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Yorkshire English is a variation of British English spoken by the people of the Yorkshire counties in England. Why learn Yorkshire English? The population of Yorkshire, at almost 5 million people, is greater than that of Scotland, Wales or Ireland. Many famous people have come from yorkshire amongst them writers such as the Bronte sisters, Ted Hughes and JB Priestley, actors such as Sean Bean, Brian Blessed, Malcolm McDowell, Patrick Stewart, Judi Dench and Ben Kingsley, bands and musicans such as the Kaiser Chiefs, the Arctic Monkeys, Jarvis Cocker and John Barry, not to mention the odd villain such as Peter Sutcliffe, the Yorkshire Ripper and of course Guy Falkes.

Lesson 4 A Loss of Self8/1/2008
Spoken Yorkshire replaces all versions of "self" and "selves" with "sen" and "sens"

Examples
Standard English : Myself, Yourself, Himself, Herself, Our selves, Yourselves, Itself
Yorkshire English: Misen, Yusen, Himsen/ Hissen, Hersen, Oursens, Yusens, Itsen
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Lesson 3 Misuse becomes correct use.18/12/2007
Us yorkshire folk don't think there's owt wrong wi' odd bit o bad grammar.* In fact many words considered incorrect in other regions are in common use in Yorkshire and many of us fail to realise that what we are saying is, technically, incorrect.

Use of the past tense instead of the gerund with the verb "to sit"
Example
Standard English: I was sitting in the corner
Yorkshire English: I was sat in the corner

"While" as an alternative to "until"
Example
Standard English: I am working from 10 until 2
Yorkshire English: I am working 10 while 2

Please note that in the above example the word "whilst" cannot be used.

Unusual past tenses.
In the construction "to have + PARTICIPLE" (e.g. I have TAKEN) the particle is often replaced with the preterite.
Example 1
Standard English: I have taken.
Yorkshire English: I have took

Example 2
Standard English: I have forgotten
Yorkshire English: I have forgot

In addition to this there are some alternative past participles used which can also be used as the simple past.

Example

The verb "to eat"
Standard English: I have eaten (compound), I ate (simple)
Yorkshire English: I have et (compound), I et (simple)

Therefore in Yorkshire one can say "I ate", "I've eaten", "I've et" or "I et" and be perfectly understood.

Example 2
The verb "to see"
Standard English: I have seen, I saw
Yorkshire English: I have sin, I sin


*Standard English: We, the people of Yorkshire don't think there's anything wrong with the odd bit of bad grammar.
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Vocabulary8/12/2007

Yorkshire English, in addition to the standard use of the words "anything" and "nothing" also has wide use of the contractions "owt" and "nowt"

Example 1
Standard English
"Have you done anything today?"
Yorkshire English
"Have you done owt today?"

Negative endings. In standard English negative phrases such as "does not" and "would not" can be contracted using an apostrophe to "doesn't" and "wouldn't" respectively. In yorkshire English a further contraction is made and these words become "dunt" and "wunt"

Example 1
Standard English
"I haven't seen anything of John for weeks, he hasn't been out for ages. Ever since his mum said he couldn't, he doesn't"
Yorkshire English
"I ant seen owt of John for weeks, he ant been out for ages. Ever since his mam* said he cunt, he dunt."

*mam is a common yorkshire variant of mum (or mom if you are American/Canadian)

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Yorkshire English for beginners lesson 1.7/12/2007

Lesson 1
Spoken Yorkshire.
The word "the" is frequently replaced with what is known as a glottal stop, similar to a T but not as pronounced. "Go to" is simplified to "gu" These characteristics help reduce the length of needlessly long sentences.

Example 1.
Standard English
"Do you want to go to the pub?"
Yorkshire English
"Do you wanna gu' pub?"

The second person.
English has always had a problem with the second person, unlike many other languages there is no distinction between the way in which one addresses one person or a group of people. The word is always "you." Some clumsy ways of getting around this problem have been to say "you all" or "you lot" Yorkshire English however solves this problem simply and logically by forming the plural as for any other English noun, the addition of an "S"

Example
Standard English
"What are you all doing tonight?"
Yorkshire English
"What are yous doing tonight?"

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