Culture of The Isle of Wight - Language and Dialect

Language and Dialect

The distinctive Isle of Wight accent is a somewhat stronger version of the traditional Hampshire dialect, featuring the dropping of some consonants and an emphasis on longer vowels. This is similar to the West Country drawl heard in south-western England, but less removed in sound from the Estuary English of the South East. The spread of the latter in general, together with continuing immigration, means the broader accent is more prevalent in the older population.

The island also has its own lexical style. Some words like grockel (visitor) and nipper/nips (addressing a younger person) are shared with neighbouring regions. Others are unique, for example mallishag (meaning caterpillar) and nammit (meaning food, usually lunch or snack) from "no meat", and "nutten" meaning "donkey". Many such terms are contained in a pamphlet aimed at tourists, which is an excerpt from W.H.Long's 19th century "An Isle of Wight Dictionary", but, even as it was written, many such terms were becoming archaic and preserved as curiosities. A more useful term for sovereigns was "yallerboys", which obviously fell out of use with the introduction of notes, but could as easily refer to the present one-pound coins.

The word "gurt" is usually given the meaning "great" but is used as an emphasiser.

To give an example of pronunciation, an outsider hearing the accent may hear the pronunciation of all right, Cowes, and tie is often awroi, Kays and toy. There is also a frequent penchant in informal speech to end a sentence or punctuate it with a rhetorical question that sounds like an impossible presumption on the listener's knowledge:

• "I was browsing on the net, wasn't I?, when I came across a web site called Wikipedia".
• "Please could I 'ave change for this five-pound?". "What would you like?". "I need five one pound coins, don't I?"

The slower, more pronounced, speech means that while the dropping of consonants or use of glottal stops is heard, it is not to the same extent of dialogues such as Cockney. Additionally, consonants may be lengthened such as r in hovercraft or changed to emphasise a word such as the g in something being pronounced as a k.