Bostin new road signs for Dawley – ya conner beat em!

New signs unveiled by Great Dawley Town Council today and written in the town's dialect will recognise the area's cultural history and celebrate the town's individuality.

Six road signs, all with different phrases all Dawley mon will recognise are going to be put up on roundabouts on the outskirts of the town.

The first signs are going up on Malinslee Castlefields and Lawley Common roundabouts this week. Othersigns will be put up on Heath Hill and Dawley Bank roundabouts in January.

Councillors say they hope they will raise awareness of Dawley High Street and celebrate the Dawley identity.

Councillor Fran Bould, of Great Dawley Town Council, said: "I think they're great jockey. I'm from Dawley orgininally and I think they are really applicable to the Dawley area.

"It's highlighting a bit of local history and the town's local dialect as well as showing what it is that makes Dawley special."

Recently, steps have been taken to relaunch Dawley market on the High Street, the town hall is being renovated, as is Dawley Park, and it is hoped that these new signs will help boost numbers visiting the town.

Mrs Bould said: "The traders are telling us that they are doing better every week."

Councillor Jane Pinter said: "Definitely each week is getting better and better because we're being supported by local people and the traders."

"We have more exciting developments that we'll be announcing in the coming months.

"It's a really effective way of getting people talking about Dawley for all the right reasons, attracting new visitors and celebrating what we have to offer, in plain language."

A further two roundabouts at Dawley Bank and Heath Hill will also get new signs in January 2014.

The Dawley dialect, which has Saxon roots and is similar to other local dialects in both east Shropshire and the Black Country, is on the wane but can still be heard in the town's High Street, shops and pubs.

Stephanie Burton, from Dawley Launderette, said it was a nice change from traditional road signs.

Ms Burton, who has worked in the launderette for just over five years, said: "I'm up for anything different, life's too boring.

"I think it will help to keep Dawley's heritage. I don't really hear too much of it now, this might help bring it back.

"Even though I live in Dawley my brother, who lives in Priorslee and has never lived in Dawley, calls me up and says 'Ow Bist'. I do actually come out with it sometimes."

Sam Parkinson, who works in the town's Flowerfair, said: "I guess it is nice to hold onto local sayings, it is quite a strong dialect and with more and more people moving into the area it is important to hold on to it."

Pete Jackson, member of the AFC Telford Dawley Supporters Group, has made his own online Dawley Dictionary on Twitter.

He said: "It's great, it is a really good way of recognising the uniqueness of Dawley and its proud history, as well as teaching young people about the dialect that is still used today.

"Hopefully it might bring a smile to a few people's faces and it is great to have it recognised."

From Pete Jackson's Dawley?dictionary:

A

• Ackyduck – Aqueduct, a village close to Dawley

• Adoo – Hello

• Ammer – Am I

B

• Bist – To Be

• Bisna – Aren’t

• Bost – Broken

• Babby – Baby/Child

• Bonk – Bank as in Lawley Bonk

C

• Conner – Can’t

• Cowd – Cold

• Clemmed – Hungry

D

• Dower – Door

F

• Fairce – Face

G

• Graft – Work

H

• Hossay – Horsehay, a village close to Dawley

• Hast – Have

J

• Jockey – Friend

K

• Ken – Know

M

• Mon – Man

O

• Ommer – Hammer

• Ow – How

• Owd – Old

• Oss – Horse

P

• Pither – Worry or Complain

R

• Rung – Wrong

S

• Shammocks – Legs

• Squawkin – Crying

• Suck – Sweets

T

• Thee – You

• Tung – Tongue

W

• Wuss – Worse

• Wun – One

• Whut – What

Star comment: Speak up round ’ere owd jockey

In an imaginative innovation which is great for promoting local heritage and pride of place, but not very good for comprehension and understanding, road signs are going up on the main approaches to Dawley written in the Dawley dialect.

They will inform motorists that Dawley is a bostin place and you conner beat it.

No motorist with their head screwed on will confuse them with normal road signs. They will see them for what they are – unusual adverts for Dawley which tell all and sundry that it is a special and interesting place.

Indeed, the Dawley dialect has been of particular interest to linguists, having elements of Biblical phrases and Black Country dialects and melding them into something unique.

The pity of it is that there are so few true exponents of Dawley-speak left. Perhaps it should be treated as an endangered language and made the subject of compulsory classes at the new Phoenix Academy.

It is a dialect which connects modern Dawley people with their past and the days in which it was a mining area.

The old spoil mounds which are still such a feature of Dawley, albeit softened by many decades of nature's work, are themselves part of the town's heritage.

This is not the first time Dawley folk have shown that they are up for a bit of fun. When the Paddock Mount was controversially cleared of trees a few years ago, some enterprising locals took the opportunity to make it less bare by putting up a big Dawley sign in the style of that famous sign in Hollywood. It did not last all that long but was a talking point while it did survive.

But what about other parts of Shropshire? There are pockets of Salopians with their own local dialects which could equally be promoted on road signs.

Dawley is leading the way for other Shropshire communities. If you do not blow your own trumpet, nobody else will do it for you.