Talk:Scottish English

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[edit] Doubt

"Doubt", in Scotland, means to think or suspect. Does it, and if so, which part of Scotland? SlimVirgin 04:58, Jan 11, 2005 (UTC)

The only reference I can find refers to Elizabethan English: [1]. Giving the Scots fondness for archaisms, it seems quite plausible though. Mark1 05:24, 11 Jan 2005 (UTC)

It comes from Scots dout [dut]. Ken Mair 12.01.05

Lanarkshire heavily uses it in this fashion.


The realisation /x/ for "ch" in loch, technical, etc.

The latter's a new one on me. I'd have thought /x/ was only common in Scots (or Gaelic) words, rather than there being much prevalence of "Scouse k" in Standard vocab. Alai 08:30, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)

It's inherited from Scots. More likely in particularly Scottish words like loch, recessive in other positions but usually never in SSE for gh as in night etc.

Ken Mair 23.02.05

"In some variaties, there's a contrast made between the diphthong /ɔɪ/ in boy and the diphthong /ʊɪ/ in buoy. See buoy-boy split."

/ʊ/ isn't a vowel that occurs is Scottish English. Have you a reference for this? Perhaps [bəɔɪ]?

Ken Mair 24.02.05

User 152.163.100.5 has been adding a lot of info on vowel length contrasts which seem to contradict the Scots Vowel Length Rule. Any references for this info?

I've not come accross such like in the literature about SSE I've read but perhaps it wasn't extensive enough.

Fay R. Doilt 28.02.05

[edit] Amn't and shew

Never heard anyone use "amn't", and "shew"? GB Shaw spelt the word that way, but I've never seen that in Scotland though.

My sister always used to say "amn't": mainly to annoy me, but it was definitely popular among a certain class in Aberdeen in the 1980s. I don't know of anything particularly Scottish about "shew",but some of us do like our archaisms. Mark1 06:28, 3 Mar 2005 (UTC)
I've never thought of amn't as being archaic, or as being a product of the 1980s. I can assure everyone that I and the people who I met as I was growing up in Northeast Scotland during the 1960s and 1970s were certainly using it when speaking Scottish English rather than Scots. Mind you if you used it in written work at school, you were marked down for using an ungrammatical construction. -- Derek Ross | Talk 22:27, Apr 8, 2005 (UTC)
I have added amn't into the syntax section. Not only is it characteristic of SSE, it can be used in declarative, not merely interrogative sentences, unlike aren't. Wiki_Scot | Talk 18 Nov 2005.
I note that someone has reglossed "Amn't I?" from "Aren't I?" to "Am I not?" which is perhaps replacing a Southern British biased gloss/transliteration with a North American one. I'll clarify the "Aren't I?" thing. Wiki Scot 09:54, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

who doesn't say amn't? i can't imagine people going around saying am i not, and even less likely aren't 81.129.169.166 10:06, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Deleted and Reinserted

For some reason this was deleted. Anyone know why?

[edit] /x/ for <ch>

in school and scheme is definitely nonsense. Some of the others are dubious. A lot of the other descriptions in the phonology section are extremely dubious. Can the authors cite any literature to back up their edits? Why half in IPA and the other half in Sampa?

Noah Winner 07.02.05

Wells (1982:408) writes:

[Scottish English] retains the velar fricative, /x/, as a member; although in English (as opposed to Scots) /x/ is really restricted to proper names... and sometimes to Greek- or Hebrew-derived words spelt with ch (technical /ˈtɛx-/, patriarch /-rx/, epoch, parochial).

--Angr/tɔk tə mi 08:08, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Definitely not in technical. Never heard a Scot use /x/ in technical in my life. Charlie Tango 11:45, 12 September 2005 (UTC)

I'm a Scot and I use it in "technical" (and in "technician", "polytechnic", and so forth) but then we've never met so that explains why you've never heard a Scot use it. I wouldn't use it in "school" or "scheme" though. -- Derek Ross | Talk 02:36, 13 September 2005 (UTC)

I'll get round to adding some references, but in the meantime I tidied up /x/ a bit. You get it in Munich, van Gogh, Bach and other loan names, but I think all regular vocabulary with it in is borrowed from Scots or Gaelic. Of course, loch has a very special status. Wiki_Scot | Talk 18 Nov 2005.

most people would pronounce it mun-IK and van go-FF where i am 81.129.169.166 10:05, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

Where is that, please? It seems like a tidbit we should know, don't you think? Cbdorsett 06:43, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Vowels

Scottish English vowel chart at [2] ([3]). Contrasts and length [4] Length [5] [6] Vowel system with key words and sound files [7] Yasser Wull 08.02.05

152.163.100.69 added 'Some speakers, however, distinguish some pairs by vowel length' and gave examples Any references for this. It doesn't seem to be mentioned in standard reference works. See talk Phonology.

