Is the Sheffield accent at risk of extinction?

A buddy of mine sent me a couple of videos online last night of Sheffield Yesteryear, from old trams to life in the steelworks. Not everyone's cup of tea but I really enjoyed watching them.

The thing that struck me most is how broad the Sheffield accent was back then in comparison to today. Pretty much everyone who spoke in the videos had deep and "proper" pronounced Sheffield tongue.

It seems these days that our accent seems to be fading. With our City being highly multicultural as well as external influence it seems we are all speaking differently? Do you agree?

Now ok, when we all venture out of Sheffield even more so the older generation, people notice our accents and instantly know we are from Yorkshire at least.

I just wondered whether others agreed really? Do you think our accent is gradually disappearing through generations?

This is a genuine discussion. Please don't turn it into any debate about race, politics or immigration.

It's bound to change over time, isn't it? I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing either. In business a broad local accent can be a turn off when dealing with people from other areas and in some cases hard to understand. Language has always evolved and will continue to do so

We were discussing accents the other day (with both us going to some lengths to lose the accents with which were were born) and we agreed that the local accents in the areas we were brought up in have changed quite noticeably during our lifetimes.

If it's happening in other areas (neither of us come from Sheffield) then it's sure to be happening here too.

Language changes a lot more rapidly than people think, try reading a book in original English from the 1800's, it will be full of words and expressions that don't mean anything to the modern speaker. The big pity is that we are rapidly going towards a unified language with very little local variation due to the influence of media/schooling and employer pressures.

how do you think people who work at gunstones feel.

Na den dee atha takin @iss.

Long live the Broad Yorkshire accent, and all the variations it produces.

Angel1

Sheffield - and indeed any region - now has more people from elsewhere in Britain, more people from overseas, and don't forget, more television and radio from beyond the local realms too; the OP mentions online videos of old trams and steelworks which are presumably from an age before television full stop, let alone 100s of channels at your fingertips. All these non-Sheffield accents will begin to naturally dilute the local one, as just hearing another accent will start to have tiny influences on your own. Then of course a Sheffielder marries someone from say, Newcastle or Malaysia or the moon, and the child they have will have something unidentifiable! Because of the different influences on their accent.

It can be a bit of a shame, but generally thats just the way things go, for any local dialect/accent really. It's probably just a quicker pace these days because of the massive outside influences.

Don't forget that to some degree, the accents/language of those people in the videos are probably somewhat removed from that of Sheffield folk from, say 1800, or 1700 as well.

In fact, I mention Newcastle, I think I'm right in saying that the Geordie accent is heavily influenced by Scandanavians who would have immigrated to Newcastle over the centuries.

---------- Post added 17-06-2014 at 12:49 ----------

Na den dee atha takin @iss.

 

Long live the Broad Yorkshire accent, and all the variations it produces.

 

Angel1

Agreed; I'm from Norfolk and I often cringe when I hear a broad Norfolk accent, but it'd be a shame if such unique accents died out all together.

A buddy of mine sent me a couple of videos online last night of Sheffield Yesteryear, from old trams to life in the steelworks. Not everyone's cup of tea but I really enjoyed watching them.

Can you post the links please so we can hear these old fashioned Sheffield accents?

I refuse to lose my Sheffield accent,why should i just to please some yuppies who think that because you speak in dialect makes you thick.Well if those people had done half the things i have done in my life in spite of my accent they would have a lot of stories to tell to their grandkids I wish people would stop trying to be some one that they are not,yes speak nice when required but be sensible with it ,dont try to talk a workman down use his language and dont speak rough to a professional or he will think you are thick just let them now who you are and where you came from.I go round John Lewis,s and here them talking la de da and paying with their credit card i speak Sheffield dialect and pay cash.No matter what dialect you speak it does not make them better than you or vise versa.

I'm at work at the minute Nagel and the videos are at home on my laptop however I will sort links out tonight for you most definitely.

A quick youtube search finds this video however, it is different to those that I have but just listen to the accent in the commentary. It's much thicker and much more pronounced that these days in my opinion.