SHEFFIELD

1
SHEFFIELD

• Life on the edge in the largest village in the
  world.

2
On the edge

• Sheffield is on the edge and between things. The
  largest city in Yorkshire, it lies at the foot of
  the county, little more than a stones throw from
  Derbyshire or Nottinghamshire. Similarly, it
  straddles the border between the midlands and the
  north. To a southerner, it is in the north, to a
  northerner it is a long way south. As a locus,
  Sheffield is an island geographically central to
  the country. (Fine 1992 9)

3
Highland-lowland division

• Sheffield is the only city to lie astride this
  division. To the west of the rivers Don and Sheaf
  are hills, to their east are plains.
• (Fine 1992 3)

4
Mercia and Northumbria

• Sheffield lies on the border of Anglo-Saxon
  Northumbria and Mercia. The border changed
  several times. Clumps of Mercians, Northumbrians
  and Britons lived together in what had become a
  bordrland, where political boundaries were
  altered by acts of sword rather than acts of
  parliament.

5
Danelaw

• Danish settlements, characterised by thorpe
  elements, cluster to the east of Sheffield.

6
Sheffield as a border city

• Highland/ Lowland
• Northumbria/ Mercia
• Archbishopric of York/ Canterbury
• Place- and river-names Dore door, narrow
  passage Sheaf boundary.
• Present-day North/ Midlands

7
The largest village

• Sheffield has been famous for cutlery since at
  least the 14th century. Chaucer Reeves Tale A
  Sheffield thwittel bare he in his hose.
  (thwittel a type of knife). Made in Sheffield
  already a brand of quality.
• The industry developed through a system of small
  workshops run by little mesters. Workers came
  from the immediately surrounding areas.

8
17th century Immigration

• Hey (1998 33-4)
• For a brief period between 24th November 1653
  and 5th December 1660 the marriage registers of
  Sheffield parish record the place of residence
  for both partners. No bridegroom came from
  further north than Leeds or further south than
  Nottingham and all but ten of them lived within
  ten miles of the centre of Sheffield.
• Between 1625 and 1649 the fathers of 23 of
  apprentices lived in Sheffield township, 20 in
  rural parts of Sheffield township, 41.3 within
  21 miles, and only 16.2 21 miles or more away.

9
Village networks

• Most families had been settled in the
  neighbourhood for several generations. The
  continuity of local surnames is particularly
  marked in the cutlery trades. A shared interest
  in the manufacture of cutlery and links forged
  through marriage and apprenticeship gave the
  people of Hallamshire a real sense of common
  identity. By the sixteenth century, the place and
  the people had acquired an identity whose
  distinctiveness was recognised throughout
  England (Hey 1998 34)

10
The Steel City 19th-century immigration

• 1841 census The distances that some migrants
  had travelled were greater than in previous
  centuries 327 Sheffielders had surnames
  beginning with Mc and 82 had names beginning with
  O but on the whole the catchment area was
  similar to what it had always been. (Hey (1998
  145)

11
Big Steel

• Development of large-scale steelworks in the
  second half of the 19th century.
• 1851 census
• 36.3 born outside the borough boundary.
• 21.5 born in Yorkshire or Derbyshire
• 5.6 in Leics, Lincs or Notts
• 3.3 Irish, some Scots. (Hey 1998)

12
Irish migration

• More Irish people settled in Sheffield in the
  next few decades after 1851. They came mostly
  from western and central Ireland and congregated
  in the north-western part of the central
  township, where in 1861 some enumerators
  districts contained as many as 25 per cent Irish
  residents (if English-born children of Irish
  parents are counted.) The Irish in Sheffield were
  never as numerous as those in Leeds or the
  industrial towns of Lancashire. (Hey 1998 148).

13
Condition of the Irish in Sheffield

• Holland An enquiry into the Moral, Social and
  Intellectual Condition of the Industrial Classes
  of Sheffield
• I am at present attending three whose homes are
  scenes of wretchedness that could not be
  surpassed by anything in Ireland. It is often
  necessary to insist on their going to the
  workhouse, simply for protection from cold and
  hunger. (cited in Pollard 1959 21)

14
Conditions of the Irish (cont.)

• Pollard (1959 21-2)
• They lived in the most insanitary districts,
  sharing their slums with pigs and other domestic
  animals and with lodgers even more wretched than
  themselves, cheek by jowl with the riff-raff of
  the underworld, which every large city seemed to
  breed, and the inhabitants of common
  lodging-houses. In Sheffield, however, the small
  number of Irish-born citizens made their problems
  less acute than in other large towns in the North.

