Germany 6

Listen to Germany 6, a 51-year-old man from Hann Münden (Lower Saxony) and Dortmund (North Rhine-Westphalia), Germany. Click or tap the triangle-shaped play button to hear the subject.

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BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION

AGE: 51

DATE OF BIRTH (DD/MM/YYYY): 1950

PLACE OF BIRTH: Hannoversch Münden, Lower Saxony, Germany

GENDER: male

ETHNICITY: German (exact ethnicity unknown)

OCCUPATION: ex-Air Force, sales manager

EDUCATION: college

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

He has also lived in England, Texas, Greece, Japan, and Hong Kong. He had spent two years in Kansas, United States, at the time of this recording.

OTHER INFLUENCES ON SPEECH:

He grew up near a large American military base, so his accent is heavily accented in the direction of American English. Notice the strongly rhotic vowels and rhythms and intonations of American English.

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

RECORDED BY: Paul Meier

DATE OF RECORDING (DD/MM/YYYY): 04/05/2001

PHONETIC TRANSCRIPTION OF SCRIPTED SPEECH: N/A

TRANSCRIBED BY: N/A

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

ORTHOGRAPHIC TRANSCRIPTION OF UNSCRIPTED SPEECH:

Well, I was born, uh, August 26, 1950, in Han Münden; uh, let’s say this way, former West Germany, because Germany now is reunited, reunited. Um, Germany is a small city of about 30,000 people live in there, and nobody actually knows it, so the rough, uh, direction is it’s right between Hanover and Frankfurt; that’s 100 miles south of Hanover, and about 100 miles north of Frankfurt. And um, I grew up there and, eh, after I finished uh, my college, school, college and everything, I started working for department store, I moved around Germany. First I was located in, stationed in, I was working in Dortmund; that’s in the German main industrial area; uh, later on I was working for Panasonic, and I was moved around all over the country: Munich, Stuttgart, Berlin, Hamburg. Um, oh, I forgot to say after school, college, you know; I joined the German Air Force for about four years, not for exactly four years, and I was stationed in, uh, Ft. Bliss, Texas; that’s El Paso. I was stationed in Holland, I was stationed in Greece, that’s, um, on the island of Crete, and, uh, in Beja, Portugal and Decimomannu, in Sardegna, which belongs to uh, Italy. So I was in, n the German Air Force. I was red operator; I was not flying personal. And later on I started a career as a businessman. I was 10 years working for Panasonic as a branch office manager; later on I got, uh, president, um, job for an English Hong-Kong Chinese company called Celestion; everybody who knows something about music, uh, knows a lot about Celestion, the biggest loudspeaker manufacturer. And now I’m in the States, I’m working for uh, Business Solutions, um, uh, operation, uh, as an area manager, sales manager for the Kansas area. Okay, that’s roughly who I am, what I did, where I’m born and …

[Interviewer: Talk, talk for a little bit about your first exposure to English.]

Well, my first exposure to English was, uh, so my hometown was close to an American, uh, army base, a more army security agency; those people listening to the radio conversations of the former east block, and I grew up with kids, so my basic vocabulary, my basic, my grammar and basic vocabulary were learned in school, and, and I added my little American slang when, in early days already hanging around with American kids of the soldiers. And, later on of course, uh, I final- … I, well, let’s, I got better at school and, during my business, even my Air Force time, I was almost stationed together with NATO troop, that means my, my … military language, which was mostly English. Then working for Panasonic, mostly English later on for the Hong-Kong/Chinese company, uh, was English, and so, I was actually as much involved in English as I was involved with German. [Subject then speaks German.]

TRANSCRIBED BY: Faith Harvey

DATE OF TRANSCRIPTION (DD/MM/YYYY): 17/03/2008

PHONETIC TRANSCRIPTION OF UNSCRIPTED SPEECH: N/A

TRANSCRIBED BY: N/A

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

SCHOLARLY COMMENTARY:

If you are a dialect researcher, or an actor using this sample to develop your skill in the accent, please see my instruction manual at www.paulmeier.com. As the speaker in this sample is a unique individual, it is highly unlikely that he will conform to my analysis in every detail. But you will find it interesting and instructive to notice which of my “signature sounds” and “additional features” (always suggested only as commonly heard features of the accent) are widely used by most speakers of the accent, and which are subject to variation from individual to individual.

COMMENTARY BY: Paul Meier

DATE OF COMMENTARY (DD/MM/YYYY): 10/11/2016

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