As a child I saw the past not through pictures or photographs but through the words of my nan and grandad, my mom and dad, and all the older members of my family. The past of which they told me was the world in which they had grown up, that of English working-class people living in a great manufacturing town. Through them I saw the bustling streets which dominated their lives, the cramped houses which they struggled to keep clean, and the hard jobs which earned them their living. Through them I felt the rough textures of their being, I smelled the pungent odors which enveloped them, and I tasted the food and drink which sustained them. Most of all, through my family I heard the expressive voices of English working-class people. Powerful and evocative were their words, the more so because they were spoken in their own language—in the accent and dialect of Birmingham.