I've deleted it. Provide a reputable reference and I#ll be glad to have learned something new.

Murdoch Soulis 09.05.05

I've re-deleted the sentence "Some speakers, it is sometimes claimed, may distinguish some pairs by vowel length, for example leek /lik/ vs. leak /liːk/, vane /ven/ vs. vain /veːn/, creek /krik/ vs. creak /kriːk/, etc" until someone provides a specific reference. I don't think this is true of Scottish English at all, but perhaps some dialect of Scots, in which case it should go into that article. Wiki Scot 11:31, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Phonology

I've redone the phonology section using The entry "Scottish English" from The Oxford Companion to the English language and The English Language in Scotland by Charles Jones as references. I also compared with the links suggested above. I removed all that wasn't mentioned in the references as incorrect - why didn't the references mention it? If the originators have references for what I've deleted they would be much appreciated.

Ken Mair 10.03.05

Am I alone in absolutely hating the table inserted by Nogger on 7th April? It looks awful, is technical and opaque. Also, it is completely inappropriate for an article on Scottish English. It's about Scots.

Tempted to remove it forthwith, but will wait for a bit of a discussion.

Jun 20th 2006

The table illustrates that the vowels system of Scottish English originates in Scots thus illustrating the resulting compromises and lexical transfers some of which are often mistaken for mergers (see Cot-Caught merger). Of course all that is technical and opaque. Perhaps the table could be better explained, although Background seems to to that. Perhaps that is passing on too much knowledge for Wikipedia and the article should be dummed down? 84.135.247.81 09:15, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Syntax section?

This doesn' seem too much like syntax to me. My hair needs washed could be, but some of the others, especially She's a bonnie lass seem to be a matter of diction. Also, I would like to meet this bonnie lass... :). Notthe9 18:12, 4 May 2005 (UTC)

Items 1 & 2 and (perhaps item 3) surely don't belong in the Syntax sub-section.

  1. She's a bonnie lass. for "She's a pretty girl."
  2. A dinna ken for "I don't know"
  3. D'you ken Ken kens Ken? for "Do you know Ken knows Ken?"

I'll move them when I have a moment to find their proper place, or perhaps someone else will help? Obiskobilob 12:53, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

They're more examples of Scots than of Scottish English, so they'd be better removed altogether. -- Derek Ross | Talk 04:10, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Legal Scots

I'm afraid I removed Sheriff-substitute as a peculiarly Scottish term, because it no longer exists, and never designated an acting Sheriff in any case (that would be a temporary Sheriff until recently, and a part-time Sheriff now). Sheriffs-substitute were the professional full-time judges who sat locally to hear cases, while the titular Sheriff would be an Edinburgh advocate who would hear appeals from his Sheriff-substitute. When reformed in the 1970's, Sheriffs-substitute became simply Sheriffs, and the appeal function went to the new Sheriff-Principal for each new Sheriffdom. I don't see that historically there was anything peculiarly Scottish about it: it merely designated the person who sat as substitute for the Sheriff.

There's a ton of legal stuff which could be added, but surely it's just examples of a technical vocabulary, in the same way that English and French both have technical legal vocabularies? Killiedaft 23:31, 12 May 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Scottish Vowel Length Rule

The diphthong /ai/ and it's short variant are usually lumped together with the rest of the vowels when talking of the SVLR, meaning that the long version should be found before syllable margins, voiced fricatives, or /r/. I beg to disagree with respect to the latter. 'fire', 'hire' and 'tyre' are short, and are actually usually triphthongs, with an additional schwa. 'hire' and 'higher' are distinct, with 'higher' having the long diphthong.

Awan Bile Yerheid

Is the diphthong actually long or does it only occur in what are descibed as long environments? Agreed in 'fire', 'hire' and 'tyre' /ai/ before /ər/ but wouldn't 'high' + 'er' give /hai/ + /ər/ as well or /hai:/ + /ər/?

