Fame!

On Wednesday morning, I was woken by a thoroughly unexpected phone call from BBC Radio Stoke, who very kindly asked if I'd like to be interviewed about the Stokie accent on the breakfast show...in about twenty minutes' time. Naturally I jumped at the chance, though was conscious of my ridiculously gruff morning voice, and so made sure to neck a few glasses of water before they called back.

The discussion of the day had turned to accents, with the launch of some Stokie ringtones on the Moorland Pottery website. Locals called in with stories about being misunderstood, opinions about what a proper Stokie accent sounds like and general dialect anecdotes, and I was called in to contribute linguistic opinion (a really big honour!). It was a charming interview and I was asked some really interesting questions - whether I managed to answer them satisfactorily is another matter entirely. But I definitely had a good go!

The programme is available here for the next week, and I also have a sound file if anybody is vaguely interested! I appear from about 2hrs 10mins, and my little piece lasts for about ten minutes.

Hugest thanks to BBC Radio Stoke for having me on!

Beginnings, updates, and learning my "spiel"...

Hello!

It's taken a little while, a lot of luck, and a whole heap of generosity, but it's time to revamp this website for what it now represents - a funded PhD project! My investigation of the accent of Stoke-on-Trent has gone from something I pursued in my gap year* and talked about relentlessly to anybody who would listen, to the project to which I'm lucky enough to be dedicating my life for the next three years (...and talking about relentlessly to anybody who will listen).

There's just one problem that comes from starting a project like this; one skill it's vital to develop: The Spiel. The early weeks of the PhD are littered with get-to-know-you events and meeting fellow students and staff, which - of course - is wonderful. (I have to say, Sheffield is the friendliest University and city I've ever encountered.) However, all this meeting and greeting demands a short, interesting and clear answer to the question "So, what's your research about?".

Not as easy as you might think.

Not only do you have to cram everything you're interested in and working on into a few sentences, using language that isn't alienating or confusing, at this precise moment, I don't know what my own research is! I have plans, I have ideas, and I think I know what I want to achieve, but I also need guidance, reining in, experience. So making a snappy spiel is a real challenge.

That said, I'm lucky, because Linguistics (and Sociolinguistics in particular) is a pretty accessible discipline - other, more complicated/specialist/abstract disciplines have it much harder. One of my favourite things about studying accents is that everybody has one, and an opinion about it, and other people's. Despite the academia involved, a Sociolinguistics spiel is a comparatively simpler one to master.

And so, The Spiel. Edited, scribbled out and memorised by heart (though probably changed a million times):

"I work in Sociolinguistics, which looks at how language interacts with social factors, and is used by people to construct and manage their identity. I'm focussing on the accent of Stoke-on-Trent, my hometown, which for many years had a strong pottery and mining industry which has recently declined. The project firstly documents the features of the accent, which hasn't really been done before, as well as investigates the relationship between accent, identity and changing social history in the region."

So there it is. My PhD summarised in a few lines. The Spiel.
Probably.
For the moment, anyway.

Anybody I meet in the coming months, look forward to hearing a (possibly garbled) version of the above!

---
*Not that kind of gap year - details of what I got up to last year can be found here!

Survey closed

Hi all,

Just wanted to say the hugest thank you to anybody who took part in our accent survey - we've had an incredible number of responses and I'm so grateful to everyone who answered the questions and/or shared it with your friends.

The survey is now closed, but may be re-opened again in the future. Stay tuned for the results - looking at the responses, they're fascinating so far!

Thanks again,
Hannah and Chris

Voices of the Potteries accent survey!

Hello!

Myself (Hannah) and Dr Chris Montgomery from Sheffield University are carrying out a survey about what people think about the accent used in the Potteries area. Our findings will be presented at a Language and Identity conference in April - so we need your help.

We're asking people to fill out a short survey  about the local area and its accent. The survey should only take about five minutes to complete, and can be found here: http://bit.ly/163oFGN

All you need to do is fill in your answers and click submit, and the data will be sent to us. All the questions are entirely anonymous - the only personal data we need is your age, and where you have lived in Stoke, and this will not be passed on to anybody outside the project.

So, if you're from the Potteries area or nearby and have a few minutes to spare, please click on the link above and fill in the survey, and if you can, share it with your friends - the more responses, the better our results will be!

Thanks very much for your help!
Hannah