Dialect and Heritage project website

Do you know your ‘dregs’ from your ‘slops’ or your ‘grouts’ from your ‘grummets’? Well these are different terms used across England to describe the leaves at the bottom of a lovely mug of tea.

So, what has this fine and interesting tea information got to do with digital architects such as Ammba I hear you say? Well quite a lot actually.

Meet the project

We’re thrilled to announce that we’ve been commissioned to develop a website for the Dialect and Heritage project. Led by the School of English at the University of Leeds, the Dialect and Heritage project is funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund, the University of Leeds’ Footsteps Fund and other alumni donations.  It aims to engage and connect new audiences with a unique national archive held at the University of Leeds, called the Leeds Archive of Vernacular Culture (LAVC). This important multimedia archive is a fascinating record of dialect, culture, beliefs and ways of life from across rural England during the 19th and 20th Centuries.

The project also aims to connect with collections from five partner museums across England:

• Avoncroft Museum of Historic Buildings
• Dales Countryside Museum
• Museum of East Anglian Life
• Ryedale Folk Museum
• Weald and Downland Living Museum

We’re looking forward to working with such a fantastic group of project partners.

Bringing dialect and heritage to life

We’re developing a website that will make these rich resources accessible to a wide range of different audiences, celebrating language both past and present.

Users will be able to explore the collections and enjoy specially curated content that brings dialect and heritage to life.

Similarly, it’s vital that the site captures dialect and language that’s used by contemporary, 21st Century communities today. We’re inviting users to upload and share their own examples of dialect. This in turn will help provide valuable dialect research data. It’s a great way to show that dialect and heritage research is not just for academics, but is a fluid, living resource that can be informed by people all over the country.

The story so far

A recent kick off meeting has given us lots of fantastic intelligence to start to shape and develop the concept. This will then lead onto the development of wireframes.

The site is due to launch during summer 2021. In the meantime we’re thoroughly enjoying getting to learn more about the language and customs of our predecessors.