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Comment by craigsmansion | Hacker News Reader

Much as I enjoy the Scots accent, it's just that: an accent.

I know: "the difference between a language and a dialect is an army and a navy." (meaning: there is no difference)

But insisting Scots is a separate language feels like a nationalist thing. As the article mentions, it's not that Scotland doesn't have a real language all its own, Scottish Gaelic. But that would take time to study and master, and it's easier to really dive into your local pronunciation up to a point where no one understands it as English, write it down phonetically, and claim it's a language.

From the article:

"Ye may gang faur an fare waur" apparently meaning: "You may go further and do a lot worse",

or,

"you may go farther and fare worse", if you pronounce it in dialect and just write it down like that.

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Fit ye bletherin on aboot ... I'd disagree.

I'd say it's a dialect; with an accent vocabulary matches somewhat, but Scots differs considerably in word use and has grammatical differences. In fact I'd be prepared to say there may be a language hidden away there somewhere, but because in use people mix it with a more standard English it's akin to a creole, perhaps.

My in-laws introduced me to "Scotland the What", and for the first few watchings mutual comprehension with my native British English was on a par with understanding Afrikaans [exaggeration]. But I think that show itself is a dialect of Scots (Doric), which supports the higher claims to linguistic independence IMO.

    "Bi foo, fit, far an fan,
    Ye can tell a Farfar man" (traditional poem)

Which of you loons and quines recognises that top line as "by who, what, where and when,"?

That said, there are lots of differences in the UK in vernacular language use: What you call your bread rolls (bread cakes, barms, baps, rolls, buns, muffin, batch, cob, etc.), or a lane (wynd [Scots], ginnel, snicket, alley, passage, jitty, etc.), for example. I imagine this is similar in other countries, certainly it seems that way in France to some extent.

If I tell you what locals called their lunch where I grew up it locates me to within about a 20 mile radius; 5 or 6 towns. But even with that Scots seems more broadly distinctive.

Scots Gaelic is the best option if we have to have one, but TBH I'm not sure that the majority of scottish people really resonate with it, as it's not been a significantly used language for the majority of Scottish people in hundreds of years.

On the scots pronunciation thing, yeah that's usually how I work out what it is, just say the words out loud with a scottish accent and I can work out what they're getting at.

>but that would take time to study and master, and it's easier to really dive into your local pronunciation up to a point where no one understands it as English, write it down phonetically, and claim it's a language.

It's more political than that, there is a protestant/catholic aspect to it too, although that is more pronounces in Ulster.

The article also says

> Scots never incorporated all that Norman stuff

So wouldn't that mean these 20 Norman words from your English-language comment above:

> enjoy, accent, difference, language, dialect, army, navy, insist, separate, nation, article, mention, real, study, master, local, pronounce, point, claim, apparent

wouldn't exist in Scots? That's a language, not a dialect.

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