spoken language and its processing in terms of units that reflect constraints on sensorimotor systems rather than conceptual linguistic units that link to writing such as phonemes, words, and sentences.

A complete list of his scholarly works is to be found at Google Scholar link.

To learn more about Inuktitut, watch the following video:

Also see Wikipedia for a more in-depth discussion of Inuktitut.

For the study on the memory benefits of repeating text while talking to someone, Professor Boucher discusses the findings on pages 214-216 of the 2021 article The Study of Speech Processes, Addressing the Writing Bias in Language Science. Cambridge University Press, UK.

Further References

Terrace, H. S. (2001). Chunking and serially organized behavior in pigeons, monkeys, and humans. In R. G. Cook (Ed.), Avian visual cognition. Retrieved from https://pigeon.psy.tufts.edu/avc/terrace/default.htm.

Boucher, V. J., Gilbert, A. C., & Jemel, B. (2019). The role of low-frequency neural oscillations in speech processing: Revisiting delta entrainment. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 31, 1205-1215. doi:10.1162/jocn_a_01410.

Lowe, R. (1981). Analyse Linguistique et Ethnocentrisme. Essai sur la Structure du Mot en Inuktitut. Ottawa, ON: Musée National de l’Homme.

 

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) is courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 71 (The History of Silent Reading)

Paul Seanger

For the last episode of 2023, Paul talks to Paul Saenger, curator of rare books, emeritus, at Chicago’s Newberry Library, about the history of silent reading (versus reading aloud) and the evolution of inserting (or not inserting) spaces between words.

They discuss the physiological processes required for decoding a written text written without spaces between words and how that practice influenced the long tradition of reading aloud.

From 1985 to 2013, Paul Saenger directed collection development at the Newberry Library in Chicago. His publications include Space Between Words: The Origins of Silent Reading (Stanford University Press, 1997) and A Catalogue of Pre-1500 Western Manuscript Books at the Newberry Library (1989). He is also the author of numerous articles, including recently “Comment Lire est Devenu un Jeu d’Enfant,” L’Histoire (no. 454, 2018), “Orality and Visible Language” in The Oxford Handbook of Latin Palaeography (2020), “Des Blancs Entre les Mots,” Écriture et image (December 2021), and “Augustine as Reader: Prospects for Collaboration Between Palaeography and the Neurosciences” in Textual Communities, Textual Selves: Essays in Dialogue with Brian Stock (2023).  His monograph-length essay, The Fifth-Century Patristic Page: The Implications of Space, Symbols, Numeration and Color for the History of Reading was in press at the time of the recording of this podcast.

Other recent articles include “Henri-Jean Martin and the Birth of the History of Reading: a Memoir,” in Histoire et Civilisation du Livre, 16 (2020); “The Twelfth Century Reception of Oriental Languages and the Graphic Mise en Page of Latin Vulgate Bibles in England” in Eyal Poleg’s and Laura Light’s collective volume, Form and Function of Latin Vulgate Bibles in the Late Medieval Bible (London, 2015), and “Jewish Liturgical Divisions of the Torah and English Chapter Divisions of the Vulgate,” in Pesher Nahum, Texts and Studies in Jewish History and Literature Presented to Norman Golb (Chicago, 2012).

EXERCISE

The following approximates, in English, what ancient Roman readers would have experienced when opening a familiar codex (of Livy, for example) written in scriptura continua (continuous script with no spaces or punctuation). What is the experience like for you? Do you find yourself reading it aloud? Perhaps sounding it out in your head? Do you notice your lips moving sometimes? Are you longing for spaces between words? Do you welcome the freedom to phrase this as you wish?

totheSupremeJudgeoftheworldfortherectitudeofourintentionsdointheNameandbyAuthorityofthegoodPeopleoftheseColoniessolemnlypublishanddeclareThattheseUnitedColoniesareandofRightoughttobeFreeandIndependentStatesthattheyareAbsolvedfromallAllegiancetotheBritishCrownandthatallpoliticalconnectionbetweenthemandtheStateofGreatBritainisandoughttobetotallydissolvedandthatasFreeandIndependentStatestheyhavefullPowertolevyWarconcludePeacecontractAlliancesestablishCommerceandtodoallotherActsandThingswhichIndependentStatesmayofrightdoAndforthesupportofthisDeclarationwithafirmrelianceontheprotectionofdivineProvidencewemutuallypledgetoeachotherourLivesourFortunesandoursacredHonor

 

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) is courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 70 (How American English Got Its Start)

Karen Burgos

In this, the 70th episode of Paul’s In a Manner of Speaking podcast, we learn what Colonial American English might have sounded like. Paul examines this fascinating and understudied topic with Karen Burgos, a freelance linguist, independent researcher, and founder of Ace Linguist, a truly valuable blog.

Karen’s articles on “Indie Girl Voice,” “Colonial American English,” and “The PIN-PEN merger” have educated many netizens on the English sound changes of yesterday, today, and maybe even tomorrow. Her focus on historical linguistics, language in popular media, and sociolinguistics makes for insightful commentary on all matter of variation in the English language.

To read her complete Dialect Dissection: Founding Fathers blog, click here.

The original Broadway cast recording of “My Shot,” from Hamilton:

The original Broadway cast recording of “Is Anybody There?” from 1776:

And here is a clip from John Adams, starring Paul Giamatti. (Catherine Charlton dialect-coached the mini-series with attention to historical accuracy.):

For a free download of Paul’s The Original Pronunciation (OP) of Shakespeare’s English, which predates the dialects discussed here by about 100 years but is still present in many of the sounds, click here. And don’t forget to listen to the September 2023 episode of In a Manner of Speaking, with David Crystal, which is a nice companion to this month’s episode.

Lastly, Paul mentions a holiday discount on his Accents & Dialects for Stage and Screen Deluxe Streaming Edition and a free recording of his audiobook reading of A Christmas Carol. Those are available from November 20, 2023 through January 5, 2024.

 

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) is courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 69 (Orality and Literacy)

Brian Ott

For the October 2023 episode of In a Manner of Speaking, Paul Meier discusses the connection between orality and literacy with Professor Brian Ott, an expert in the field of rhetoric and media. Paul and Brian discuss many topics related to rhetoric and the oral tradition throughout human history.

Professor Ott, who holds a Ph.D from the Pennsylvania State University, is professor of communication and media at Missouri State University. He has been studying rhetoric and media and their intersection for more than 25 years.

Brian has authored numerous books and essays on the changing nature of communication in the digital era, and he has been interviewed by the Associated Press, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, The Atlantic, and Politico, among others. His op-eds have appeared in outlets such as The New York Times, USA Today, NewsweekSalon, Business Insider, and The Hill. He is the former director of Texas Tech University Press, a former editor-in-chief of the Western Journal of Communication, and a former president of the Western States Communication Association.

For more information on Brian, visit Wikipedia and Missouri State University’s website. And for a PDF list of Professor Ott’s media interviews, go here.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) is courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 68 (English Through the Ages)

David Crystal

The September 2023 episode of In a Manner of Speaking features a trip through time:  a conversation between Paul and distinguished linguist David Crystal about the history of the English language. David traces the development of English from the Roman occupation of Britain to the spread of Modern English around the world.

Highlights include a discussion of Old English, Middle English, Early Modern English (and Original Pronunciation), along with a brief look at the contributions of the Angles, Saxons, Jutes, and French.

David (a native of Liverpool, England, and North Wales) has authored more than 100 books in the field of language, including several Penguin books, but is perhaps best known for his two encyclopedias for Cambridge University Press, The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language and The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language. His books on English phonetics and phonology include Prosodic Systems and Intonation in English and The English Tone of Voice.

He was founder-editor of the Journal of Child Language (1973-85), Child Language Teaching and Therapy (1985-96), and Linguistics Abstracts (1985-96), and associate editor of the Journal of Linguistics (1970-73). In addition, he has been a consultant, contributor, or presenter on several radio and television programs and series. David is currently patron of the International Association of Teachers of English as a Foreign Language (IATEFL) and the Association for Language Learning (ALL); president of the Chartered Institute of Editing and Proofreading, the UK National Literacy Association, and the Johnson Society of London; and an honorary vice president of the Institute of Linguists and the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists.

David is also a renowned Shakespeare and Original Pronunciation (OP) scholar. For more on his work with the Bard, visit ShakespearesWords.com.

For a full biography and more information on David, visit his website, DavidCrystal.com. Go here for a list of all of David’s published works.

Further links to David’s books:
Oxford Dictionary of Original Shakespearean Pronunciation
Shakespeare’s Words
Everyday Shakespeare: Lines for Life (co-authored with Ben Crystal)
Shakespeare’s Original Pronunciation website
A Date with Language

YouTube videos on the history of English:

This is David’s fifth appearance on the podcast. He appeared previously in episodes 5 in June 2018 (Pragmatics), 22 in November 2019 (Received Pronunciation)44 in September 2021 (“Let’s Talk), and 56 in September 2022 (“Sounds Appealing”).