No doubt there will be people who differentiate though.

Any references for descriptions of this?

Byltheid

Lots of accents of English can distinguish hire and higher, if people want to do so enough. Usually they don't. This is NOT part of Scottish English. From the point of view of the SVLR hire and higher are homophonous, and please, unless you can provide a proper reference to the contrary, don't add this to the Phonology section.

[edit] Doric

Surely there should be a link to, and probably, for that matter, some mention of Doric[8] in this page. -- Anon user

There are a couple of links to Scots and you'll find a link to Doric from there. I don't think that there's a particular need for a Doric link directly from this article, although I wouldn't remove one if it already existed. -- Derek Ross | Talk 21:27, May 16, 2005 (UTC)

Since this article states "Here Lowland Scots is excluded and only what is known as Scottish Standard English considered" and Doric is a dialect of Scots a link to Doric would be more appropriate in the article Scots language where it is in fact mentioned.

cliver Lounie

[edit] Syntax / Vocabulary

With the exception of "bonnie lass" & "hair needs washed", all of the examples in the section on Syntax are standard colloquial British English. It mentions the lack of should / ought without mentioning what replaces it, ie "will". How about a list of other vocabulary differences such as juice/pop, stay/live?

[edit] /* Regional accents */

I removed the section about regional accents because it wasn't worthy of wiki. It was just a confused mixture of local accent and features from local Scots dialects etc. Which are covered better elsewhere and were already liked to in the existing page.

"Dinna ye ken? for Don't you know."

Other than Scotty in Star Trek, I don't know anybody that says "dinna", most would use "dinnae".

a) That shows your lack of experience of Scots accents around Scotland. Plenty folk would never use anything but "dinna", myself included.
b) The line as quoted is bad Scots grammar anyway. It should be "Dae ye nae ken" not "Dinnae ye ken". -- Derek Ross | Talk 18:49, 19 September 2005 (UTC)
All the na in dinna is, is the traditional way of writing the Scots negative particle. Its pronounciation varies from dialect to dialect.

[edit] Needs washed

The "needs washed" phenomenon is a standard example in US introductory linguistics textbooks of regional syntactic differences within that country, although I don't recall where it occurs. — Pekinensis 17:20, 9 August 2005 (UTC)

Since so much of North America was settled by speakers of Scots or of Scottish English that doesn't surprise me. Many North Americans also pronounce "solder" as "sodder" which is the Scots (but not the Scottish English) pronunciation of the word. There is undoubtedly a lot of Scottish influence on the way many North Americans speak English. -- Derek Ross | Talk 22:43, 27 April 2006 (UTC).

[edit] Inaccurate map

This discussion has been moved to [9]

[edit] Aye (meaning yes)

This was deleted. I strongly feel as a user of Scottish English that this belongs here; 'aye' meaning always is certainly Scots, but I think my example meets all the criteria for inclusion, as well as undoubtedly being the commonest example used where I live (Leith). Thoughts? Guinnog 19:20, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

"Ken", "canna" and "dinna" are Scots rather than Scottish English but I must admit that "aye" probably straddles the divide (just as "wee" does). "Aye" meaning "yes" is used by some non-Scots in phrases like "Aye aye, captain". -- Derek Ross | Talk 19:52, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
"Aye" and "nay" are used in American English, but only in the context of parliamentary votes - parliamentary in the sense of committees and social organizations as well as lawmaking institutions (Congress and state legislatures). Cbdorsett 06:39, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps in the section Lexis add a para. ... some Scots elements which are commonly used in Scottish English are ...

[edit] References

Here are some references for the discussion to add to Wells (1982). I'll try to select some good ones for the article - if "goodness" includes ease of accessibility.

Abercrombie, D. (1979). The accents of Standard English in Scotland. In Languages of Scotland, eds. Aitken A. J. & McArthur, T., pp. 65-84. Chambers, Edinburgh.

Foulkes, P. & Docherty, G. J. (Eds.) (1999) Urban Voices: Accent Studies in the British Isles. Arnold, London.

Hewlett, N., Matthews, B. M., & Scobbie, J. M. (1999). Vowel Duration in Scottish English Speaking Children. In Proceedings of the 14th International Congress of Phonetic Sciences, pp. 2157-2160. San Francisco.

Hughes, A., Trudgill, P. & Watt, D. (2005) English Accents and Dialects (4th Ed.) Arnold, London.

