Dialects and Accents of Germany
The archive provides:
In a small number of cases, you will also find a narrow phonetic transcription of the sample (see Phonetic Transcriptions for a complete list).
The recordings average four minutes in length and feature both the reading of one of two standard passages, and some unscripted speech. The two passages, Comma Gets a Cure (currently our standard passage), and The Rainbow Passage (used in our earliest recordings), may be accessed from the menu bar to your right.
To access IDEA's sound files and documents, you will need an mp3 player, and Acrobat Reader, available free from Acrobat Reader.
If you are interested in specific information about Germany, please go to Yahoo's website at dir.yahoo.com/Regional/Countries/Germany/
For instructional materials or coaching in the accents and dialects represented here
please go to
Other Dialect Services
Dialect Samples
To properly play a sound sample, you may first need to save it to your own computer. To do so, right-click on the desired sample and save it. A high-speed connection to the internet may allow you to play the file simply by clicking it.| Sound Sample | Basic Information | Text Files |
|---|---|---|
| Germany One | Female, 20's, Hamburg, slight American accent | Germany One |
| Germany Two | Female, 20's, hybrid accent | Germany Two |
| Germany Three | Female, 20's, Reppenstedt, English fluent | Germany Three |
| Germany Four | Male, 20's, Ludwigshafen, English fluent | Germany Four |
| Germany Five | Male, 40's, Essen, English fluent | Germany Five |
| Germany Six | Male, born Hann, Munden, Lower Saxony, 1950 | Germany Six |
| Germany Seven | Male, born Sindelfingen, 1968, network engineer, English good | Germany Seven |
| Germany Eight | Male, born Memel, Lithuania, 1934, Physician | Germany Eight Transcription |
| Germany Nine | female, born in Catalan, Spain, of a German father and Catalan mother. Educated in German. Submitted sample as she had been told she had a "strange accent" diffcult to place. | Germany Nine |