Tongue-tied
This is a pity, for it encourages the opposite reactions, like that of Norman Murphy, who reiterates the view that Scots is no longer a language as Gaelic is. This will be seen as a nonsense when a full Scots canon is commonly known.
IAIN WD FORDE
Main Street
Scotlandwell, Kinross-shire
Here we go again. For Norman DH Murphy (Letters, 2 March), the Scots leid, "an increasingly debased dialect, over-rich in glottal stops", can be reduced to "semi-literate, grunting, incoherent" noises.
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Hide AdThe reality is that it shouldn't matter whether Scots is a bona fide language (as I believe it is) or the mere dialect Mr Murphy and his too numerous ilk call it (usually with a sneer: what matters is that it is a means of communication, in all its variants and registers.
English as we know it is, after all, a dialect, albeit that of authority. We've got used to it, given it the status of "standard", but it is of no greater intrinsic value than its regional variants. There's barely a language in Europe that isn't basically a dialect.
AONGHAS MACNEACAIL
Carlops
Peeblesshire