York Guides

Chris Benfield (Yorkshire Post)

If you buy the kids plimsolls for PE, rather than pumps, you probably live in East Yorkshire – or outside the region.

A few might call them pliggies, jimmies or slippers, but pumps is
the favoured word in Yorkshire, except for around the Humber, a BBC survey reveals.
The BBC has had 32,000 responses to an online dialect survey which included asking people to report the words they used for "soft shoes worn for PE" and other things to spot differences.
The BBC drew up the list of prompts on the advice of Carmen Llamas of Aberdeen University, a former student in the language studies departments of Leeds and Sheffield, which also advised and will help to analyse the results.
Another cue was "attractive".
The top 10 suggestions nationally were: fit, gorgeous, pretty, hot, sexy, good looking, lush, lovely, cute and tasty.
Bonny was popular in Scotland, Yorkshire, Newcastle, Ulster and some other parts. Doncaster suggested smart; Londoners buff; Midlanders bostin; and the Scots stoater.
Far from being wiped out by the mass media, local dialects are thriving, says the BBC, thanks to migration, which cross-fertilises old traditions and produces new ones.
Parky, once a northern word, is now recognised everywhere as a way of describing cold weather or feeling cold. But there are still plenty of localised favourites – like, shrammed in Bristol; frozzed in the Midlands; clemmed in Sheffield; and nithered elsewhere in Yorkshire.
For friend, pal is top choice in Scotland and mate everywhere else. But marra makes the top 10 in the North West, North East and Yorkshire, and oppo got a significant number of votes in Yorkshire and the South West.
Yorkshire still says ginnel, and occasionally tenfoot, twitchel or cut, for what most of the nation calls an alley.
Playing truant from school is mitching in Ulster; twagging in East Yorkshire; slamming in Bradford; jigging in York; skidging in Paisley in Scotland; and skiving almost everywhere.