Contribute to our collection of East Anglian speech
We are also building a permanent collection of speech from across all of East Anglia. The region has a distinctive and important linguistic heritage, and we want to record as many different local accents and dialects as possible. These recordings will help us preserve the rich variety of speech found across East Anglia and create a valuable resource for future research, teaching and community heritage. Whether you live in a city, town, village, or rural area, and whatever your age, you can take part.
Interested? Follow the steps below to submit your recording via our secure online portal.
STEP 1
Get set up
Set yourself up in a quiet room without any background noise, where you are unlikely to be disturbed for 10-15 minutes. If you have headphones, you should wear these. Check your microphone is on, working, and not ‘peaking’ (see how in our FAQs at the bottom of this page).
STEP 2
Open the recording portal
This can be found below Step 3 and will open directly in your web browser. At the beginning, you will be asked to provide responses to a few background questions about yourself, including your age, gender, education and location.
STEP 3
Follow the on-screen prompts
You will first be asked to record two short pieces of speech. These are based on materials that have been adapted from Trudgill’s original work:
1) a list of words
2) a short story
Next, you will be asked to listen to pairs of words and to answer some simple questions about how they sound to you. Finally, you’ll be shown some images and be asked to provide the word or phrase you would most often use to describe what you see in the image. Once completed, you can then submit your audio recordings to our collection.
Ready to take part?
FAQs
By submitting your responses, you are giving the EAST project team at the University of Leeds permission to use the audio and related background information for the purposes of research and the dissemination of that research. At the end of the project, the EAST audio collection will be deposited with local archives and the UK Data Service. This will allow researchers and individuals to listen to and use these recordings for the purposes of academic research in the future.
Go to Settings > System > Sound, select your mic under “Input,” and test it by speaking to see the volume bar move.
Your microphone is ‘peaking’ when you see the audio waveform hitting the very top of the volume bar, which may turn red. To resolve this, move a few inches further from the microphone or turn down the input volume on the microphone or computer.
Open System Settings (or Preferences) > Sound > Input and speak to see if the “Input level” bar moves.
Your microphone is ‘peaking’ when you see the audio waveform hitting the very top of the volume bar, which may turn red. To resolve this, move a few inches further from the microphone or turn down the input volume on the microphone or computer.