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) is courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 67 (Harmonic Overtone Chanting)

Jill Purce
  • For the August 2023 episode of In a Manner of Speaking, Paul talks to Jill Purce, the doyenne of harmonic overtone chanting, which is often called polyphonic overtone singing, or singing two or more notes at the same time. Paul and Jill discuss all aspects of this unique art.

Jill is recognized globally as the pioneer of both the sound and the ancestral healing movements. In the 1970s, she introduced the teaching of overtone chanting throughout the world, along with the spiritual potential of the voice for healing and meditation.

In the early 1970s, she lived and worked with German composer Karlheinz Stockhausen, exploring music’s spiritual dimension. She learned overtone chanting in the Himalayas with the chant master of the Gyutö Tibetan Monastery. Jill practiced Dzogchen from 1978 with the late Namkhai Norbu Rinpoche.

In the last 40 years, she pioneered both her workshops, Healing Voice and Healing the Family and Ancestors, the latter a unique combination of family constellations, chant, and ceremony.

Jill is the author of The Mystic Spiral: Journey of the Soul. Her recordings include Overtone Chanting Meditations and The Healing Voice. She lives in London with her husband, Rupert Sheldrake, and their two sons, musician Cosmo and author and biologist Merlin.

For more information about Jill, visit HealingVoice.com.

Several YouTube clips are excerpted under the copyright doctrine of fair use in this podcast. Below you will find the entire clips:

Nestor Kornblum, Amazing Grace

Harmonic Choir, Hearing Solar Winds: Ascending and Descending

Jill Purce: Overtone chanting in St. Paul’s Cathedral

Five female overtone and throat singing experts

 

Now available from Jill Purce:
Online Family Constellation Workshop, September 22 -24, 2023.
London Non-residential Week Intensive, October 28 – November 3, 2023.
Online Healing Voice Workshop, October 21-22, 2023.
Jill’s two albums: Overtone Chanting Meditations and The Healing Voice.

 

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) is courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 66 (“Shakespeare’s Magical Keyboard”)

The July 2023 episode of In a Manner of Speaking is all about William Shakespeare. Paul dives deep into the Bard, from iambic pentameter, to scansion, to scoring, to metre, to Original Pronunciation. It’s a fun exercise for scholars and professionals but also actors just starting out on their Shakespeare journey.

Paul references his Voicing Shakespeare ebook, which is a great accompaniment to this month’s podcast. For details on how to purchase and download it, go here. (It’s available both in Windows and iTunes/Mac/iPhone formats.)

 

Below is Edmund’s speech from King Lear, Act 1, Scene 2. To hear Paul deliver the speech in Original Pronunciation (OP), click or tap the triangle-shaped play button. (To hear Paul’s reading of the speech in a modern dialect, go here. ) And for a more complete scansion and scoring of the speech, click here.

 

Thou, na│ture, art│ my god│dess; ││ to │thy law ENJ
My ser│vices│ are bound. │││Wherefore│ should I ENJ
Stand in│ the plague│ of cus│tom, ││ and│ permit ENJ
The cu│rios│ity│ of na│tions││ to│ deprive│ me, HEX
For that│ I am│││ some twelve│ or four│teen moon-│shines ENJ
Lag of│ a broth│er? │││Why bas│tard? where│fore base? HEX [1]
When my│ dimen│sions ││ are│ as well │compact,
My mind │as gen│’rous,
││and │my shape │as true ENJ
As hon│est ma│dam’s iss│ue? │││Why brand│ they us ENJ HEX[2]
With base? │ with base│ness? ││ bas│tardy? │ base, base?
Who, [in │the lust│y stealth│ of nat│ure, ││] take ENJ
More com│posi│tion ││and│ fierce qua│lity ENJ
Than doth, [│within│ a dull, │││stale, tir│ed bed,]
Go t’ the │crea│ting a│ whole tribe│ of fops,
Got ‘tween │asleep │and wake? │││Well, then, TETR
Legit│’mate Ed│gar, ││ I│ must have│ your land:
Our fa│ther’s love│││ is to│ the bas│tard Ed│mund ENJ
As to│ the le│git’mate: │││fine word, — │legit│imate! HEX
Well, my │legit│’mate, ││if │this let│ter speed,
And my │inven│tion thrive, │││ Edmund │the base ENJ
Shall top │the leg│it’mate. │││ I grow; │ I pros│per:
Now, gods, │││ stand up│ for bas│tards!

[1] This line scans as a broken-backed hexameter with a silent extra beat, taking up metrical space, following brother.  This is a very rare type of line.
[2] And again, another broken-backed hexameter.

For a partial phonetic analysis of the speech in Original Pronunciation, see below. (For further analysis of OP, see Paul’s Original Pronunciation ebook.)

Thou, nature, art my goddess; to thy law
ðəʊ    nɛːtʰə˞  a˞t mɪ gɑdɛs    tʰə ðəɪ lɑː

My services are bound. Wherefore should I
mɪ  sɐ˞vɪsɪz  ə˞ bəʊnd   ʍɛ˞fɔ˞       ʃʊd əi

Stand in the plague of custom, and permit
stand ɪ ðə pʰlɛːg ə kʰɤstəm an pʰɐ˞mɪtʰ

The curiosity of nations to deprive me,
ðə kʰju̹ɹiɑsɪtʰəɪ ə nɛːsjənz tʰə dɪpʰɹəɪv mɪ

For that I am some twelve or fourteen moon-shines
fə˞ ðatʰ əi am sɤm tʰʍɛɫv ə˞ fo˞tʰeːn mu̹nʃəɪnz

Lag of a brother?  Why bastard? wherefore base?
lag əv ə bɹɤðə˞    ʍəɪ bastə˞d     ʍɛ˞fɔ˞    bɛːs

When my dimensions are as well compact,
ʍɛn məɪ dəmɛnsjənz a˞ əz wɛɫ kʰəmpʰaktʰ

My mind as generous, and my shape as true,
mɪ məɪnd əz d͡ʒɛnɹəs and mɪ ʃɛːp əz tɹu̹ː

As honest madam’s issue? Why brand they us
az  ɑnɪst madəmz ɪsjə     ʍəɪ  bɹand ðɛ ɤs

With base? with baseness? bastardy? base, base?
wɪ  bɛːs     wɪ bɛːsnəs     bastʰɐ˞dəɪ bɛːs bɛːs

 

And for further Shakespeare study, don’t forget to listen to Paul’s previous podcasts: episodes one, fifteen, thirty-six, forty-three, and fifty-eight.

 

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) is courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 65 (“Namecoach”)

Praveen Shanbhag

After asking the Shakespearean question “What’s in a name?” on the May 2023 In a Manner of Speaking podcast, Paul takes that topic a step further for the June episode by interviewing Praveen Shanbhag, the founder and CEO of Namecoach.

Namecoach allows you to create a “namebadge” that you can add to your e-mail signature or social-media account, or wherever you want. The badge contains a sound file of you pronouncing your own name. Paul and Praveen discuss Namecoach and other topics related to name pronunciation.

After hearing his sister’s name mispronounced at her college graduation, Praveen says he was compelled to create the initial Namecoach product while finishing his Ph.D. at Stanford. Prior to building Namecoach, he pursued studies in biochemistry, physics, history, and philosophy, and holds degrees from Harvard (B.A.), Columbia (M.A.), Cambridge (MPhil), and Stanford (Ph.D).

For more information, visit Name-coach.com. To record your own “namebadge,” go here.

For Namecoach’s social media, visit Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, and Instagram.

And watch Praveen’s appearance on Alan Headbloom’s Feel Like You Belong:

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) is courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 64 (‘What’s in a Name?’)

Graham Pointon

For the May 2023 episode of In a Manner of Speaking, Paul and his guest, Graham Pointon, attempt to answer the popular question “What’s in a Name?” Specifically, they discuss how one decides on pronunciations of people and place names, and the issues surrounding “proper” pronunciation of words in general.

Graham is the former pronunciation adviser for the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC). After studying French and linguistics for an MA (Hons), receiving the diploma in phonetics at Edinburgh University, and spending a year on a Spanish-government scholarship at Madrid’s Complutense University, Graham spent six years as a lecturer in English phonetics at Trondheim University in Norway. He also completed his MLitt for Edinburgh on the rhythm of spoken Spanish.

He then moved back to the United Kingdom to take up the post of pronunciation adviser at the BBC, where he stayed until the end of 2001. Since leaving the BBC, he has co-authored three books on English usage with a former colleague in Norway, Stewart Clark, and writes an occasional blog: Linguism.

For more information on the BBC Pronunciation Unit, go here. For more on Paul Auster’s novel, 4-3-2-1, see Wikipedia.

And learn how to pronounce one of the world’s longest place names:

And for further reading on this topic, Graham suggests Jurg R. Schwyter’s Dictating to the Mob, from Oxford University Press in 2016 (ISBN: 9780198736738), which discusses the history of the BBC Advisory Committee on Spoken English.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) is courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

 

Episode 63 (The Oxford English Dictionary)

Catherine Sangster

Welcome to the April 2023 episode of In a Manner of Speaking. This month’s guest is Dr. Catherine Sangster, executive editor of pronunciations at Oxford Languages. She has been in charge of the Oxford English Dictionary’s pronunciations for 11 years.

