From divvy to dinlo: index of insults aims to record Britain’s diverse dialects

Academics from the University of Sheffield hope to create a ‘vivid, honest record’ of swearwords and other slights to stop them dying out An idiot wandering the British Isles is sure to be greeted with a colourful volley of insults, each a signifier of the place in which he finds himself: “divvy” in Merseyside, “pillock” in Leeds or “dinlo” in Portsmouth. But with parochial phrases increasingly being lost to the homogenisation of the English language, experts are worried that soon, the wander...

By Hannah Al-Othman