Many got rid of their dialect and some almost became ashamed of the way their parents spoke. Children were told that certain words were only fit for people who aspired to no higher than menial jobs all their lives. Cornish self-esteem was eroded and too many Cornish tried to ape the English accent. This is an attitude I have never understood and luckily have never suffered from. I was brought up to be proud not only to be Cornish but to sound Cornish.
Many countries are so proud of their dialects.
The old Venetian speech can be heard in the medieval town of Marostica near Venice, for instance. In the town square is a huge chess board where the moves are called out in their old dialect as the human chess pieces move. Yet in this country we seem obsessed with the idea of getting rid of regional accents and replacing them with flavourless English. Dominated as we are by experts and literal facts, we are also fast losing the habit of instant metaphor which comes so naturally to dialect speakers. For whatever the faults and limitations of dialect it is a language which though down to earth, gives scope to the imagination found in no other form of speaking or writing.