Northern accents could die out within decades
And other stories from the stranger side of life
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
You are now subscribed
Your newsletter sign-up was successful
Northern accents could start dying out within the next 45 years as a result of the rising dominance of southern dialects, according to a new study. Researchers at Cambridge University found children living in towns and cities across the north of England are increasingly using pronunciations more usually spoken in the south because they are easier to pick up. “What we see are changes happening in big classes of words - but not all of them,” said one researcher.
Police identify the Indiana ‘pooper’
Police in Indiana say they have identified a woman who has been defecating on lawns. Residents in the suburb of Fishers have been unsettled in recent weeks by a prolific early morning visitor dubbed “the pooper”. However, thanks to video from a doorbell camera, police say the culprit had been identified. In 2017, a family in Colorado was targeted by a woman they called “the Mad Pooper”, who regularly defecated on their sidewalk.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Time traveller from 5000 in water warning
A man who insists he is a time-traveller from the year 5000 says entire cities will be underwater because of climate change. The man, known only as Edward, said he was part of a top-secret time-travelling experiment in 2004 and was sent 3,000 years into the future. He says he discovered Los Angeles submerged by a great body of water. Last week, a time traveller from the year 2491 said giant aliens with a “distorted appearance” will arrive on Earth in 2022.
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Chas Newkey-Burden has been part of The Week Digital team for more than a decade and a journalist for 25 years, starting out on the irreverent football weekly 90 Minutes, before moving to lifestyle magazines Loaded and Attitude. He was a columnist for The Big Issue and landed a world exclusive with David Beckham that became the weekly magazine’s bestselling issue. He now writes regularly for The Guardian, The Telegraph, The Independent, Metro, FourFourTwo and the i new site. He is also the author of a number of non-fiction books.
-
What to know before filing your own taxes for the first timethe explainer Tackle this financial milestone with confidence
-
The biggest box office flops of the 21st centuryin depth Unnecessary remakes and turgid, expensive CGI-fests highlight this list of these most notorious box-office losers
-
The 10 most infamous abductions in modern historyin depth The taking of Savannah Guthrie’s mother, Nancy, is the latest in a long string of high-profile kidnappings
-
Epstein files topple law CEO, roil UK governmentSpeed Read Peter Mandelson, Britain’s former ambassador to the US, is caught up in the scandal
-
Iran and US prepare to meet after skirmishesSpeed Read The incident comes amid heightened tensions in the Middle East
-
Israel retrieves final hostage’s body from GazaSpeed Read The 24-year-old police officer was killed during the initial Hamas attack
-
China’s Xi targets top general in growing purgeSpeed Read Zhang Youxia is being investigated over ‘grave violations’ of the law
-
Panama and Canada are negotiating over a crucial copper mineIn the Spotlight Panama is set to make a final decision on the mine this summer
-
Why Greenland’s natural resources are nearly impossible to mineThe Explainer The country’s natural landscape makes the task extremely difficult
-
Iran cuts internet as protests escalateSpeed Reada Government buildings across the country have been set on fire
-
US nabs ‘shadow’ tanker claimed by RussiaSpeed Read The ship was one of two vessels seized by the US military