When is a language not a language?
Date: 16th June '01
Name: Oor Wullie
Country: SundayPostLand
This is from the latest issue of Scottish Socialist Voice, the SSP's now weekly newspaper. The advocates of this 'Lallan Scots' (that's Lowland Scots to those in need of subtitles) "language" are as out-to-lunch as those unionists and loyalists in the north of Ireland who have tried to promote their own dialect of English which they call "Ulster Scots" as having equal status with the Irish language. Mancunians, Scousers, Brummies, Bristolians, Cockneys and West Country folk please take note... Your accents and dialects may actually be a language just waiting to be funded by the EU.
Don't get me wrang noo... there's naithin wrang wi writin in yer ain dialect... bit that's whit it is... a dialect, no a langwich.
Bizarre, but the SSP is full of rank opportunists and extreme populists that will gladly embrace even the more lunatic sections of Scottish society should they show the remotest interest in the party...
Read on MacDuff...
Scottish Socialist Voice - 15/6/01
The mither tung o workin class fowk
by Stuart McHardy
FACT - Scots is a language on its ain.
FACT - it's been aroun in ae form or anither for ower a thoosan year.
FACT - the British government has estimated at least 1.5 million fowk in Scotland still speak it as thair main language.
FACT - alang wi Basque, Breton, Catalan an monie ithers, Scots is recognised as a European Lesser Used Language.
Despite recognisin Scots as a language, the government haes nae real intention o supportin the mither tung as waes shown bi thair refusal tae include Scots language quaistions in the census.
Thay hae nae bather wi supportin Gaelic seein as it has sae few speakers it
cannae really be uised tae build onie poleetical power base tae challenge oor oot-dated an inherently
corrupt pairty poleetical system.
The fact that Gaelic, wi less nor 70,000 speakers gets millions, whan Scots,
spoken by mair nor a million, gets a few thoosan is aw richt bi thaim.
It's been gey obvious ower this past wee whilie that the main poleetical pairties are mair concerned wi graspin power than wi representin the interests o thaim who gie thaim thair jobs - us, the electorate.
An the truth o the maitter is that monie Scots speakers in Scotland are, or hae been, workin class - the destruction o oor main industries ovwer the past couple o decades means monie fowk ha've nivver kennt employment and arenae likely tae.
We hae whit are nou cawed areas o multiple deprivation - baith rural an urban - whaur maist fowk speak Scots.
It's amang sic fowk that votin's aye the lowest - no onlie dae the main pairties ignore thaim, thay nivver address thaim in thair ain tung - Scots.
Jist as ye need English tae get an education, sae ye hae tae uise English in a maitters o public discoorse. Whit's that aw aboot? It's aboot prejudice. There's a lot o Scots language activists A've haud tell me that the fowk in the schemes dinnae speak Scots, thay jist speak slang!! An that's fae fowk wha see thairsels as educated an informed!
An aw the time, oor poleeticians, (hou monie cam fae the workin class an got thair education on government grants thay nou deny oor children?) jist pretend there's naethin wrang.
They ken fine that to get on thay'd tae anglicise thair ain speech but dinnae really want remindin.
By international law, tae which the British government are signatories, it's jist as illegal tae discriminate agin onie individual because o thair language as it is thair colour, sex, religion or poleetical belief.
By nivver uisin Scots in onie official wey - ye'll see aw kins o government pamphlets in Bengali, Punjabi, Urdu an Welsh - fowk wha onlie ivver speak in Scots are kept as ootsiders in thair ain land.
Gin ye're tellt ye speak a coorse dialect, that ye're ignorant an unemployable whit's the pynt in votin?
Speakin tae fowk in thair ain language is a first step tae poleetical empowerment, ken whit A mean?
Stuart McHardy is the editor of a new anthology of poems in the Scots language published by Luath Press
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