Yorkshire dialect, also known as Yorkshire English, Broad Yorkshire, Tyke, or Yorkie, is a grouping of several regionally neighbouring historical and modern dialects of English spoken in Yorkshire. Yorkshire experienced drastic dialect levelling in the 20th century, eroding many traditional features, though variation and even innovations persist, at both the whole regional and sub-regional levels.Haigh, Sarah (2015). "Investigating Regional Speech in Yorkshire: Evidence from the Millennium Memory Bank" Doctoral dissertation. University of Sheffield, 159, 171. Organisations such as the Yorkshire Dialect Society and the East Riding Dialect Society exist to promote the survival of the more traditional features.Beal, Joan (2010). "Shifting Borders and Shifting Regional Identities". Language and Identities. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 220. https://doi.org/10.1515/9780748635788-023.
The dialects have been represented in classic works of literature such as Wuthering Heights, Nicholas Nickleby and The Secret Garden, and linguists have documented variations of the dialects since the 19th century. In the mid-20th century, the Survey of English Dialects collected dozens of recordings of authentic Yorkshire dialects.
Early history and written accounts Based on fragments of early studies on the dialect, there seem to have been few distinctions across large areas: in the early 14th century, the traditional Northumbrian dialect of Yorkshire showed few differences compared to the dialect spoken in Aberdeen, now often considered a separate Scots language. The dialect has been widely studied since the 19th century, including an early work by William Stott Banks in 1865 on the dialect of Wakefield,Banks, William Stott (1865), A List of Provincial Words in Use at Wakefield in Yorkshire, WR Hall (Wakefield) and another by Joseph Wright who used an early form of phonetic notation in a description of the dialect of Windhill, near Bradford.Wright, Joseph (1892), A Grammar of the Dialect of Windhill, Truebner & Co, London Significant works that covered all of England include Alexander John Ellis's 1899 book On Early English Pronunciation, Part V, and the English Dialect Dictionary, which was published in six volumes between 1898 and 1905.
Charles Dickens' Nicholas Nickleby (1839) and Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights (1847) are notable 19th century works of literature which include examples of contemporary Yorkshire dialects. The following is an excerpt of Brontë's use of contemporary West Riding dialect from Haworth in Wuthering Heights, with a translation to standard English below:Aw wonder how yah can faishion to stand thear i' idleness un war, when all on 'ems goan out! Bud yah're a nowt, and it's no use talking—yah'll niver mend o'yer ill ways, but goa raight to t' divil, like yer mother afore ye!I wonder how you can dare to stand there in idleness and worse, when all of them have gone out! But you're a nobody, and it's no use talking—you'll never mend your evil ways, but go straight to the Devil, like your mother before you!
20th-century recordings The Survey of English Dialects in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s recorded over 30 examples of authentic Yorkshire dialects which can be heard online via the British Library Sound Archive.
Geographic distribution Yorkshire covers a large area, and the dialect is not the same in all areas. In fact, the dialects of the North and East Ridings are fairly different from that of the West Riding, as they display only Northumbrian characteristics rather than the mixture of Northumbrian & Mercian features found in the West Riding. The Yorkshire Dialect Society draws a border roughly at the River Wharfe between two main zones. The area southwest of the river has been influenced by Mercian, originating from the East Midlands dialects during the industrial revolution, whilst that to the northeast, like Geordie, the Cumbrian dialect and the Scots language, is descended more purely from the Northumbrian dialect. The distinction was first made by A. J. Ellis in On Early English Pronunciation. The division was approved of by Joseph Wright, the founder of the Yorkshire Dialect Society and the author of the English Dialect Dictionary. Investigations at village level by the dialect analysts Stead (1906), Sheard (1945) and Rohrer (1950) mapped a border between the two areas. A rough border between the two areas was mapped by the Swiss linguist Fritz Rohrer, having undertaken village-based research in areas indicated by previous statements by Richard Stead and J.A. Sheard, although there were "buffer areas" in which a mixed dialect was used, such as a large area between Leeds and Ripon, and also at Whitgift, near Goole.
One report explains the geographic difference in detail:This distinction was first recognised formally at the turn of the 19th / 20th centuries, when linguists drew an isophone diagonally across the county from the northwest to the southeast, separating these two broadly distinguishable ways of speaking. It can be extended westwards through Lancashire to the estuary of the River Lune, and is sometimes called the Humber-Lune Line. Strictly speaking, the dialects spoken south and west of this isophone are Midland dialects, whereas the dialects spoken north and east of it are truly Northern. It is likely that the Midland influence came up into the region with people migrating towards the manufacturing districts of the West Riding during the Industrial Revolution.
