Sting -When The Last Ship Sails

[Maggie/915]

Adam just accept that was the sound you were going for posh or Geordie or Northumbrian.

Sounds to me as if one or two people are winding you up.

[Adam Hogg]

Adam just accept that was the sound you were going for posh or Geordie or Northumbrian.

Sounds to me as if one or two people are winding you up.

I think they are Maggie but I don't mind really at times depend what day you talk to me on , Malcolm will back me up on that.

[Canny lass]

Adam, I am quite certain that you don't speak a Northumbrian dialect. That's a traditional, rural dialect and as such it doesn't belong in the Bedlington area - assuming that anybody is still speaking it nowadays. Your dialect is more likely to be a modern, urban dialect - or even a hybrid. ( I'm assuming you were born and raised in the area). I'm in Gothenburg tomorrow, I'll pop into the English faculty at the uni and see what the British linguists are saying about dialects in the North East. I'll get back to you on it.

[Maggie/915]

Canny Lass you are forgetting that more is at stake.

Remember a friend of mine who joined us from afar with a South African accent.

She still feels she was bullied at school.

Sometimes it is just a simple case of one upmanship.

The ultimate put down here is you have a cockney accent. That seems worse, somehow, than posh.

[Adam Hogg]

Adam, I am quite certain that you don't speak a Northumbrian dialect.

I should say Pitmatic in a sort of way not Like our Very own High Pit Wilma, But I'm getting there.

[Canny lass]

Pitmatic would be nearer the mark, Adam. It's Lovely isn't it!

[Maggie/915]

I am looking forward to you search results from today in Gothenburg Canny Lass!

[Symptoms]

When I was a lad growing up in Bedders I have a clear memory local accents which varied from town to town.  Friends from Ashington had different ways of pronouncing the same words as folk from Bedders;  ditto Morpeth lads.

[Vic Patterson]

Blyth, Bedlington, Ashington , Newcastle and Morpeth all had very distinctive accents, I always thought it was because of their local industries, farming, mining, ship building and ports and the fact that there was a very little amount of travel in the OLD days.

Travel, media and the economy has changed all that and the dialects and accents are all being diluted, is it better or worse? who knows but I see such as the u-tube videos are doing a great service preserving it for the future, I wonder if museums are archiving some of it!

[Symptoms]

I'm sure I read somewhere that years ago there was a team that went around the North East recording old guys talking ... preserving each towns' variation of our local dialect - perhaps someone here can confirm this?  A bit like Alan Lomax, the Yankee music collector, who went around the USA in the 40s recording the old Blues men for the Library of Congress.

 

Just image if Lomax came across Blind Lemon Cramlington Budgie Strangler in the 'Deep South of Geordieland' ... I reckon he'd say "Boy, you ain't got no voice worth putting down on my here vinyl." 

Edited January 3, 2014 by Symptoms

[doglover]

Yes I always say to people when I go Down South  you know that I'm not a Geordie I'm a posh Northumbrian.   Ha Ha.  Getting back to Sting and Jimmy Nail their concert was absolutely great I put on the subtitles and got the gist of the story  easier  Well done to Sting.

[Canny lass]

Those people who Think you are a Geordie, based on your speech, may not be too falling too short of the mark, Adam. There are many definitions of what a Geordie is. My own belief has Always been that a Geordie is someone born within spitting distance of the Tyne - North bank or South bank. Symptoms, on the other hand, favours a definition that bestows this name only on those who are born on the North bank within hockling distance (slightly more difficult I would imagine). Then there's the traditional scots way of thinking about Geordies -they're just scots with their Brains bashed oot! I don't think there's any research based definition of what a Geordie is. However, when it comes to Geordie - the dialect - there is a wealth of research that describes it's various features and where it's spoken.

 

Myself, I've never been able to hear any difference between my own dialect and that of someone from the banks of the Tyne but having said that, I have to admit that I haven't met too many from the North bank but have had a great deal of Contact with south bank dwellers and they talked just like me except for the odd word. Fortunately there are linguists who have studied it in depth and not too far in the distant past, so their findings are still very relevant. One of Britains leading linguists is David Crystal. He's a former professor of linguistics at Reading University and he was awarded an OBE in 1995 for his services to the study and teaching of the English language. His work has been widely published in over 40 volumes, so I think we can assume that he knows what he's talking about.

 

He has this to say about the Geordie dialect:

 

"The area around the R. Tyne, in NE England, and dominated by Newcastle, has a wide range of dialect features, often summed up in the label 'Geordie' (a Scottish nickname for George). This dialect area extends throughout Northumberland,and shares several features with Southern Scots". (Crystal, D. 1999:The Cambridge Encyclopedia of The English Language. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press. p 326)

 

So, while the physical being, a Geordie, confines itself, by birthright and spitting ability, to the banks of the Tyne, the Geordie dialect does not. Chances are that we are all using it to some degree.

 

Crystal goes on to describe some of the grammatical features of the dialect. These grammatical features are often more reliable than the vocabulary as the grammar of a language changes very slowly in comparison to the vocabulary, where words come and go at an alarming rate. In particular he describes some changes in the irregular verb system which appear to be unique for  the Geordie dialect. He describes 21 irregular verbs which, in various dialects can be used in a non-standard manner in various urban dialects, including Geordie. He also describes 4 variations which are distinctive to the Geordie dialect area. These verbs are: treat, come, run, see and shrink.

