Arkansas Seven - Text
The subject is a 23 year-old Caucasian female from Harrison, Arkansas. She has recently graduated from the University of Arkansas/Fayetteville with a BA in Drama. Both her parents were born and raised in Arkansas as well. Her voice tends to reflect the "vocal fry" quality that has become characteristic of many contemporary females in her age-range. Interestingly, when the subject is fondly recalling happy childhood scenes near the Buffalo River, her voice takes on a clearer tone and she loses her "fry". tHE "I/E" substitution is evident in words like "Memphis", "ten", "sentimental", "friends". Middle consonants are occasionally left out, as in the word "mirror" and "twenty". The "d" in "accordingly" is glottalized. Occasional Arkansas regionalisms creep into her speech, although she has obviously decided to smooth them out to produce a more Standard American sound. Thus we hear "git(get)", "ketch(catch)", and "thang(thing)" when she is more relaxed and talking about her childhood memories.
Recorded by Mavourneen Dwyer, 2.15.2001, and edited by Paul Meier 3.14.2003. Running time: 00:04:19.
TRANSCRIPTION
I’m 23 years old. I was born in Harrison, Arkansas, and-- January 3rd of 1978. My parents are both from Harrison. And (uh) I have two older brothers, both married. I grew up in Harrison and went to school there. I never moved until I came to college (um) after I graduated high school in 1976. I’d never been out of-- I’d always had the same bedroom until then, so…
It was quite a change to move just an hour and a half west of there. (Um) I go to school at the University of Arkansas. I’m a drama major and a Spanish minor. I’ll be graduating in May, and I hope to do theater work. I’d like to be paid to act, in some capacity.
(Um) What else about my family? I (uh)… My father is a retired politician. My parents both retired, just this past December; after serving as (uh) the county clerk and the deputy clerk for (uh) 24 years.
And my father also owns a farm, where he raises beef cattle. So, trips to the farm were a fun thing, when I was younger. That’s where we went and got our Christmas trees. And (um) I would pick them out, and my dad would cut them down. And, we would bring them home and my mother would complain that they were too big. Because they always look a lot taller in the field than they do when you get them in the house. And so they would double over on the ceiling and we would have to cut the top out or something.
And so, she gave us the rule that we could never get any trees taller than my father was. But…
So that’s one of my memories-- from growing up, and the farm. And getting to feed baby cattle, from out of the bottle, things like that.
UNSCRIPTED SPEECH TRANSCRIBED BY JACQUELINE BAKER, ASSOCIATE EDITOR FOR TRANSCRIPTIONS, September 30, 2007