Portsmouth is an Island City. According to this video from Mainstream Productions, this has a special impact on the way the citizens of Portsmouth see themselves and how the local dialect has evolved.
If you have never visited the city of Portsmouth you have probably not heard of the word ‘Squinny’, or ‘Dinlo’, maybe not even ‘Mush’. It would be a very rare person in Portsmouth who didn’t understand those words.
If you watch this video you will see the accent of ‘Roight at the loights’ discussed, which is similar to a London accent but also quite different. There are so many examples, even a street map with the special words used as street names. Sadly as the world is becoming more global, as social media takes over, TV takes over and we all lose our local identity language starts to become homogenised, but for the time being, we in the city are still proud of the way we are. Enjoy this video, if you are from Portsmouth it is fascinating, if you are not it is really interesting.
Click on image for video
This video is published by Millstream Production – have a look at some of their other videos which are also about the local area, if you are interested in football there is a
great video on Portsmouth Football Club.