Paul and Catherine discuss not just the dictionary and the purpose and origins of the dictionary but many other topics related to pronunciation.

Before moving into lexicography, Dr. Sangster headed the BBC Pronunciation Unit and completed a D.Phil. in sociophonetics. Catherine’s linguistic research interests include accents and dialects, Germanic languages, the phonology of conlangs, language and gender/sexuality, and Latin and its Anglicization.

For the OED’s pronunciation models and transcription keys for World Englishes, visit https://public.oed.com/how-to-use-the-oed/key-to-pronunciation/. 

For the recent press release discussing the decision to add Indian-English pronunciations to the dictionary, click here.

For more information about the OED, go to OED.com. And for more about Catherine, click here.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) is courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 62 (Fast-Talkin’ Dudes)

For the March 2023 episode of the podcast, Paul takes an in-depth look at the world of speed talking and speed singing. He examines the world records and introduces us to the wide variety of people who are called upon to talk or sing quickly — from actors to auctioneers to debaters to people who simply enjoy speaking at high speeds.

Here is the original text that Paul and Cameron use in their speed test:

“So this old guy comes up to me and wants me to tell him how fast I can talk. I told him I didn’t know but like why did he want to know such a thing.  He said he’d heard of a man who could speak four times as fast as the norm. So I said to him let’s put it to the test and I told him I’d write him a short speech that we could use to test our own speeds and this is it. So if you want to see how close you can get to the top speeds I spoke of just use this brief text. Can you do it fast and still make it clear and not make it sound like a speed test?”

For the lyrics to “The Major-General’s Song” or “I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major General,” plus the lyrics to Tom Lehrer’s parody, “The Elements Song,” go here.

This episode includes many fair-use snippets of longer video and audio clips. Many of those clips are available in their entirety below.

And to hear cattle auctioneer John Korrey, go directly to YouTube.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) is courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 61 (Irish: A Language in Danger)

Malachy O’Neill

The Irish language is the podcast topic for February 2023, and Paul’s guest is Professor Malachy O’Neill, Irish language scholar and director of Regional Engagement at Ulster University. Paul and Malachy discuss all aspects of the Irish language, including its history, dialects, and status as an endangered language.

In his position at Ulster University, Professor O’Neill takes responsibility for relationships with key stakeholders including governmental agencies, councils, trusts, and other relevant authorities on behalf of the institution. He was awarded a personal chair in Irish (2020) and was provost magee campus (2016-2021) and head of the School of Irish Language and Literature (2012-2017). He has played a central role in a range of strategic initiatives for the university, including city and growth deals (UK government), Shared Island (Irish government), the inception of a School of Medicine (opened in 2021), the development of the North West Cross-border Tertiary Cluster (with FE/HE partners), and the accreditation of Derry/Strabane as a UNESCO Learning City Region.

He was awarded a National Teaching Fellowship in 2019, the highest accolade in UK Higher Education, and is a principal fellow of the Higher Education Authority.  He was appointed to the Department for Communities’ Irish Language Strategy Expert Advisory Panel in 2021 was a member of the Irish Government’s Review Board of the Official Irish Language Standard (2016). He was editor of An tUltach (2008-2010). His research includes modern Irish pedagogy, the O’Neill dynasty, and Irish language theatre; and he is lead investigator (Northern Ireland) in the c.€4million Shared Island social capital research initiative with NUI Galway, University of Limerick and Atlantic Technological University. He is a board member of the Derry Chamber of Commerce and a director on the Governing Body of North West Regional College. For more information on Professor O’Neill, go here.

Malachy recently contributed his voice to the International Dialects of English Archive (IDEA). Go here to listen to him speak both English and Irish.

For information about Irish and Celtic Studies at Ulster University, go here. A similar resource can be found here. In addition, An Cailín Ciúin (The Quiet Girl) is currently making cinematic waves. And for Irish poetry, visit Lyrikline. Lastly, a wide range of short films are available online, particularly on YouTube. Yu Ming is Ainm Dom (My Name is Yu Ming), below, is a particularly illustrative look at the Irish language as perceived by both the Irish and non-Irish.

Below is a transcription of the text that Professor O’Neill reads:
Extract from An Druma Mór by Seosamh Mac Grianna (An Gúm, 1969):
Eadar sliabh agus cladach, ó Iorras go Málainn Mhór, atá Gaeltacht Thír Chonaill, mar bheadh sí ag casmairt le fiántas na farraige móire. Is iomaí fail agus cneá ar na cladaigh chéanna, is iomaí colm agus gág iontu, de thairbhe an chomhraic sin a thosaigh sula dtáinig Parthalán go hInis Samhaoir, sea, agus sula dtáinig blianta nó laetha chun an tsaoil as broinn chian cheoch na haimsire. Tá an brablach tanaí domasaí atá mar úir ann ina luí ar na creagacha is sine ar an domhan; tá grágáin go fras ann – buna na gcrann mór a mbíodh an eilit ag dul i bhfostó iontu sula gcuala Éire guth daonna riamh. Ní inseoidh neach saolta goidé mar cuireadh síol an fhraoigh atá le fáil go fóill, d’ainneoin curaíochta, síos go fíorbhéal an láin mhara. Níl seanchas lena inse féin cé a chuir an chéad spád ann. Ach is furast a dhreach a shamhailt sula ndeachthas a bhaint barr as …

English translation:
The Big Drum by Art Hughes (Ben Madigan Press, 2009):
The Gaeltacht of Tyrconnell lies between the rugged mountain and rocky shores from Urris to Malinmore, as if it were dueling with the Great Ocean. These same shores bear many wounds and scars, gores and gashes as a consequence of that conflict which began before Parthalán came to Inis Samhaoir, yes and before years or days came into the world from the distant, misty womb of time. The thin covering of mossy ground which serves as soil there lies on the oldest rocks in creation; bog oak is found in abundance – the stumps of the great trees into which the doe used to flee before Ireland ever heard a human voice. No living soul could ever tell how the first seeds of heather were planted, a plant which, in spite of tillage, is still found to the very edge of the sea. No living lore recounts who thrust the first spade there, but it is easy to imagine its countenance before it was ploughed for crops …

 

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) is courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

 

 

Episode 60 (Whistled Speech)

Julien Meyer

For the first podcast of 2023, Paul discusses the unique topic of whistled speech with Julien Meyer, linguist, acoustician, and professor at the European Institutes for Advanced Study at the University of Lyon, France.

Found in more than 80 languages around the world, whistled speech, or whistled language, is often used to communicate when other forms of speech cannot be used or cannot be heard, often outdoors at great distances.

Meyer was a post-doctoral associate researcher (CNPq) at the Linguistics Division of the Museu Goeldi in Belém, Brazil, from 2009 to 2013. He holds a Ph.D. in cognitive sciences option linguistics from the University of Lyon and is currently a CNRS researcher at the GIPSA-lab in Grenoble, France.

His research is focused on acoustic communication, principally human language. He studies cognitive, physiologic, ecologic and environmental constraints that influence language production and comprehension.

Meyer is the author of Whistled Languages: A Worldwide Inquiry on Human Whistled Speech (2015). He is a research fellow of the Marie Skłodowska Curie Actions programme at the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) in Grenoble, for a project called Icon-Eco-Speech.

With global inquiries on whistled, drummed, and other instrumental forms of languages based on first-hand fieldwork documentation and study in 15 different language communities, Meyer has developed a unique expertise on natural human telecommunication systems and musical surrogacy encoding human language. He develops methodologies to run production and perception experiments both in the field and in the lab. His research also deals with the music-language edge and the relationships between language and natural rural environments.

For additional information about Meyer and whistled speech, visit Eurias-FP.Edu, KnowableMagazine.org, and SoundCloud.com. And for videos related to this topic, watch the YouTube clips below:

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) is courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 59 (Exploring Roy Hart’s Legacy)

Roy Hart

Welcome to the December 2022 episode of the podcast, in which Paul and his guests, Enrique Pardo and Linda Wise of Pantheatre, discuss the legacy of the intriguing and sometimes controversial figure of Roy Hart (1926-1975). Pardo and Wise have spent decades building on the legacy of the actor and vocalist. Known for his almost superhuman vocal range, his avant-garde performances, and his work with German singing teacher Alfred Wolfsohn, Hart casts a long shadow over the performing arts.

Enrique Pardo

Enrique Pardo is an artist, performer, essayist, and visual artist. “My ‘cutting-edge’ work happens, unquestionably, in performance laboratories,” Pardo says. “The goal: psychological creativity. My role: the one alchemy called ARTIFEX: artificer, catalyst and, why not, shaman.” He directs Pantheatre with Linda Wise, based in Paris and at Malerargues (Roy Hart Centre, Southern France), where they organize the yearly Myth and Theatre Festival.

Wise says, “One my greatest artistic interests and areas of research is the Interpretation of sound as emitted by the human voice — be it in song, speech, or improvised free vocalizing. I hear the sound before the word or before the concept of ‘being in tune.’ This work is a keystone in both my teaching, directing and performance practice.”

