Sydney Speaks: Variation and Change in Australian English

Typecollection
TitleSydney Speaks: Variation and Change in Australian English
Brief TitleSydney Speaks
Collection TypeCollection
Access PrivilegesSchool of Literature, Languages and Linguistics
DOI - Digital Object Identifier10.25911/m03c-yz22
Metadata LanguageEnglish
Data LanguageEnglish
Significance StatementThe Sydney Speaks collection is the largest transcribed collection of historical and contemporary spoken Australian English capturing the spontaneous speech of Australians of diverse socio-economic class and ethnic backgrounds. The collection comprises approximately 1.5 million words of speech from 260 Australians residing in Sydney, whose birthdates span over 100 years (from 1890 to 2000). From a linguistic perspective, the time-aligned transcriptions make the data ideal for linguistic analysis at a range of levels. From a socio-historical perspective, the oral histories and sociolinguistic interviews that make up the collection provide invaluable insights into life in Australia from the early 1900s to the present day.
Full DescriptionA compilation of three sub-corpora of Australian English, made up of sociolinguistic interviews and oral histories. Recordings are from a total of 260 speakers, born from the 1890s to the 1990s, recorded in the 1970s~1980s and 2010s~2020s. The sub-corpora include the Bicentennial Oral History Project (with speakers born around 1900, and recorded in 1988); the Sydney Social Dialect Survey (with speakers born in the 1930s and 1960s, and recorded in 1977-1981; cf. Horvath 1985); and Sydney Speaks 2010s (with speakers born in the 1960s and 1990s, and recorded from 2014 to the present). All participants are native speakers of Australian English, and come from diverse ethnic backgrounds, currently Anglo-Celtic, Chinese, Greek and Italian (and this is under expansion). The sample is further stratified according to sex and social class. Approximately 5,000 words per speaker have been transcribed, for a total of some 1.5 million words. Orthographic transcriptions (including prosodic information) are time aligned at the level of the utterance, and have been force aligned to the level of the segment, making the data ideal for linguistic analysis at a range of levels. The socio-historical information in the recordings provides both information about the times the participants have lived through, and allows for social contextualisation of the linguistic patterns observed.
Contact Emailcatherine.travis@anu.edu.au
Contact AddressRoom W3.17, Baldessin Precinct Building (110)
The Australian National University
Acton ACT 2601 Australia
Contact Phone Number02 6125 0634
Principal InvestigatorCatherine Travis
CollaboratorsJames Grama
Simon Gonzalez
Fields of Research4704 - Linguistics
Socio-Economic Objective130202 - Languages and linguistics
KeywordsLinguistics
Language variation and change
Ethnicity
Socio-economic class
Sociolinguistics
Sociophonetics
Australian English
Australian history
Australian migration
Type of Research ActivityPure basic research
Date Coverage
Date FromDate To
1900s2020s
Time PeriodFive age groups, recorded over three time periods: speakers born in the 1900s (recorded 1988); speakers born 1930s and 1960s (recorded 1977-1981); speakers born 1960s and 1990s (recorded 2014-2023)
Geospatial Location
Location TypeLocation Value
TextSydney, Australia
Date of data creation2014
Year of data publication2023
Creator(s) for Citation
Given NameSurname
Catherine ElizabethTravis
Publisher for CitationThe Australian National University Data Commons
Publications

Identifier Type
Digital Object Identifier
Identifier Value
10.1080/07268602.2020.1823818
Publication Title
Ethnolectal and community change ov(er) time: Word-final (er) in Australian English
Publication Reference
Grama, James, Catherine E. Travis and Simon Gonzalez. 2020. Ethnolectal and community change ov(er) time: Word-final (er) in Australian English. Australian Journal of Linguistics 40(3): 346-368. https://doi.org/10.1080/07268602.2020.1823818


Identifier Type
'info' URI scheme
Identifier Value
https://www.jbe-platform.com/content/books/9789027259820-silv.25.13gra
Publication Title
Ethnic variation in real time: Change in Australian English diphthongs
Publication Reference
Grama, James, Catherine E. Travis and Simon Gonzalez. 2021. Ethnic variation in real time: Change in Australian English diphthongs. In Hans Van de Velde, Nanna Haug Hilton and Remco Knooihuizen (eds), Studies in Language Variation, 292-314. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. https://www.jbe-platform.com/content/books/9789027259820-silv.25.13gra


Identifier Type
Digital Object Identifier
Identifier Value
10.1515/lingvan-2019-0058
Publication Title
Comparing the performance of forced aligners used in sociophonetic research
Publication Reference
Gonzalez, Simon, James Grama and Catherine E. Travis. 2020. Comparing the performance of forced aligners used in sociophonetic research. Linguistics Vanguard 6(1). https://doi.org/10.1515/lingvan-2019-0058


Identifier Type
'info' URI scheme
Identifier Value
https://assta.org/proceedings/ICPhS2019/papers/ICPhS_1818.pdf
Publication Title
Initiation, progression and conditioning of the short-front vowel shift in Australian English
Publication Reference
Grama, James, Catherine E. Travis and Simon Gonzalez. 2019. Initiation, progression and conditioning of the short-front vowel shift in Australian English. In Sasha Calhoun, Paola Escudero, Marija Tabain and Paul Warren (eds), Proceedings of the 19th International Congress of Phonetic Sciences (ICPhS), Melbourne, Australia, 1769-1773. Canberra, Australia: Australasian Speech Science and Technology Association Inc. https://assta.org/proceedings/ICPhS2019/papers/ICPhS_1818.pdf


Identifier Type
Digital Object Identifier
Identifier Value
10.1080/23268263.2020.1750791
Publication Title
Australian English over time: Using sociolinguistic analysis to inform dialect coaching
Publication Reference
Purser, Benjamin, James Grama and Catherine E. Travis. 2020. Australian English over time: Using sociolinguistic analysis to inform dialect coaching. Voice and Speech Review 14(3): 269-291. https://doi.org/10.1080/23268263.2020.1750791
Related Websites
URLTitle
https://slll.cass.anu.edu.au/sydney-speaksSydney Speaks Project
https://legacy.dynamicsoflanguage.edu.au/stories/sydney_speaks.phpsydney-speaks-examining-language-variation-and-change-through-the-stories-people-tell/CoEDL Legacy Web Page
https://sydneycorpuslab.com/sydney-speaks-examining-language-variation-and-change-through-the-stories-people-tell/Sydney Speaks: Examining language variation and change through the stories people tell
Access RightsAccess may be requested through the Chief Investigator (Catherine Travis), consistent with the conditions agreed to by the participants.
Access Rights TypeRestricted
Licence TypeAusGoalRestrictive - AusGoal Restrictive Licence
Data LocationThis data is located on a NECTAR provided server and held by the Chief Investigator (Catherine Travis)
Retention PeriodIndefinitely
Extent or Quantity260 (as of Jan 2023; collection continues to be expanded)
Data Size250 GB
Data Management PlanNo
Status: Published
Published To:
- Australian National University
- Australian National Data Service
Identifier: anudc:6184
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Updated:  07 February 2019/ Responsible Officer:  University Librarian/ Page Contact:  Library Systems & Web Coordinator