15
Influence of Scots and Irish

• There is virtually no evidence of any substantial
  Scots in-migration
• Irish migration is small compared to other
  northern towns and cities
• Where Irish were relatively numerous, they
  clustered in the poorest districts, drawing
  attention from social commentators for the
  wretchedness of their lives.
• The village nature of Sheffield, with its
  long-established networks of long-settled
  families, would militate against the Irish having
  any substantial influence.

16
Linguistic evidence

• Accounts of the Sheffield dialect go back to at
  least the early 19th century (Hunter 1829). The
  strong sense of identity forged by the close
  networks of the cutlery industry is reflected in
  pride in the dialect.

17
Dogs that didnt bark

• There is no evidence in accounts of the Sheffield
  dialect for features identified elsewhere as
  marking Scots and / or Irish influence
• Plural yous
• Lenition of final voiceless stops
• Generic the
• Double modals

18
Second person pronouns

• Yous absent from Sheffield, but (in more
  traditional dialect) Thee/ thou fulfil the
  function of number contrast and provide a
  vernacular variant. Thee-ing and tha-ing is
  used as a term meaning to speak in broad dialect.
  One elderly female informant from the Survey of
  Sheffield Usage said to the interviewer Thee
  thee and tha thyself and see how thou likes it.

19
Spread of yous

• There is evidence of yous spreading to areas in
  which it was not used until recently. A recent
  student survey in Warrington (midway between
  Manchester and Liverpool) provides apparent-time
  evidence for its introduction within the last 15
  years. Although Warrington has a sizeable
  population of Irish ancestry (of which I am a
  product!), this is a case of a feature being
  transferred, not directly from Hiberno-English,
  but either from the neighbouring cities (yous
  found I both Liverpool and inner-city
  Manchester), or, given the disappearance of thou,
  simply to broaden the vernacular base
  (Meyerhoff Niedzelski). I have found no evidence
  of yous in Sheffield, but, since thou is
  receding, it could appear in future.

20
False friends

• Some words found in glossaries of Sheffield
  dialect (e.g. Hunter 1829, Bywater 1854, Addy
  1888), appear to be Scots or Irish. However,
  these are or were in use throughout the North of
  England so cannot be attributed to dialect
  contact in any specific location.

21
Boke Hunter to boken, to nauseate, ready to
vomit.

• Wright
• BOKE v.2 and sb. Sc. Irel. Nhb. Cum. Wm. Yks.
  Lan. Chs. Der. Not. Lin. Pem.
• Sooa nivver boak at tnastiest pill. Leeds Merc
  Suppl (Nov 14 1891)
• Also cited from e. Yorks in Marshalls Rural
  economy 1788.

22
Crack Hunter to boast

• Commonly assumed to be a recent import from Irish
  craic. However, Wright
• Var. dial. Uses in Sc. Irel. Eng. And Colon.
• 7. Talk, conversation, gossip, chat. Citations
  from Scotland, Northumberland, Durham, Yorks,
  Lancs, Cheshire.
• n. Yorks He stopped for a bit of a crack (1865)
• W. Yorks Cracks in tingle neuk (1895)

23
Crack (cont.)

• OED gives loud talk, boast, brag arch. and
  dial. brisk talk, conversation Sc. and northern
  dialect.
• Meaning of talk, gossip seems established
  throughout Scotland and the North of England.
  Could more recent meaning be due to semantic
  transference c.f. Old English/ Scandinavian
  dream?

24
Conclusions

• No solid evidence of Scots or Irish influence on
  the dialect of Sheffield.
• The critical mass required for influence via
  dialect contact never reached
• Sheffield had close networks of artisans linked
  for generations through apprenticeships and
  strategic marriages.
• This led to early development of urban identity
• External influences less likely to affect the
  dialect.
• Immigration from surrounding counties would
  reinforce the border nature of Sheffield and
  its dialect.

25
References

• Addy, S. O. (1888) A Glossary of Words Used in
  the Neighbourhood of Sheffield London Trubner
  for the English Dialect Society
• Bywater, A. (1854) The Sheffield Dialect London
  Halifax Sheffield William Evans Milner and
  Sowerby Rodgers and Fowler
• Fine, D. (1992) Sheffield History and Guide
  Stroud Alan Sutton.
• Hey, D. (1998) A History of Sheffield Lancaster
  Carnegie Publishing
• Hunter, J. (1888) The Hallamshire Glossary
  London Wiliam Pickering
• Meyerhoff, M. and Niedzielski, N. (2003) The
  globalisation of vernacular variation, Journal
  of Sociolinguistics 7 (4) 534-555.
• Pollard, S. (1959) A History of Labour in
  Sheffield Liverpool Liverpool University Press.