Linda Wise (photo by Javier de Riano Echanove)

For information about Pantheatre, visit Pantheatre.com, and for information on voice teaching and Roy Hart, go here and here.

Visit Wikipedia for even more information about Hart.

Below you will find the full YouTube clips that are excerpted in this podcast:

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) is courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 58 (Shakespeare’s Rhetoric)

Gideon Burton

For the November 2022 episode of the podcast, Paul welcomes Gideon Burton, professor in the English Department at Brigham Young University in Salt Lake City, Utah, and creator of the website Silva Rhetoricae: The Forest of Rhetoric. Paul and Gideon discuss Shakespeare’s use of rhetoric, in addition to rhetoric in general, which is often defined as the art of effective or persuasive speaking or writing.

Gideon Burton has taught courses in rhetoric, Renaissance literature, and digital media since 1994 at Brigham Young. His Silva Rhetoricae: The Forest of Rhetoric website has introduced countless online visitors to the basic concepts and terms of rhetoric since 1996. An avid skier,  Gideon lives in Salt Lake City.

Dr. Burton’s faculty biography, with a list of his publications, is available here.

Paul Meier’s Voicing Shakespeare, with a chapter on Rhetoric, is available here.

Click here for more Guess that Accent quizzes on IDEA.

Paul’s free ebook, The Original Pronunciation of Shakespeare’s Pronunciation, and other material on the topic, is available here. And for further related topics, see episodes 15 and 36 of this podcast.

Hear Alex Waldman, a Royal Shakespeare Company actor, explore the same speeches as Paul and Gideon do in this month’s podcast:

The speeches discussed in this podcast, from William Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, 3:2:

Brutus:

Romans, countrymen, and lovers! hear me for my cause, and be silent, that you may hear: believe me for mine honour, and have respect to mine honour, that you may believe: censure me in your wisdom, and awake your senses, that you may the better judge. If there be any in this assembly, any dear friend of Caesar’s, to him I say, that Brutus’ love to Caesar was no less than his. If then that friend demand why Brutus rose against Caesar, this is my answer: –Not that I loved Caesar less, but that I loved Rome more. Had you rather Caesar were living and die all slaves, than that Caesar were dead, to live all free men? As Caesar loved me, I weep for him; as he was fortunate, I rejoice at it; as he was valiant, I honour him: but, as he was ambitious, I slew him. There is tears for his love; joy for his fortune; honour for his valour; and death for his ambition. Who is here so base that would be a bondman? If any, speak; for him have I offended. Who is here so rude that would not be a Roman? If any, speak; for him have I offended. Who is here so vile that will not love his country? If any, speak; for him have I offended. I pause for a reply.

Then none have I offended. I have done no more to Caesar than you shall do to Brutus. The question of his death is enrolled in the Capitol; his glory not extenuated, wherein he was worthy, nor his offences enforced, for which he suffered death.

Here comes his body, mourned by Mark Antony: who, though he had no hand in his death, shall receive the benefit of his dying, a place in the commonwealth; as which of you shall not? With this I depart,–that, as I slew my best lover for the good of Rome, I have the same dagger for myself, when it shall please my country to need my death.

 

Marc Antony:

Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears;
I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.
The evil that men do lives after them;
The good is oft interred with their bones;
So let it be with Caesar. The noble Brutus
Hath told you Caesar was ambitious:
If it were so, it was a grievous fault,
And grievously hath Caesar answer’d it.
Here, under leave of Brutus and the rest–
For Brutus is an honourable man;
So are they all, all honourable men–
Come I to speak in Caesar’s funeral.
He was my friend, faithful and just to me:
But Brutus says he was ambitious;
And Brutus is an honourable man.
He hath brought many captives home to Rome
Whose ransoms did the general coffers fill:
Did this in Caesar seem ambitious?
When that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept:
Ambition should be made of sterner stuff:
Yet Brutus says he was ambitious;
And Brutus is an honourable man.
You all did see that on the Lupercal
I thrice presented him a kingly crown,
Which he did thrice refuse: was this ambition?
Yet Brutus says he was ambitious;
And, sure, he is an honourable man.
I speak not to disprove what Brutus spoke,
But here I am to speak what I do know.
You all did love him once, not without cause:
What cause withholds you then, to mourn for him?
O judgment! thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason. Bear with me;
My heart is in the coffin there with Caesar,
And I must pause till it come back to me.

 

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) is courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

 

Episode 57 (How We Learn to Talk)

Jenny Saffran

How do babies learn to talk? That’s the topic of the October 2022 episode of Paul’s podcast. And to help answer that question, Paul welcomes Jenny Saffran, professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and an expert in language acquisition and cognitive and linguistic sciences.

Jenny received her A.B. in cognitive and linguistic sciences from Brown University and her Ph.D in brain and cognitive sciences and linguistics from the University of Rochester. Since 1997, she has been on the faculty at UW-Madison, where she directs two labs. The Infant Learning Lab focuses on the learning abilities of infants and toddlers, with a primary focus on language, while the Little Listeners Lab focuses on understanding early-language comprehension and learning in autistic toddlers.

Professor Saffran has received many honors and awards for her research and teaching, including election to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and, most recently, the inaugural Jeffrey Elman Prize from the Cognitive Science Society.

Visit https://infantlearning.waisman.wisc.edu to learn about Dr. Saffran’s Infant Learning Lab at the University of Wisconsin. And for the publications of that lab, go to https://infantlearning.waisman.wisc.edu/publications/.

Her work is featured in the Netflix documentary Babies. The episode is available to the public on Netflix’s YouTube educational channel:

The entire video of the twin babies babbling, which Paul and Jenny refer to in the podcast, can be found on YouTube, and below:

Lastly, for more information on Professor Saffran, visit her Wikipedia page.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) is courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 56 (Sounds Appealing)

David Crystal

For the September 2022 episode of In a Manner of Speaking, Paul welcomes back renowned linguist and author David Crystal for his fourth appearance on the podcast. They discuss various topics related to David’s 2018 book, Sounds Appealing, including pronunciation, phonetics, phoneticians, speech melody, intonation, and stress patterning.

David ( a native of Liverpool, England, and North Wales) has authored more than 100 books in the field of language, including several Penguin books, but is perhaps best known for his two encyclopedias for Cambridge University Press, The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language and The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language. His books on English phonetics and phonology include Prosodic Systems and Intonation in English and The English Tone of Voice.

He was founder-editor of the Journal of Child Language (1973-85), Child Language Teaching and Therapy (1985-96), and Linguistics Abstracts (1985-96), and associate editor of the Journal of Linguistics (1970-73). In addition, he has been a consultant, contributor, or presenter on several radio and television programs and series. David is currently patron of the International Association of Teachers of English as a Foreign Language (IATEFL) and the Association for Language Learning (ALL); president of the Chartered Institute of Editing and Proofreading, the UK National Literacy Association, and the Johnson Society of London; and an honorary vice president of the Institute of Linguists and the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists.

David is also a renowned Shakespeare and Original Pronunciation (OP) scholar. For more on his work with the Bard, visit ShakespearesWords.com.

For a full biography and more information on David, visit his website, DavidCrystal.com. Go here for a list of all of David’s published works and here to purchase them.

Visit David’s YouTube channel for more information relevant to this podcast. We present here just two of his many videos.

Lastly, for a discussion of English long and short vowels, one of the topics that David and Paul discuss on this podcast, go here.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) is courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 55 (Language Versus Reality)

Nick Enfield

Paul’s podcast guest for August 2022 is Nick Enfield, professor of linguistics at the University of Sydney. Inspired by Nick’s 2022 book, Language Vs. Reality: Why Language Is Good for Lawyers and Bad for Scientists, Paul and Nick discuss how language is not always the best tool for conveying and representing reality.

Over the last three decades, Nick has conducted fieldwork on language, culture, mind, and society in mainland Southeast Asia, especially Laos. He won an Ig Nobel Prize for his role in discovering that “huh?” is a universal word in the languages of the world. He has published numerous books in linguistics and anthropology, including Roots of Human Sociality, The Utility of Meaning, The Languages of Mainland Southeast Asia, and How We Talk: The Inner Workings of Conversation.

For a complete list of references that informed Professor Enfield’s Language Vs. Reality, consult this PDF. And check out these other podcasts on which Nick has been a guest:

Sean Carroll’s Mindscape, July 11, 2022
The Neutral Ground, May 12, 2022
Word of Mouth with Michael Rosen, BBC Radio 4, May 10,  2022
The Armen Show, May 19, 2022
Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps, April 28, 2022
Many Minds, April 13, 2022

You can find some of Nick’s speeches and interviews on YouTube, such as “The Chronicle of Evolution” from 2017 and “Natural Causes of Language” from 2014.

For more information, please visit Nick’s website, especially this page, which lists all of his publications.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) is courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 54 (The Woman’s Voice)

Patsy Rodenburg

Welcome to the July 2022 episode of Paul Meier’s In a Manner of Speaking podcast, which features Patsy Rodenburg, who is often regarded as the world’s leading voice teacher and coach. Paul and Patsy discuss a range of topics related to Patsy’s forthcoming book, The Woman’s Voice.

