Keith Skipper

Welcome from FOND founder Keith Skipper

Cum yew on, tergether!
Welcome to the wonderful world of Norfolk dialect and a flourishing organisation formed to preserve and promote this precious strand of our cultural heritage.
FOND - Friends Of Norfolk Dialect - was formed late in 1999 when over 50 enthusiasts agreed it was high time to put a much-needed campaign on an official footing
Much has been achieved since then. Membership is 284, with several Norfolk exiles among our keenest supporters. Absence still makes the heart grow fonder! A lottery grant of nearly £4000 has enabled FOND to buy special equipment to record the county's traditional words, sayings, stories and songs. Material is being shared with the Norfolk Record Office. County Archivist Dr.John Alban has warmly welcomed this brand of co-operation.
The Merry Mawkin, a regular newsletter packed with articles both light - hearted and serious, is proving highly popular as the Norfolk message spreads. Social events - known, of course, as FOND dews - are being held in all parts of the county.
The new chairman Colin Burleigh looks forward to your support.
The organisation's president is Norfolkman Peter Trudgill, internationally renowned Professor of English Linguistics at the University of Fribourg in Switzerland. Some of Norfolk's leading citizens are coming on board as vice - presidents, including Sir Timothy Colman, Lord Lieutenant of the County.
There are encouraging signs that those involved in making national television and radio programmes calling for a distinctive Norfolk sound are at last realising the accursed "Mummerzet" will not do! FOND has pointed out forcibly that Norfolk is not a little place wedged somewhere between Devon and Dorset.
Several members of the acting profession with proud Norfolk roots are pledged to usher in a more enlightened era.
Of course there's much more to do, not least in encouraging local schools to show a keener interest in the dialect and encourage teachers and children to see it as an important subject in its own right.
Forging a partnership between the old and the new - like setting up a website to extend FOND's influence - has to be the way ahead for a vibrant campaign with long term ambitions.
Agitation and aggression must be matched by achievement. So cum yew on, my bewties, an' git stuck in afore that go orltergether.
Cor, that would be a rum ole dew.......!

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