The Yorkshire Film Archive collects, preserves, and shows film made in, or about Yorkshire. Our collections are non-fiction, dating from the 1890s to the present day, and providing a rich and visually compelling record of all aspects of lives, cultures, landscape, industries, major events and everyday activities, many of which are available to watch, free of charge, on our website.
This film is part of Free
Local Dialects
This film takes us on a tour of Yorkshire and offers a profoundly interesting and focused examination of many of the area’s regional dialects.
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Overview
A Calendar reporter follows Yorkshire dialect expert Stanley Ellis as he undertakes a brief car tour of the region to examine its many different dialects. The reporter conducts interviews through Ellis, who acts as a translator, throughout the film, despite the fact that all participants are in fact speaking English.
Stanley Ellis was one of the most famous experts on Yorkshire dialects in the 20th Century. He was frequently used as an expert witness in court cases to identify the origin of regional dialects. The Yorkshire dialects are believed to be derived from both Old English and Old Norse. The dialects have changed a great deal through the centuries and are expected to continue to change in the future.
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