Over the past 45 years, Professor Rodenburg, OBE, has become a world expert on teaching voice, speech, and presentation skills to individuals and companies across both corporate and creative industries. She has also had an incredible career working with actors in theatre, film, and television, changing the way actors speak on stage and screen.

Patsy originally trained as an actor but moved into voice coaching, fast becoming an associate of the Royal Court Theatre and the Royal Shakespeare Company. She eventually went on to work as head of voice at the Royal National Theatre for 16 years.

Patsy is currently professor of text and poetry at Guildhall School of Music & Drama, after serving as head of voice from 1981 to 2016. Over the past 40 years, Patsy has been pioneering the only existing MA in Training Actors (Voice) and has sat on the board of directors with the Royal Shakespeare Company.

Her books include The Right to Speak, The Need for Words, The Actor Speaks, and Speaking Shakespeare.

She has worked extensively with actors (including Dame Judi Dench, Sir Ian McKellen, Daniel Craig, Ralph Fiennes, Hugh Jackman, and Natalie Portman), directors (Trevor Nunn, Richard Eyre, Franco Zeffirelli, and Tim Burton) and playwrights (Arthur Miller, Harold Pinter, and Samuel Beckett).

For more information, see PatsyRodenburg.co.uk.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) is courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 53 (The Bard of Bath)

Kevan Manwaring

For the June 2022 edition of his In a Manner of Speaking  podcast, Paul Meier welcomes the “Bard of Bath,” Kevan Manwaring. The two discuss the ancient Bardic Tradition and how it is still relevant and powerful today.

Dr. Manwaring, senior lecturer in creative writing at Arts University Bournemouth, in England, is the author of more than two dozen books (both novels and non-fiction) but is probably best known as the author of The Bardic Handbook: the Complete Manual for the 21st Century Bard (Gothic Image, 2006). Since becoming “Bard of Bath” in 1998 (when he won the competition for the best storyteller, poet, or singer in the city), he has made the Bardic Tradition one of his research specialisms.

His additional books have explored both the theory and practice of being a modern-day bard. And thanks to his organizing and hosting of countless open-mic nights, spoken-word showcases, symposia, festivals, workshops, and courses (plus his numerous media appearances, such as live storytelling on BBC Breakfast TV, academic consultant for BBC 4’s The Secret Life of Books, and panel guest on BBC Radio 3’s Free Thinking), he has forged a distinctive approach over the last two decades and more. His current focus is primarily within higher education, empowering future wordsmiths alongside his own creative-critical practice. He blogs and tweets as the “Bardic Academic.”

For more information on Kevan, visit http://kevanmanwaring.co.uk/.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) is courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 52 (How To Do Accents)

Edda Sharpe

Paul’s guests for May 2022 are Edda Sharpe and Jan Haydn Rowles, authors of How To Do Accents and leading figures in the world of voice, speech, and dialects. The three discuss dialects in the English National Opera revival of My Fair Lady (which is coached by Edda) and the film Belfast (coached by Jan). They also engage in a larger discussion of dialects and accents, including the ones featured in those productions: Received Pronunciation (RP), Northern Irish, and Cockney.

As well as looking after a busy independent client list, Edda Sharpe is visiting dialect coach for the Royal Shakespeare Company and head of voice at Canada’s Shaw Festival Theatre, where she has coached accents for more than 100 productions. She is also a senior voice and communications coach in the public and private sector.  As a coach, teacher, and trainer, Edda strives to liberate, educate, and inspire individuals to unlock their personal talent and develop their unique potential. Edda is also an accredited NLP Master Practitioner.

Jan Haydn Rowles

Jan Haydn Rowles has been working across the creative industries at the highest professional level as a dialogue and dialect coach for the past 23 years.  As head of voice at Shakepeare’s Globe (2007-2010), Jan coached more than 20 plays and worked with more than 200 actors.  You may well have seen and heard her work at the RSC, the Almeida, the Donmar, and the Royal Court. On film and TV, her credits include the aforementioned Belfast (Kenneth Branagh), Pistols (Danny Boyle’s Sex Pistols biopic), This Sceptered Isle (Kenneth Branagh), Game of Thrones, and House of The Dragons.

All audio clips are excerpted from YouTube under fair use. The clip from Belfast (written, directed, and produced by Kenneth Branagh) is copyright 2021 TKBC. (Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 51 (Celebrating the First 50)

The April 2022 episode is a celebration of the first 50 episodes of In a Manner of Speaking, the podcast Paul began in February 2018. Reminisce with Paul about some of his favorite episodes and join him in thanking all his guests — and YOU for listening.

Click here for the full YouTube clip of James Earl Jones’ performance in August Wilson’s Fences from 1987.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 50 (The Power of Voice)

Denise Woods

Paul’s guest for March 2022 is Denise Woods, successful Hollywood dialect coach, theatre professor at the California Institute of the Arts, and author of the recent book The Power of Voice, published by HarperCollins.

In addition to the two dialect coaches discussing the finer points of their profession, Paul and Denise talk about the contentious terms “accent reduction/modification” and how to help clients who believe their accent is holding them back socially or professionally. They also discuss coaching Black actors and delve into the changing landscape of audiobooks and how a single narrator can respectfully voice scores of characters who differ in age, gender, dialect, nationality, and ethnicity.

A native of New York City’s Lower East Side and a graduate and former faculty member of the Juilliard School, Denise has coached Queen Latifah, Will Smith, Halle Berry, Jessica Chastain, Amber Heard, Anthony Mackie, Phylicia Rashad, Ellen Burstyn, Jeanne Tripplehorn, Soledad O’Brien, Morris Chestnut, Taye Diggs, Paul Rodriguez, David Alan Grier, Victoria Rowell, Kellan Lutz, Ray Liotta, Portia De Rossi, Rachel Weisz, Mekhi Phifer, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Jeffrey Wright, Mike Myers, and many others. She was recently the dialect coach for the Netflix film The Harder They Fall, starring Idris Elba and Regina King, and she coached Don Cheadle in the critically acclaimed Showtime series, Black Monday.

For more information about Denise, visit her website, SpeakItClearly.com.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 49 (You Are What You Speak)

Lane Greene

Paul’s guest for February 2022 is Lane Greene, language columnist and Spain correspondent for The Economist. This month’s episode takes its title from one of Lane’s books, You Are What You Speak (2011), and Paul and Lane tackle a variety of topics related to linguistics, accents, and the myths, fears, hopes, history, and politics surrounding language.

Before Lane moved into his current role at The Economist, he covered digital news, books and culture, European business, law, energy, the environment, and American politics for the publication. He is based in Madrid, after living in London, Berlin, and New York City.

In addition to the aforementioned book, Greene is the author of Talk on the Wild Side (2018) and the winner of the journalism award from the Linguistic Society of America in 2017. He is a former adjunct assistant professor in Global Affairs at New York University and a consultant to Freedom House, a non-governmental organization. He received an M.Phil. from Oxford in European politics and a B.A. with honors from Tulane in international relations and history. Lane, who speaks nine languages, was born in Johnson City, Tennessee, and grew up in Marietta, Georgia.

For more information on Lane, visit LaneGreene.com.

Episode 48 (Pitch)

Gillyanne Kayes
Jeremy Fisher

Paul’s first guests of 2022 are Gillyanne Kayes and Jeremy Fisher of “Vocal Process,” internationally renowned voice experts specializing in vocal technique and performance in many different genres. A husband-and-wife team, they combine a deep understanding of the voice that comes from science knowledge, performance practice, and decades of experience. The three discuss pitch, specifically the extremes of the human voice as it relates to both speaking and singing.

Jeremy and Gillyanne were first feaured on the podcast in July 2019.

Gillyanne is a voice researcher, pedagogue, and coach, working with numerous artists in theatre, cabaret, and in the recording studio, while Jeremy is a national prizewinning pianist, performance coach and vocal educator. For their full bios, visit https://vocalprocess.co.uk/gillyanne-kayes-jeremy-fisher/.

Gillyanne and Jeremy’s recent work includes the new Online Learning Lounge: more than 600 videos and vocal training resources for voice professionals. They are the authors of 10 books (five of them Amazon #1 bestsellers), including This Is A Voice (Wellcome Trust), Why Do I Need A Vocal Coach (Canu Publishing), and Singing and the Actor (Routledge). Their One Minute Voice Warmup app (Android #1 and Apple #3) was featured in the UK’s leading computer magazine. Their podcast, This Is A Voice, is in the top 5 percent of podcasts worldwide, and they have an updated singing teacher Accreditation program and a new merchandise brand for 2022 (Voicenerdz®).

