[Treyno]

"Hey up, Poke. Is that thy lad?" - Hello, is that you lad?

Then to me: "Hey up, Young Pokey. Is tha barn darn t' pit?" - Hello, Young Pokey. Is your child down the pit?

"Aye, sither. Ah'm barn darn t' thutty-niners wi' t' fa'ther." Yes he is, the child is down the mines with the father"

"He's a cheyky young bleeder. Tha wants to gi'im thick end o' thi belt." - He's a cheeky young bleeder(bugger), you want to give him the thick end of the belt.

"Thi dad had to grease a few palms to get thi darn t' pit that day, tha knows. Nar look at thi. Tha passed thi Eleven Plus, tha's bin to college an' tha's got a reet good job, an't tha?" - Your Dad had to grease a few palms to get down the pit that day, you know(Good gestures to the right people). Now look at him, he passed the eleven plus, been to college, got a right good job and that?

I'm from Leeds, Yorkshire. But this is very broad Yorkshire. Was a pleasure to read it actually. The part of Yorkshire I am based at the moment has a lot of folk who still speak this way. Some things still throw me. Tha' knows.

http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~maureenmit...

It's like a whole new language, the southerners struggle to understand us sometimes and think we're crazy.

[pjc50]

There is the little detail in there that when the kid is speaking like that the other miner assumes he's joking, because that's not his natural accent. It's very regional. The bit in My Fair Lady where Higgins places people to the street level by accent isn't quite realistic but it's very close.

(a map for our American readers:

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/dir/Methley,+West+Yorkshire,+U...

[robocat]

Movement of households, radio, TV, and internet are homoginising accents. E.g. yoofs speaking Ebonics in island nations.

Some people have an incredible ability to place accents e.g. I was hitching in Ireland, he picked up another guy, and then thw driver guessed the birthplace of the hitcher to a tiny village (10s of people) just by accent.

I have picked that someone I met at the pub was from a particular house (flat) by accent once (students sharing house).

[andyjohnson0]

A minor point, but in the third passage Leetning is speaking to the author and so I think the translation should be "Now look at you, you passed the eleven plus..."

[nmeofthestate]

"Is that your lad?"

"Ah'm barn darn t' thutty-niners wi' t' fa'ther."

I'm bairn down the thirty niners with father

Not grammatical - hence I think why folk though he was talking the mickey.