 

 

How much Geordie are you speaking?

 

Test yourself:

When speaking  your own dialect to someone who speaks the same dialect, which of the following would you say:

 

A. He tret his mother very badly.

B. He treated his mother very badly.

 

 

A. He's tret her badly for years.

B. He's treated her badly for years.

 

A. I come to see him last week

B. I came to see him last week.

 

A. They had came to see me the week before.

B. They hade come to see me the week before.

 

 

A. He run away wi the next door neighbour's wife.

B. He ran a way wi the next door neighbour's wife.

 

 

A. He had ran away with her sister last year.
B. he had run away with her sister the year Before.

 

 

A. A seen im last week in Blyth.

B. A saw im last week in Blyth.

 

 

A. A'd saw him a month ago in Morpeth.

B. A'd seen him a month ago in Morpeth.

 

 

A. I'm sorry pet. Ya frock shrunk  in the washing.

B. I'm sorry pet. Ya frock shrank in the washing.

 

 

A. Did you say me frock had shrank in the washing?

B. Did you say me frock had shrunk in the washing?

 

Well? How much Geordie are you speaking in Bedlington? You'll find the answer on my profile. You may just be surprised. I know I was.

[Maggie/915]

Very Good your profile is going to be popular.

Sadly I did not get all 'A 's'

[Maggie/915]

Page 15 of the Guardian Review yesterday discusses-

Harry Ritchie's English for the Natives: Discover the Grammar You Don't know You Know

Published by John Murray

The topic head says

Why do we persist in thinking that standard English is right when it is spoken by only 15 percent of the English population?

Linguistic - loving Harry Ritchie blames Noam Chomsky

Noam Chomsky it seems thinks language skills are innate and other areas of linguistics are glimpsed, if at all fuzzily in the background..

[Vic Patterson]

  

I got 2 b's 

[Alan Edgar (Eggy1948)]

How much Geordie are you speaking?

 

Test yourself:

When speaking  your own dialect to someone who speaks the same dialect, which of the following would you say:

 

A. He tret his mother very badly.

B. He treated his mother very badly.

 

 

A. He's tret her badly for years.

B. He's treated her badly for years.

 

A. I come to see him last week

B. I came to see him last week.

 

A. They had came to see me the week before.

B. They hade come to see me the week before.

 

 

A. He run away wi the next door neighbour's wife.

B. He ran a way wi the next door neighbour's wife.

 

 

A. He had ran away with her sister last year.

B. he had run away with her sister the year Before.

 

 

A. A seen im last week in Blyth.

B. A saw im last week in Blyth.

 

 

A. A'd saw him a month ago in Morpeth.

B. A'd seen him a month ago in Morpeth.

 

 

A. I'm sorry pet. Ya frock shrunk  in the washing.

B. I'm sorry pet. Ya frock shrank in the washing.

 

 

A. Did you say me frock had shrank in the washing?

B. Did you say me frock had shrunk in the washing?

 

Well? How much Geordie are you speaking in Bedlington? You'll find the answer on my profile. You may just be surprised. I know I was.

A,A, neetha (but if the word 'I' was replaced with 'A' then ,B,B,A (but a would always avoid Blyth so it dosnt coont),B( but just on a Market Day when the pubs were open all day),nivva weshed a frock so cant say, If a had weshed a frock wor lass wud not complain aboot the ootcum. 

[Maggie/915]

Canny Lass would 'told or telt' be included.

Ie 'get him telt'

Or 'get him told'

[Maggie/915]

The Cd is now out for Sting 's

'When the last Ship Sails'

Tracks with Jimmy Nail and the Unthanks.

I think it is great, sorry Symptoms.

Sting does affect a Geordie accent!

[Canny lass]

Maggie, I must have missed your last posting dated 10th January 'told vs. telt'. I have no answer for that. Could be Geordie but I Think I've Heard it in other parts of England and Scotland. I'll keep it in mind for the next time in the faculty.

[Symptoms]

Maggs wrote: "Sting does affect a Geordie accent!"

 

I rest my case.

[Maggie/915]

Who is the 'Workie Ticket'?

This is the question.

Has anyone read Sting's Autobiograpy.

That would give you lots of anecdotes!

[Symptoms]

Oh no!  He hasn't written an Autobiography, has he?

[Canny lass]

Broken Music: a memoir. GREAT!

[mickypotts]

I read it when it forst came oot an a luved it, He,s from Tynemooth  and used ti deliva milk wi ees dad ivry morning, he went ti newcasstle college of art but also taught in durham as weel later on, theres nowt uppity aboot him that I can see.

[Maggie/915]

The cd is now a firm favourite with our Grandkids.

The Jimmy Nail track is the first to catch on , with everyone shouting 'what have we got'

The next to catch on is Dead Mans Boots.

The Ballard of the Great Western is great story telling.

Basically you need to have bought this one yesterday.

Even you Symptoms!