The fair-use audio snippets you hear in this month’s podcast were excerpted from the following YouTube clips:

  1. Eight Songs for a Mad King, by Peter Maxwell Davies.
  2. Casta Diva by Bellini, sung by Jeremy Fisher.
  3. Osmin’s Aria from Mozart’s Abduction.
  4. Billy Connolly in performance.
  5. The Doll Aria from Tales of Hoffmann.
  6. Peter Ablinger’s computer-driven player piano rendering the voice of Miro Markus.
  7. A Mariah Carey medley.
  8. Roy Hart’s demonstration of the human voice scaling 6.5 octaves, and
  9. Tim Storms in De Profundis by Paul Mealor with the St Petersburg Chamber Choir.

 

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

 

Episode 47 (Teaching Dialects and Grammar)

Willem Hollmann

Paul’s final guest for 2021 is Willem Hollmann, who has been generating headlines recently with his thoughts on how we teach grammar and dialects. A professor of linguistics and associate dean in the Faculty of Arts & Social Sciences at Lancaster University in England, Hollman encourages a more robust discussion of regional English dialects and grammar in English education. But his views have also been distorted by the media, so in this month’s podcast, Paul and Willem set the record straight.

All dialects are equal, but are some more equal than others? Find out by listening to the December podcast.

To learn more about Paul’s guest, go here, or read the following biography, supplied to us by Professor Hollmann:

Willem was born in the Netherlands, where he grew up and went to school. He did an MA in English linguistics and literature at the University of Amsterdam, after which he got funding for an MA in English language and lnguistics at the University of Manchester, a university he picked because of the fantastic combination (at the time) of expertise in historical linguistics (especially Prof. David Denison and Prof. Richard Hogg) and cognitive linguistics (particularly Prof. Bill Croft). He managed to get AHRC funding to stay on at Manchester and do a Ph.D (on causative constructions), which was supervised by Prof. Bill Croft and Prof. David Denison.

During the last year of his Ph.D, Willem applied for and was offered a lectureship at Lancaster University, where he has been since. He does research on cognitive linguistics, including the relatively new, highly interdisciplinary sub-discipline of cognitive sociolinguistics, which he has helped pioneer. He’s interested in linguistic theory, informed by synchronic and diachronic (historical) data, and often uses corpora to get those data. In the context of his interest in cognitive sociolinguistics, he looks at linguistic variation, including dialect variation, and has published several papers on Lancashire dialect, studied through the lens of cognitive, usage-based linguistics.

Willem also has a strong interest in educational linguistics and has done consultancy work for the Department for Education (including on the literacy skills tests for newly qualified teachers in England) and for the exam board OCR (their revised, 2015 A-level English Language). He is a long-standing member (and former secretary and chairman) of the Committee for Linguistics in Education (https://clie.org.uk) and also chairs the Education Committee of the Linguistics Association of Great Britain (http://www.lagb.org.uk/).

Willem’s broad interests have seen him develop and teach many different modules, including cognitive linguistics and construction grammar, general linguistics, English grammar, language change, the history of English, forensic linguistics, and research methods.

Willem is married, and he and his wife have two boys, ages five and seven. The boys are being raised trilingually, and their linguistic and cognitive development often features in his lectures — and occasionally also on Twitter, which Willem has recently discovered, following discussion there about the way in which his two articles on The Conversation, published in September and October this year, had been (mis)represented in mainstream media.

 

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

 

Episode 46 (Highly Irregular)

Arika Okrent

For the November 2021 episode of the podcast, Paul discusses the peculiarities of the English language with Arika Okrent, author of Highly Irregular: Why Tough, Through, and Dough Don’t Rhyme.

Arika is also a linguist and author of In the Land of Invented Languages. She worked in a brain-research lab on her way to a Ph.D in psycholinguistics from the University of Chicago and now writes about language for publications including Mental Floss, The Week, Smithsonian Magazine, Popular Science, Slate, and Aeon. For more information on Arika, visit http://arikaokrent.com.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 45 (Read Me a Story)

Elizabeth Wiley

Paul’s October 2021 podcast focuses on the art of audiobook narration. His guest is professional audiobook narrator Elizabeth Wiley, who has earned multiple Audie nominations, Voice Arts nominations, and AudioFile Magazine Earphones Awards. She is also a Voice Arts Award winner for narration.

Elizabeth works across a wide range of literary genres, with publishers and authors often seeking her out for her agility with dialects, rich character work, and facility with complex language.

She is a professor emerita of the College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia, where she taught acting, voice and speech, dialects, physical theatre and Shakespeare performance. She has also coached and directed many theatre productions in academia and professionally.

For further information, see www.WileyVoice.com.

Paul reads from Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol while Elizabeth reads from Andromeda Romano-Lax’s Annie and the Wolves, copyright 2021 Highbridge, a division of Recorded Books. To purchase that entire audiobook, visit Audible.com.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 44 (Let’s Talk)

David Crystal

Paul’s guest for September 2021 is the respected linguist David Crystal, who is making his third appearance on the podcast. Inspired by Let’s Talk, one of David’s latest books, Paul and David converse about … conversation itself.

To learn about David, visit his website and Wikipedia, or listen to David’s two prior appearances on this podcast: June 2018 and November 2019.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 43 (Heightened Language and Black Playwrights)

Jacqueline Springfield

For the August 2021 podcast, Paul talks about heightened language and Black playwrights with his guest, Professor Jacqueline Springfield of Kennesaw State University in Atlanta, Georgia. Often defined as a more formal, emotional, or poetic way of speaking, “heightened language” frequently features words that are chosen for their sound and power, not just their meaning. Among the many playwrights Paul and Jacqueline discuss are Lorraine Hansberry and August Wilson.

Professor Springfield is a professional actor, director, and instructor of acting, voice, speech, and dialects. She has been based in New York for the last nine years and has just relocated to the Metro Atlanta area. Her teaching credits include: The Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute, The American Musical and Dramatic Academy (NY), The Black Arts Institute at Stella Adler, New York Film Academy, Brooklyn College, Point Park University Conservatory of Performing Arts, Montclair State University, University at Albany, Wildwind Performance Lab at Texas Tech, The Kennedy Center, and The American College Theatre Festival.

Her professional dialect coaching credits include: True Colors Theatre, The Kennedy Center, Ensemble Studio Theatre, American Players Theatre and Pittsburgh Playhouse. She holds a master of fine arts degree in acting from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and is a certified associate instructor of Fitzmaurice Voicework. Jacqueline is a proud member of Actors’ Equity Association and SAG-AFTRA, and she continues to work as a performer in film, television, theatre, and voiceover. For more information, visit her website.

The YouTube clips played in this podcast are used under the copyright doctrine of fair use. The complete copyright information on each clip is listed at the end of the podcast. For the full Raisin in the Sun clips, go here and here. For the Fences clips, click here and here. For the clip from The Mountaintop, go here. And for the clip of Marcus Gardley, go here.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 42 (Law Talk)

Pamela Keller

For the July 2021 podcast, Paul’s guest is Professor Pamela Keller of the School of Law at the University of Kansas, where she teaches what she calls “lawyering skills.” Appropriately, the topic of conversation is the spoken word as it relates to the law and, specifically, courtroom procedures and presentations.

Professor Keller has been a law clerk and litigation attorney for a large law firm and, for the last 20 years, has been teaching lawyering and advocacy skills. For her complete biography, go here.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 41 (Glossolalia)

Paul de Lacy

The topic for the June 2021 podcast is glossolalia, which this month’s guest, phonologist Paul de Lacy, defines as “spontaneous, sustained speech that doesn’t convey complex meaning.” Sometimes referred to as “speaking in tongues,” glossolalia has been de Lacy’s passion since he began researching it in the mid-1990s.

De Lacy is professor emeritus of linguistics at Rutgers University in New Jersey and an honorary associate professor at the University of Auckland in his native New Zealand. He is a phonologist, specializing in the part of the brain that plans speech sound production. His research has focused on how cognitive limitations produce asymmetries in the sound patterns of human speech. He has worked with speakers of diverse languages, including Māori and Nevisian Creole.

For more on Paul, visit https://www.pauldelacy.net.

The snippets from YouTube clips featured in this episode are used under fair use. To watch and listen to the entire scene from Cape Fear (copyright 1991 Amblin Entertainment), go here. For the Sid Caesar clip (copyright 1952 NBC), click here. The full “Omnish” recording can be found here while the full “speaking in tongues” recording can be heard here. Lastly, go here for the “raw tongues” prayer.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 40 (Reading to Children, with Mem Fox)

Mem Fox

For the May 2021 podcast, Paul talks to Mem Fox, Australia’s bestselling writer, about reading to children.

Mem Fox was born in Melbourne, grew up in Africa, went to drama school in England (where she and Paul met), and came back to Australia in 1970, at the age of 23. In 1983, she became Australia’s bestselling writer and has remained the pre-eminent author for children for an entire generation. Her more than 40 books include Possum Magic, Time for Bed, Where Is the Green Sheep?, and Ten Little Fingers and Ten Little Toes.

Mem’s latest book, Early One Morning, illustrated by Catherine Davenier, is aimed at very young children. It’s a mere 90 words but took her eight years to write.