Over time, speech has become closer to Standard English and some of the features that once distinguished one town from another have disappeared. In 1945, J. A. Sheard predicted that various influences "will probably result in the production of a standard West Riding dialect", and K. M. Petyt found in 1985 that "such a situation is at least very nearly in existence".
Pronunciation Some features of Yorkshire pronunciation are general features of northern English accents. Many of them are listed in the northern English accents section on the English English page.
Vowels
Words such as strut, cut, blood, lunch usually take , although is a middle-class variant. Most words affected by the trap-bath split of South East England – the distinction between the sounds and – are not affected in Yorkshire. The long of southern English is widely disliked in the "bath"-type words. However, words such as palm, can't, spa are pronounced with a long vowel, usually more fronted . In parts of the West Riding, none, one, once, nothing, tongue, among(st) are pronounced with rather than A shibboleth for a traditional Huddersfield accent is the word love as , pronounced with the same vowel as "lot". Words such as late, face, say, game are pronounced with a monophthong or . However, words with in the spelling (e.g. straight, weight), as well as exclamations and interjections such as hey and eh (the tag question), are usually pronounced with a diphthong . Some words with ake at the end may be pronounced with , as in take to tek, make to mek and sake to sek (but not for bake or cake). Words with the vowel in Received Pronunciation, as in goat, may have a monophthong or . In a recent trend, a fronted monophthong is common amongst young women, although this has been the norm for a long time in Hull (where it originates). It has developed only since 1990, yet it has now spread to Bradford.
If a close vowel precedes , a schwa may be inserted. This gives for and (less frequently) for . When precedes in a stressed syllable, can become . For example, very can be pronounced . In Hull, Middlesbrough and the east coast, the sound in word, heard, nurse, etc. is pronounced in the same way as in square, dare. This is .Handbook of Varieties of English, p. 125, Walter de Gruyter, 2004 The set of words with , such as near, fear, beard, etc., may have a similar pronunciation but remains distinctive as . In other parts of Yorkshire, this sound is a short or long . This seems to have developed as an intermediate form between the older form (now very rare in these words) and the RP pronunciation . In Hull, Middlesbrough and much of the East Riding, the phoneme (as in prize) may become a monophthong before a voiced consonant. For example, five becomes (fahv), prize becomes (). This does not occur before voiceless consonants, so "price" is . In the south of the west riding, Middle English /uː/ is traditionally realised as a monophthong or in the Holme Valley as a diphthong [ɛə] as in daan, abaat, naa, haa, and aat for down, about, now, how and out. The traditional pronunciation of these words is in the east riding and the eastern part of the north riding; in the western half of the north riding and northern west riding it is as in doon, aboot, noo, hoo, oot.These are now far less common than the RP found throughout Yorkshire. Words like city and many are pronounced with a final in the Sheffield area. What would be a schwa on the end of a word in other accents is realised as in Hull and Middlesbrough. A prefix to a word is more likely not to take a reduced vowel sound in comparison to the same prefix's vowel sound in other accents. For example, concern is or rather than , and admit is rather than . In some areas of the Yorkshire Dales (e.g. Dent, Sedbergh), the FLEECE vowel can be so that me is and green is .
The following features are recessive or even extinct; generally, they are less common amongst younger than older speakers in modern Yorkshire: Words originating from old English ō (e.g. goose, root, cool, roof, hoof) historically had an sound in the West Riding word-medially (ɡooise, rooit, cooil, rooif, hooif) as well as an sound in the North and East Ridings (ɡeease, reeat, keeal, reeaf, yuf). Today a more RP-like pronunciation is found in all Yorkshire accents. Traditionally in the West Riding, in word final environments and before [k], ō is realised as the vowel in words such as book, cook, and look, this also occurred in the east and north ridings, where it was realised before [k] as an and as in word final environments. Traditionally words such as "swear", "there", "wear" take the diphthong , often written sweer, theer, weer in dialect writing. This sound may also be used in words originating from Old English ēa, commonly spelt ea in standard english spelling: for example, head as (heead), red as (reead) leaves as (leeavs). may take the place of , especially in the West Riding in words such as key, meat, speak, either, with the second two often written meyt, speyk in dialect writing. Words such as door, floor, four, board may take on a variety of diphthongal pronunciations, . This is a consequence of an incomplete horse–hoarse merger. Words which once had a velar fricative in Old and Middle English or a vocalised consonant may have for (e.g. browt, thowt, nowt, owt, grow, gowd, bowt for brought, thought, nought, ought, grow, gold, bolt). Words that end -ight join the FLEECE lexical set. Today they can still be heard in their dialectal forms. For example, neet and reet for night and right. This can also be heard in Nova Scotia, Geordie and the Lancashire dialect.