Johnston, P. (1997) Regional Variation. In The Edinburgh History of the Scots Language ed. C. Jones. Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh.

Jones, C. (1997) The Edinburgh History of the Scots Language. Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh.

Lawson, E. & Stuart-Smith, J. (1999). A sociophonetic investigation of the “Scottish” consonants (/x/ and /hw/), in the speech of Glaswegian children. In Proceedings of the 14th International Congress of Phonetic Sciences, pp. 2541-2544. San Francisco.

Macafee,C. (1983). Varieties of English around the world: Glasgow. Amsterdam, Benjamins.

Macafee, C. (1994) Traditional dialect in the modern world: a Glasgow case study. Peter Lang, Frankfurt am Main.

Marshall, J. (2004). Language change and sociolinguistics: Rethinking social networks. Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke.

Robinson, C. & Crawford, C. A. (2001). Scotspeak: a guide to the pronunciation of modern urban Scots. Scots Language Resource Centre, Perth.

Scobbie, J. M., Hewlett, N., & Turk, A. (1999a). Standard English in Edinburgh and Glasgow: the Scottish Vowel Length Rule revealed. In Urban Voices: Accent Studies in the British Isles, eds. P.Foulkes & G.Docherty, pp. 230-245. Arnold, London.

Stuart-Smith, J. (1999). Glasgow: accent and voice quality. In Urban Voices: Accent Studies in the British Isles, eds. P.Foulkes & G.Docherty, pp. 203-222. Arnold, London.

Stuart-Smith, J. (2003) The phonology of modern urban Scots. In eds. Corbett, J., McClure, J. D., & Stuart-Smith. pp. 110-137. Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh.

Wiki Scot 23:14, 18 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Sound Files

What format is that soundfile? My computer can't do anything with it. I bet I'm not alone. Seems to have been a bit of a pointless excercise.

Technotwat

Hi Technotwat, the file is in .ogg format which is the only permitted sound format on wikipedia. Believe me, I'd rather use MP3 but it's not allowed. There's a page here: Wikipedia:Media help (Ogg) which should help you play them. By the way, I won't take it personally if someone can find a better representative accent than mine, but I do think there should be one! Thparkth 23:30, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Cot-Caught merger

"Essentially the Scots vowel system [10] has been applied to English lexical incidence (Macafee 2002). [...] The case of LOT and THOUGHT is complicated, in that Scots speakers did not have to split one phoneme into two similar ones, but had to transfer part of the inventory to a completely different sound not corresponding to anything existing in the Scots system. Vowel 5+18 had to be split between /o/ and RP LOT /ɑ/, to which the nearest sound was Vowel 12 /ɔ/, and LOT words accordingly went to /ɔ/ together with THOUGHT words. The resulting impression of a merger is illusory. (The FOOT/GOOSE case is exactly the same.)" (Macafee 2004: 74)

[edit] Scottish vowel system

I'm not a dab hand with Wells' lexical sets. The table may need correcting/adjusting or adding to. Nogger 19:49, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Introduction

The introduction paragraph to this article:

Scottish English is taken by some to include Scots and by others to exclude it. In this article, however, Scots is excluded and only what is known as Scottish Standard English (SSE) is considered. There is a separate article on Scottish Highland English.

Is very confusing and doesn't actually state simply what Scottish English is as it should do. Canderra 02:48, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

Then enlighten us and rewrite it so that we are all is a position to know what Scottish English is.
84.135.213.97 12:14, 12 May 2006 (UTC)
OK, I have re-phrased the introduction to place the definition of Scottish English in the first sentance where it belongs, and to make it generally clearer to the casual reader. The only sentance I removed was the short one which reads: "Phonetics are in IPA.", which I placed in the Phonology section.
I do not know much about Scottish English (and more specifically, about it's relationship with Scottish Gaelic language and Scots), so please change it if I have made any mistakes or if you feel you can make it better in any way. Canderra 16:06, 12 May 2006 (UTC)
Since when has Scottish English had an official form?
84.135.213.97 18:27, 12 May 2006 (UTC)
The original paragraph reads: "It is the language normally used in formal, non-fictional written texts in Scotland.". I think this and the fact it is what is predominantly taught in schools, qualifies it's "official" status. Maybe it's not the best word to use though. Can you think of anything better? Canderra 18:36, 12 May 2006 (UTC)
"Other forms of the English language in Scotland are Scottish Gaelic language and Scots. Some people consider Scottish English to include Scots language."
Since when has Scottish Gaelic been a form o English?
84.135.216.23 08:21, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Proposed merge: Scottish colloquial terms

