Transcribing the Spoken Word

With help from the editors at Daily Writing Tips https://www.dailywritingtips.com/

We’re transcribing some oral histories of musicians in North Carolina. The speaker is talking about music he listened to as he was growing up. He says “Let's see, there was not much music when I was growing up that was easy to get access to. I'm sure some of you who are my age know that that was—you know—the television had just a little bit; radio had some. But I didn't like stuff like, How Much is That Doggie in the Window?”

The transcriptionist researched the song (which is exactly what she’s supposed to do). She found that the original title of the song was “That Doggy in the Window.” It is cited as “(How Much is) That Doggy in the Window.”

Wikipedia says this: ”(How Much Is) That Doggie in the Window?” is a popular novelty song written by Bob Merrill and first registered on September 25, 1952, as “The Doggie in the Window”. On January 27, 1953, its sheet music was published in New York as “(How Much Is) That Doggie in the Window”.^[1]

The song was first recorded by Patti Page in December, 1952, and has been re-released many, many times. But it’s best known as “How Much is That Doggie in the Window?”

In this usage, though, he’s not citing the exact title of the song—either “That Doggie in the Window” or “The Doggie in the Window.” The song has been released so many times, it’s become a colloquialism. Oxford Languages defines a colloquialism as a word or phrase that is not formal or literary, typically one used in ordinary or familiar conversation.

The (How Much Is) in parentheses would just distract from the conversation, so we decided to use the popular title, “How Much is That Doggie in the Window.”

What do you think?