BBC Voices

Long description:

Recordings in this collection can be played by anyone.

The BBC Voices project provided a snapshot of the linguistic landscape of the UK at the start of the 21st century by encouraging members of the public to contribute their words and reflect on the language they use and encounter in their daily lives.

An online data gathering exercise carried out by BBC Nations and Regions was complemented by an audio strand: the BBC Voices Recordings. Between May 2004 and July 2005 group conversations were recorded in 303 locations involving a total of 1,293 people across the UK, Channel Islands and the Isle of Man. The vast majority of conversations were conducted in English, but the collection also includes 31 interviews in Scots, 9 in Welsh, 5 in Scots Gaelic, 3 in Irish, 3 in Ulster Scots, and 1 each in Manx and Guernsey French. The selection available here represents the entire set of conversations conducted in English and Scots.

To ensure the data were comparable across radio stations and between speaker groups, each conversation followed the same loose structure. This methodology was devised by researchers at the University of Leeds under the direction of Professor Clive Upton. In advance of a recording session, each participant was sent a ‘spidergram’ containing a set of 40 prompt words (e.g. ’tired’, ‘to play truant’ and ‘narrow walkway between/alongside buildings’). BBC audio gatherers used this spidergram to initiate discussions about alternative words and to explore participants’ attitudes to language, the reactions of others to the way they speak, their reactions to other accents, the language of their parents and/or children, the role of education in language use, the influence of the media/popular culture and attitudes to swearing and ‘bad language’.

Detailed descriptions of the linguistic content of selected recordings have been created and published here alongside the corresponding audio file. These descriptions, created by researchers in the Voices of the UK project, present linguistic features in four categories:

• Elicited lexis: a list of responses to 40 prompt words
• Spontaneous lexis: a glossary of spontaneously occurring words and phrases that contrast with mainstream usage and potentially reflect regional and/or social variation (e.g. ‘slape’ [= 'slippery'] or 'court' [= 'to date/go out with'])
• Phonology: an auditory assessment presented in IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) of (i) vowel sounds arranged according to Wells’ lexical sets; (ii) consonantal features (e.g. H-dropping: 'happy' [api] for /hapi/); and (iii) selected continuous speech processes (e.g. secondary contraction: 'haven’t' as [ant])
• Grammar: an inventory of forms that contrast with Standard British English presented using neutral terminology (e.g. 'generalisation of simple past': that man’s never spoke to me from that day to this)

More resources from the British Library

There are further recordings of accents and dialects on Sounds Familiar, which is an interactive, educational website that explores and celebrates the diversity of British accents and dialects, with access to 78 extracts from recordings of speakers from across the UK and over 600 audio clips that illustrate change and variation in contemporary British English.

All recordings on this site are governed by licence agreements.