Globalisation not only threatens the socio-economic vibrancy of localities and drives a cosmopolitanisation of cultures, it also creates the conditions for local autonomy and the valorisation of difference.

• Project Dates: 2000
• Project Leader: Christopher Ray
• Sponsors: Faculty Research Committee, University of Newcastle

Rural development theoreticians and practitioners were involved in the search for strategies to improve their socio-economic well-being. One part of the strategy was to valorise local cultural identity. The aim of this study was to consider the role that regional dialects might play in a strategy of socio-economic development, using the North of England as a case study.