For more about Mem, visit her website at https://memfox.com/about/.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 39 (Speech and Voice Disorders)

Joanna Cazden

For the April 2021 edition of the podcast, Paul discusses speech and voice disorders with Joanna Cazden, a speech pathologist specializing in voice rehabilitation for actors and singers, and an advocate for preventive vocal health education. She served for 18 years as the senior voice clinician at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, and her 2010 book, Everyday Voice Care: The Lifestyle Guide for Singers and Talkers, is a widely used text in performing arts programs in the United States and the United Kingdom.

She has also published in Journal of Voice, Voice and Speech Review, and numerous music magazine and guest blogs. As a lifelong singer and musician, with an MFA in theater arts, she brings to her clinical work a deep knowledge and lifelong affection for performing arts, and attributes her fascination with the voice to an experience at age 11 while auditioning for a children’s Shakespeare program. She has released six solo albums, performed with Pete Seeger and Amanda McBroom, and she maintains active music projects alongside her clinical and scholarly activities. Click here to hear some of her music.

She was the founder of the special IDEA collection, Speech and Voice Disorders, which we created so actors might have real-life sources to draw on when their character has such a disorder.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 38 (The Curious Affair of the Glottal Stop and the Schwa)

For the March 2021 episode, Paul discusses the phonetic phenomena known as the glottal stop and the schwa. The glottal stop is that little explosion you feel in your throat when you say phrases such as  “uh-huh,” “huh-uh,” and “uh-oh,” while the schwa is the most common vowel in the English language that is not formally a vowel. Instead, it’s a vowel substitute that sounds like “uh.”

The clip from Roar by Katy Perry, Maria Callas singing Summertime, and the Filipino beatboxer Rhelzedeck are used under fair use.

Glossonomia links:
The schwa episode
The t/d episode (which touches on glottals)
Find Glossonomia via Google Podcasts here. And find Glossonomia via Apple Podcasts here.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 37 (Polari: the Secret Language of Gay Men)

Paul Baker

For this month’s podcast, Paul discusses Polari, the secret language used predominantly by gay men in the United Kingdom in the 19th and 20th centuries. Paul’s guest is Paul Baker, professor of English Language at Lancaster University.

Baker has written 18 books, including Fabulosa: The Story of Polari (2019), Sexed Texts (2008), and, with Jo Stanley, Hello Sailor! (2003). He regularly gives talks and workshops about Polari and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences.

The clip from Around the Horne is copyright 1966 British Broadcasting Corporation, used under fair use.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 36 (Shakespeare’s Shapely Language)

Jan Gist

The topic for the January 2021 podcast is what Paul’s guest, Jan Gist, calls “Shakespeare’s Shapely Language.” Shapes is her term for literary or rhetorical tropes; she and Paul broaden the discussion to reflect on how such ancient devices figure in advertising, political oratory, and other forms of the spoken word today.

Jan Gist has been the voice, speech, and dialect coach for Old Globe productions on 89 shows and for 50 USD/Shiley MFA productions. She has coached at theatres around the country including Ahmanson Theatre, La Jolla Playhouse, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, The Shakespeare Theatre Company in Washington, D.C., The American Shakespeare Center, Utah Shakespearean Festival, Alabama Shakespeare Festival, Arena Stage, San Diego Repertory, North Coast Repertory, Milwaukee Repertory, PlayMakers’ Repertory, Indiana Repertory, American Players Theatre, and Mo’olelo Performing Arts Company. She coached dialects for the film The Rosa Parks Story and recorded dozens of Books To Listen To.

She is an original member of the Voice and Speech Trainers Association (VASTA) and has presented at its conferences, as well as to Voice Foundation’s conferences. Gist has taught workshops at London’s Central School of Speech and Drama and the International Voice Teachers Exchange at the Moscow Art Theatre in Russia. She has been published in numerous VASTA journals. Chapters in books include an interview in Voice and Speech Training in the New Millennium: Conversations with Master Teachers, exercises in The Complete Voice And Speech Workout, and Yiddish, in Jerry Blunt’s More Stage Dialects. Most recently, her article “Voicing Poems”, including some of her own poems, was published in Voice and Speech Review. She is a professor in The Old Globe/USD Shiley Graduate Theatre Program.

For more information on Jan, visit her website: http://jangistspeaking.com.

And for a related discussion, listen to episode 58 of this podcast.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 35 (The First Sound Recordings)

Patrick Feaster

December’s podcast focuses on the earliest sound recordings: the experiments of Édouard-Léon Scott de Martinville (and his phonautograph from the 1850s and 1860s) and Thomas Edison (and his phonograph from the 1870s and 1880s). Paul Meier’s guest is Patrick Feaster, principal of First Sounds.org (along with David Giavannoni) and creator of Phonozoic.net (a website devoted to the history of the phonograph and related media) and Griffonage (a site that explores historical media).

This podcast marks the debut of one of Scott de Martinville’s earliest recordings, from 1857.

Feaster is media preservation specialist for the Media Digitization and Preservation Initiative at Indiana University Bloomington, where he received his Ph.D in Folklore and Ethnomusicology in 2007. A co-founder of the First Sounds Initiative and three-time Grammy nominee, he has played a central role in identifying, playing back, and contextualizing many of the world’s oldest surviving sound recordings. He is the author of Pictures of Sound: One Thousand Years of Educed Audio, 980-1980, as well as numerous album notes and articles on media history and theory.

Cameron Meier (film critic and historian, executive editor of IDEA, and vice president of Paul Meier Dialect Services) joins the conversation.

Episode 34 (“It’s All Greek to Me”)

Rush Rehm

The topic for the November 2020 podcast is the Ancient Greek language. Paul’s guest is Rush Rehm, professor of Theater and Classics at Stanford University, and their discussion tackles many aspects of Ancient Greek, including the sound of the language and theatrical performances in Ancient Greece.

Rehm publishes on Greek tragedy, including Euripides’ Electra, Understanding Greek Tragic Theatre, Marriage to Death, The Play of Space, Radical Theatre: Greek Tragedy and the Modern World, and Aeschylus’ Oresteia: A Theatre Version. Founder and Artistic Director of Stanford Repertory Theater, he has worked as an actor or director at the several regional theaters in the United States and abroad, including Magic Theater, TheatreWorks, the Alliance Theater, Seven Stages, the Guthrie Theater, Center Theater Group/Getty Museum, Arena Stage, and the McCarter Theater.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 33 (Voices of Africa)

Dr. Joyce Dlamini-Sukumane

Paul’s guest for October 2020 is the distinguished South African linguist Dr. Joyce Dlamini-Sukumane. Paul and Joyce discuss various topics related to African languages, voices, dialects, and language policy.

Dr. Sukumane’s working career has been predominantly in higher education. She began teaching in 1976, having completed her teacher training in English Literature and African Languages. From the early years of her career and consistent with her training in languages and linguistics, she was privileged to enter the domain of language practice in terminology development, lexicography, translation, editing, orthography reviews, the writing of grammars, and literature development. Her teaching career spanned 27 years before she joined the Public Service as Deputy Director in the Language Planning and Development Unit at the Department of Arts and Culture in 2005. For three years in the position, she managed the development and implementation of national language policies and legislation. In 2008, she was promoted to head the Language Planning and Development Unit as director.

Her various professional roles have been teaching linguistics, languages, and literature in English and African Languages at different institutions of higher learning, which include Parkland State College (Illinois), and the universities of Swaziland, Zululand, Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Limpopo, and South Africa.

While in public service, she valued her invigorating experience as a member of the Basic Education Minister’s Curriculum Management Team for the development of South African Sign Language (SASL). Similarly, serving on the Higher Education Minister’s Advisory Panel on Language Policy and African Languages was exciting, and, most importantly, her constant awareness of the pressing need for the development of African languages was heightened.

Having lived in various countries, she was able to experience firsthand their education systems, particularly in relation to her interest in languages and education. Her greatest achievements have been the final mainstreaming of multilingualism in the promulgation of the Use of Official Languages, Act No. 12 of 2012 and the South African Language Practitioners’ Council Act No. 8 of 2012.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

 

Episode 32 (So You Wanna Change Your Accent?)

Jerome Butler

September’s guest is renowned dialect coach Jerome Butler. Paul and Jerome discuss many topics related to dialect coaching but pay particular attention to accent modification (often called accent reduction), for those wishing to alter their native accent or dialect.

Jerome has been a dialect coach for film, TV, and theatre for more than 20 years. His many film and TV credits include For Life, The Loudest Voice, The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind, Infinite, LUCE, When They See Us, This is Us, The Undoing, Just Mercy, The Plot Against America, The Deuce, LBJ, Blade Runner 2049, Zero Dark Thirty, and How Stella Got Her Groove Back, among many others. (Visit his IMDB page for a full list.) He is also the founder of DialectCoachesCorner.com, an innovative resource for accent modification and dialect work.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 31 (Foreign-Language Accents)

In the August 2020 edition of the podcast, Paul discusses foreign-language accents both in the context of acting and everyday comprehension. He addresses issues related to English as a Second Language (ESL) speakers in addition to English-language speakers’ attempts to master languages that are foreign to them, specifically French, German, Russian, etc. Paul also talks about phonetics, the difference between an accent and a dialect, “accent reduction,” and “reverse mistakes” when attempting to either speak a new language or, in the case of an English-language actor, master an accent for the screen or stage.

