Sunday, September 23, 2018

Mysterious English

Traveling in Scotland means lots of new words. What's a bothy? What's a crofter? What's a loch??




8 comments:

  1. To the Scottish illiterate, I shall translate the sentence:

    There's a quiet house in the small stream just by the field at the edge of the lake.

    Hope that helps.

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  2. "Crivens!
    Nac Mac Feegle! The Wee Free Men! Nae king! Nae quin! Nae laird! Nae master! We willna' be fooled again!”

    The biggest fear of the Nac Mac Feegle: WORDS!

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    Replies
    1. A word writ doon can hang a man...

      ("There can only be whin t'oosand!")

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  3. I once made my ESL students listen to "Auld Lang Syne" on Burns' Night. Their facial expressions were hilarious! I've never seen such panic and confusion in a language lesson :)
    Then again, what do you expect when someone sings "we twa hae run about the braes and pu'd the gowans fine"... :P

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  4. Many people consider Scots English to be it's own language, since it's far enough away from Standard English to have issues with mutual comprehension.

    Far enough away that there's now a Scots translation of Harry Potter, which is incredibly enjoyable to read!

    https://smile.amazon.com/Harry-Potter-Philosophers-Stane-Language/dp/1785301543/

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    Replies
    1. Well, Scots tended be different folk from Britons back in day ...assume got well along with vikings of era which might help with local language transformation.

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