Phonetic change over a lifetime in the media

Abstract

Speech in the media is increasingly exploited in phonetic studies, as it constitutes unprecedented amounts of data easily accessible to researchers. In this contribution, we exemplify how speech in the media can be used to advance our understanding of phonetic change over the lifespan, an issue long hampered by data scarcity. We present longitudinal studies on three public figures – Queen Elizabeth II, Alistair Cooke, and Michaëlle Jean – in which recordings of single individuals over several decades were analyzed to explore the extent of phonetic flexibility during adulthood. Focusing on vowels, these studies showed that change tends to be gradual, non-linear, selective, and conditioned by social factors such as sound changes in progress in the community, geographic mobility, and speaker-specific life events. Speech in the media can contribute valuable data to a wide range of phonetic studies, provided that some caution is exercised when selecting and analyzing materials to avoid common pitfalls.