For The Click Song, visit YouTube, copyright Miriam Makeba. And for The Syringa Tree audio file Paul references in the podcast, visit IDEA.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 30 (Introducing Estuary)

For the July 2020 edition of In a Manner of Speaking, Paul introduces his new Estuary dialect product. Estuary, named for the River Thames, is the modern sound of southern England. Crossing ethnic and racial lines, it is spoken in the area that expanded out from London to alter the character of the dialects and accents of the seven “home counties” bordering London, and far beyond. See our Estuary page for more information.

Currently Paul’s Estuary manual is available only by ordering the new Deluxe Streaming Edition of Accents & Dialects for Stage and Screen. (This is a new print edition of his book, but for the first time the sound files are delivered through streaming audio, not on CD.)

The movie clips played on this month’s podcast are used under the copyright doctrine of Fair Use. Notting Hill was directed by Roger Michell and is copyright Polygram Filmed Entertainment; Happy-Go-Lucky was directed by Mike Leigh and is copyright Film4 Productions; Lenny Henry at The Apollo is copyright Apollo Theatre Productions; Howards End was directed by James Ivory and is copyright Merchant Ivory Productions; and Ghost Town was directed by David Koepp and is copyright Dreamworks.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 29 (Ritual Speech)

For the June 2020 edition of the podcast, Paul discusses ritual speech, which can include oaths, vows, blessings, mantras, curses, spells, formal prayers, invocations, religious worship, opening ceremonies, atonements, coronations, inaugurations,  declarations of sovereignty, and formal sentencings of convicted defendants in criminal courts.

Eric Idle’s Rutland Weekend Television and the Stanley Unwin sketch, A Partly Satirical Broadcast, are both copyright BBC.  A Streetcar Named Desire was directed by Elia Kazan, screenplay by Tennessee Williams based on his play by the same name, distributed by Warner Brothers.

See YouTube for Eric Idle’s “Gibberish Sketch” from Rutland Weekend Television. Also see YouTube for Stanley Unwin’s sketch.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 28 (Russian Language & Accents)

Curtis Ford

The May 2020 podcast focuses on the Russian language and Russian accents, and features Paul Meier’s special guest, Professor Curtis Ford. Curt and Paul discuss a variety of topics related to Russian speech, including the challenges Russians face when speaking English and the challenges English-speaking actors face when playing Russian characters.

The YouTube Russian grammar channel references in the podcast can be found at https://www.youtube.com/user/russiangrammar. And please visit https://americanvoicesapp.com/about-this-project to learn more about Curt’s American Voices app. (See https://americanvoicesapp.com/connected-speech for Curt’s analysis of connected speech.)

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 27 (Secret Languages)

As we practice social distancing and schools transition to online learning during the coronavirus pandemic, Paul explores the power of the spoken word and the necessity of communication, specifically the importance of secret languages. In this month’s podcast (April 2020), Paul discusses Polari, Ob, Pig-Latin, Efe, Pe, Verlan, and similar linguistic traditions.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 26 (Spanishes)

Micha Espinosa

Paul’s guest for the March 2020 edition of his podcast is Micha Espinosa, a vocal coach, artist, activist, IDEA associate editor, and professor of voice and acting at Arizona State University. Micha and Paul discuss all things related to the Spanish language, including Spanish linguistics and dialects, and Hispanic, Latino/a/x, and Chicano culture and identity.

For more information on Professor Espinosa, visit her IDEA and VASTA biographies.

(Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.)

Episode 25 (Tongues of Scotland)

Ros Steen

February’s podcast focuses on Scotland, specifically all its rich dialects, accents, and languages. Paul’s guest is Ros Steen, IDEA associate editor, and emeritus professor and fellow of the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. Formerly she was head of Drama Research and the Centre for Voice in Performance at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, where she established Nadine George Voice Work as the core spoken technique for the Centre’s teaching, practice, and research agendas. For more about Professor Steen, visit her IDEA profile.

The texts you hear demonstrated by Professor Steen:

1. Scottish English:

“It’s a fine auld machine,” I assured him then slipped in a quick commercial which glossed over the typewriter’s crucial lack of the letter I. “I’ll give you a wee demo if you like.”

Adjusting the creased sheet of paper I briskly typed. “There. How’s that?”

He shrugged his skinny shoulders. “Hanged if I know. Havnae got ma readin specs.”

He tugged from his pocket a hankie, so clatty it would’ve been the talk of the steamie.

2. Scots

Lennie Buchan wis harrigal-thin, his knees as knobbly as twa piz stuck doon a pair o’ drinkin straws. A forced plant, wha’s breenged up ower seen tae greet the sun, he ay lookit peely-wally, as if affrontit o’ his prodigious growth.

He hunched hissel up fin he traivelled; his neb dreeped, his een wattered, and his skimpit grey schule brikks wis gad-sake-glued wi’dauds o’ bubblegum. Stains o’ suspicious broon clung aboot the lirks’ o’ his doup, an’ gin aa this wisna enough tae damn the craitur frae favour foriver, he hid skyrie reid hair peppered wi dandruff, a ploukie face, wee bauld bits on his heid and a niff.

From A Nippick o’ Nor’ East Tales: A Doric Hairst by Sheena Blackhall

harrigal/entrail   breenged/bounded   daubs/pieces   lirks/folds   doub/backside   skyrie/gaudy   ploukie/spotty   niff/smell

3. Shetland

NEIL: Two years – is it that long? This’ll be a big New Year for you, then. Are you going down to the Market Cross for midnight?

RONA: I’m too old for that. I’d be the only one over eighteen.

NEIL: True enough. Mind, we were just the same.

RONA: We were never that bad.

NEIL: Oh really?

From Auld Lang Syne, by Grace Barnes. Premiered at the Traverse Theatre, 1999.

4. Northeast Scots

Now fin I hear folk speakin’ that wey…I jist go aa’ the braidest Doric that I could possibly gie them…..so that….lats them see that I’m nae cairin’ a dyte….aboot their English… that…I’m a native o’ this bit…o’ Scotland an’ I’d very much like to keep wir native tongue alive……an’ there’s naething….bothers me mair…fin I’m in company tae hear….my ain folk….comin’ awa with great lang gashes….o English mair or less…

Text from a radio interview with Duncan Muirden

5. Borders accent

Did you like the uniform?

No, really, I didnae. Ah didnae like the hat.

Why?

I didnae ken, ah didnae…didnae fancy the hat.

Did you get rid of it as much as you could?

I did. I hid it off as much as I could…well the summer you hid tae…

And were you meant to wear them? I mean did somebody…

Well, that was jist a’, a’ the fashion you see for, for the Bondagers and there were…you got new rigoot for the harvest…that was your new rigoot…eh…for the harvest.

Text from an interview with Agnes Grey, who was a Bondager

6. New Testament in Scots 

This is the storie o the birth o Jesus Christ. His mither Mary wis trystit til Joseph, but afore they war mairriet she wis fund tae be wi bairn bi the Halie Spírit. Her husband Joseph, honest man, hed nae mind tae affront her afore the warld an wis for brakkin aff their tryst hidlinweys; an sae he wis een ettlin tae dae, whan an angel o the Lord kythed til him in a draim an said til him, “Joseph, son o Dauvit, be nane feared tae tak Mary your trystit wife intil your hame; the bairn she is cairrein is o the Halie Spírit. She will beir a son, an the name ye ar tae gíe him is Jesus, for he will sauf his fowk frae their sins.” Aa this happent at the wurd spokken bi the Lord throu the Prophet micht be fulfilled: Behaud, the virgin wil bouk an beir a son, an they will caa his name Immanuel – that is, “God wi us”. Whan he hed waukit frae his sleep, Joseph did as the angel hed bidden him, an tuik his trystit wife hame wi him. But he bedditna wi her or she buir a son; an he caa’d the bairn Jesus.

7. Winnie-the-Pooh in Scots 

Pooh aye liked a wee sneyster at eleeven o clock on the mornin, and he wis gey please tae see Rabbit bringin oot the plates and tassies; and when Rabbit said, ‘Hinny or condensed mulk wi yer breid?’ he wis that kittled up he said, “Baith,” and syne, sae he didna seem grabbie, he added, “But dinna fash aboot the breid, if ye wull.” And for a lang while efter yon he didna say ocht…till, at last, bummin tae himsel in a claggy kind o voice, he got up, coshly shook Rabbit by the loof, and said he had tae be gettin alang.

“Dae ye hae tae?” Rabbit spiered politely.

“Weel,” said Pooh, “I could bide a bittie langer if it – if ye…” and he tried gey hard to keek in the airt o the pantry.

“As a maitter o fact,” said Rabbit, “ I wis jist gaun oot masel the noo.”

From Winnie-the-Pooh in Scots, translated by James Robertson. Itchy Coo, 2008.

Bach’s Cello Suite #1 in G Major BMV 1007 Prelude (by Ivan Dolgunov) courtesy of Jamendo Licensing.