\n<\/p>\n
September 25, 2025<\/p>\n
3 min read<\/p>\n
Scientists Take on Taylor Swift\u2019s Linguistic Eras<\/p>\n
An analysis of Taylor Swift\u2019s interviews suggests her speech pattern has changed over her career<\/p>\n
Taylor Swift delivered a commencement address to New York University graduates in May 2022.<\/p>\n
Angela Weiss\/AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n
Researchers have confirmed what Taylor Swift fans have long suspected: the music megastar\u2019s dialect and pitch have shifted throughout her career.<\/p>\n
In the early stages of Swift\u2019s music career, while she was living near Nashville, Tennessee, her speech had the hallmarks of a southern US accent. When she released her pop album Red in 2012, the southern twang had faded, suggest researchers who have analysed her voice. It changed again when she moved to New York City, they say.<\/p>\n
A person\u2019s dialect is typically associated with the region they are from, although it can change throughout their lifetime. But being able to study how they change is rare, says Matthew Winn, an audiologist at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities in Minneapolis. \u201cWe cannot typically follow someone around with a microphone,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
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Enter Tay Tay. \u201cTaylor Swift has essentially been followed around with the microphone for most of her adult life,\u201d says Winn.<\/p>\n
In the study published today in The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, Winn and his colleague analysed more than 100 minutes of Swift\u2019s interviews across three distinct eras of her career. In 2008, Swift released Fearless while living near Nashville; in 2012, she released Red; and in 2019, Lover was released when she lived in New York City.<\/p>\n
The pair used computer software to track how the pronunciation of Swift\u2019s vowels changed. \u201cAs a person changes dialects \u2014 within English at least \u2014 mostly those changes are reflected in the vowels,\u201d says Winn.<\/p>\n
Early in her career, Swift\u2019s pronunciation of \u2018i\u2019 in words such as \u2018ride\u2019 became shorter, pronouncing the word more like \u2018rod\u2019, which the researchers say is a classic southern US feature. The \u2018oo\u2019 sound in words like \u2018two\u2019 also changed to sound like \u2018tee-you\u2019, another southern signature.<\/p>\n
Swift\u2019s vowels lengthened around the time she started singing more pop music, with a clearer distinction between words such as \u2018cot\u2019 and \u2018caught\u2019, which the authors say is a feature of dialects in Pennsylvania, where Swift grew up, and New York.<\/p>\n
The researchers suggest that these changes reflect Swift\u2019s desire to be part of those communities. \u201cI was one of those people who thought of dialects mainly as reflecting where you come from, but they obviously also reflect what kind of community you want to be a part of,\u201d says Winn.<\/p>\n
Alice Gaby, a linguist at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia, says that the study confirms what people have noted \u2014 that Swift had a fairly marked shift in her pronunciation once she moved to Tennessee and then back to Pennsylvania again.<\/p>\n
But Swift is no different from many other people who adapt their dialect throughout their lives, says Gaby. \u201cIt\u2019s interesting to note that the change is not just specific to the location but also how she\u2019s positioning herself,\u201d she adds.<\/p>\n
The researchers also found that the pitch of Swift\u2019s voice got lower when she moved to New York City, a change that they suggest coincided with her emergence as a vocal advocate on social issues. But they acknowledge that this change might be age related.<\/p>\n
Nature has reached out to Swift for comment on the study results.<\/p>\n
This article is reproduced with permission and was first published on September 23, 2025.<\/p>\n
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