At this AFD discussion - Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Scottish colloquial terms - it has been proposed that the Scottish colloquial terms article be merged into this one (after cleanup). What do other Users think? --Mais oui! 05:15, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

The Scottish colloquial terms article is a mixture of Scots, Glaswegian slang, and phonetically spelled English. It's frankly off-topic for this article besides being a list of dicdefs more suited to wiktionary. . -- Derek Ross | Talk 06:23, 5 July 2006 (UTC)
I second that. Why spoil a good article by adding a load of confused crap?
172.189.39.27 21:18, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Peeve meaning alcoholic drink

I've never heard of this in any part of Scotland. The Urban Dictionary suggests it might be Cumbrian. Devilgate 14:13, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

never heard it either 81.129.169.166 10:09, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Intrusive R

Is the intrusive R commonly used in Scotland? --The Lazar 04:07, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

No. Scottish accents are all rhotic -- although a few use back-R instead of front-R -- which means that our pronunciation differentiates between long vowels and vowels followed by R. Hence we never add non-existent "R"s to long vowels as speakers with non-rhotic accents (like RP) often do. -- Derek Ross | Talk 04:41, 24 September 2006 (UTC)
That's called hypercorrection, I think. Cbdorsett 06:36, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Unclear?

It would be nice if the "Syntax" section were elaborated on, since the given examples are not actually explained (like hair needs washed) from a grammatical perspective. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 68.163.131.152 (talk • contribs) 02:33, 24 November 2006.

[edit] Or, oar and awe

I was once told that most Scottish accents differentiated from English accents by having distinct pronunciations for or, oar and awe. If this is true, it would be a good example to list in this article. --ML5 12:41, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

They do have different pronunciations. That's why they have different spellings. In fact from the Scottish point of view, there is a fourth member of the group, 'owe', which is 'oar' without the 'r', just as 'awe' is 'or' without the 'r'. -- Derek Ross | Talk 16:57, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

yup standard english pronounces -aw- as -or- the dafties 81.129.169.166 10:11, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] How come

in the article we are told "How?" is used to replace "Why?" surely it would be "how come?" Davidb90 10:16, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

Nope. Typical usage might be "How are you not coming to the party tonight?" or "How does he get an ice-cream but I don't?". In both of these the questioner wants to know the reason, not the method. -- Derek Ross | Talk 23:49, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
You know, I've heard this usage of "how" in American English as well; it gives the utterance a bit of a poetic quality. "How come" is of course more common, and often used by children. I would note that in the right context, "how" is understood to mean "why", but it is not 100% fully interchangeable. I think it may have to do with whether or not the usual "how" meaning makes any sense in the sentence. Consider the two examples given by Derek Ross. The word could not possibly mean "how" in that context, so we understand it to mean "why". Cbdorsett 05:06, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
American English has quite a lot of Scottish influence. I didn't know about the "How" one but another one that I was aware of was the American use of the Scots pronunciation of "solder" (to rhyme with "fodder") in place of the English pronunciation (to rhyme with "boulder"). -- Derek Ross | Talk 06:22, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
Yes, indeed, plenty of Scottish influence. Someone once called me on using the word "stymie" - I thought it was perfectly acceptable American English, and this other person thought it was obscure slang. Go figure. Cbdorsett 06:35, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

from personal experience people also say 'how come you're not coming to the party?' and 'how come he got an ice cream?', i would never say 'how no' but i frequently use 'how come', 'how no' is what a ned would say not a scottish person 86.146.54.184 15:50, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

How not?:}82.41.4.66 04:24, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, how does 86.146.54.184 not think that neds can be Scottish persons ? -- Derek Ross | Talk 06:31, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
The unstoppable desire of the Scots to become English results in the avoidanace of Scotticisms and the adoption of the much more civilised English practices. It is no wonder that many people rarely experience such Scotticisms they are dying out. As 86.146.54.184 points out, only neds are too stupid to be able to ape their English betters.
84.135.206.220 12:52, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for venting here and not on the main article page. Sounds a bit POV, eh? Cbdorsett 13:17, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
Since when has well researched anthropology been POV?
84.135.206.220 15:58, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
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