Made In Yorkshire…

Tags

Culture, Environment, France, French, Humour, Language, Life, Yorkshire

 

We’ve lived in France for over three years now.

My kids were 3 and 6 when we arrived, so they’re pretty much French now.

They chatter away to each other and their mum in French all the time.

My son’s just come looking for his pencil case, asked me if I’d seen it.

I told him to look outside as I suspected his sister had it.

He glanced out of the back door and saw her, scribbling away with his felt tips.

He let out a deep sigh and said ‘Aww, bloody hell!’.

You can take the kid out of Yorkshire…

Torturing The French 2…

Tags

France, French, fun, Humor, Humour, Language, Learning, Yorkshire

Just got back in from my Yorkshire/English class and I have to say my group of French students did incredibly well and really jumped in with both feet. Stumbling blocks came when their English – as in ‘proper’ English – met Yorkshire English. They had a hard time with:

 

Yorkshire t’ = English to/the

 

Yorkshire wi’ = English with

 

Yorkshire me = English my

 

I thought Pierre’s head was going to explode when I explained that the ‘g’ in ‘maungy’ wasn’t pronounced the same as it was in ‘mingin”.

 

Fabienne really didn’t like having to say the Yorkshire slang for coal cellar in a sentence: ‘They’re in t’ coil oyle Margaret’.

 

And I fear I have damaged relations between Christine and I after I made her repeat ‘Let’s take a shortcut through t’ snicket’ five times, because she kept saying ‘the snicket’.

 

Yes, it did feel strange correcting people’s English, because it was correct English, but not correct Yorkshire English.

 

Next session we will be finishing this off (we only got up to ‘sup’ before time ran out) and delving into the Scottish dialect.

 

A Yorkshire/Scottish cocktail, what could go wrong?

Torturing The French….

Tags

France, French, fun, funny, Humor, Humour, Language, Learning, Teaching, Yorkshire

 

Every third Tuesday I teach a group of mostly retired, lovely French people, whose only goal is to improve their English.

I asked them the last time for suggestions on what they would like to do at the next class.

‘Tell us about England, about the colour, the life’ they said to me.

‘Speak about where you are from, tell us about Yorkshire’ they asked me.

‘We love hearing all the different ways you say things’ they told me.

‘There are so many regional accents in the UK, it’s really quite wonderful’ they opined.

 

‘I’m sorry, I didn’t catch that, can you say it again but slowly this time please?’ they frequently added.

They may regret their requests when they see what I have in store for them tonight. The handouts I provide aren’t just for reading you see, they are also for reading ALOUD.

Bonus points will be awarded for correctly pronouncing ‘sithee’ ‘ey up’ and ‘Eh by gum, tis chuffing cawd enuf t’freeze t’balls off a brass bloody monkey aht theer’