Talk:Scots language

Lead sentence removal question

Does anyone have qualms with me removing the three instances of "Scots" in a row in the first sentence to reduce redundancies? As it currently reads: Scots (Scots: Scots; Scottish Gaelic: Albais/Beurla Ghallda) is a West Germanic language variety, when we could just have Scots (Scottish Gaelic: Albais/Beurla Ghallda) is a West Germanic language variety. Wolfdog (talk) 11:13, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

It's not redundant, it notes the term for the tongue in Scots. That in this instance a term in Scots is the same as the term in English wouldn't be evident unless it is noted. Mutt Lunker (talk) 11:53, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

What about Scots (endonym: Scots; Scottish Gaelic: Albais/Beurla Ghallda) ...? –Austronesier (talk) 12:03, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

Possibly, am pondering it. Your suggestion is It's clear to me, provides the information about the term for Scots in Scots, though I know what endonym means. It may be less clear to those who don't know what endonym means but all they have to do is click. It may be preferable to those who are confused about what is being conveyed, per the earlier thread above. Mutt Lunker (talk) 12:11, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

It's clear to me as well, but only because I frequently edit WP language pages. My kneejerk feeling is that it's perplexing. I'd be on board for Austronesier's endonym workaround. Wolfdog (talk) 18:23, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

Sorry, just realised I was being ambiguous. Though the current version is clear to me it does seem to perplex some people and in my last post I was meaning that Austronesier's suggestion is (also) clear to me. Go for it. Mutt Lunker (talk) 19:41, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

Erm.. not directly about there being three but.. 'Beurla Ghallda' from looking around it means to 'speak with foreign tongue'.. yes that's original research and I am not going to change it myself, but couldn't that apply to any foreign language? Google translates 'Berula' as 'English'.. so is it a slight against the Scots language and so would be disqualified as hate speech on wikipedia. just some thoughts there.

Dava4444 (talk) 17:20, 18 November 2021 (UTC)

All I can say is that in Gaeilge "Bérla" simply refers to the english language even if the literal meaning is different. Similar to the way "Sasanach" may literally mean foreigner but is only used to mean "English Person". WikiLearnedMeGood (talk) 19:30, 7 December 2022 (UTC)

Indigenous

Should it actually be classified as an indigenous language when it came from german settlers? Shouldn't the indigenous language be a celtic language like Gaelic? Malcolmmwa (talk) 00:39, 22 March 2022 (UTC)

By that logic, celtic languages wouldn't count either as the celtic settlers didn't spring from the Scottish soil either. Or the pre-celtic ones. Mutt Lunker (talk) 10:28, 22 March 2022 (UTC)

The term 'indigenous' can be used in various ways, and ideally, the qualification as 'indigenous' should always be attributed to a given source. In this case, the source is the Scottish government, as can be read in the linked web page. FWIW, the category "indigenous languages of Scotland" also includes Gaelic and English. So the ideal phrasing would be: "Scots is recognised by the Scottish government as an indigenous language of Scotland (next to Gaelic and English)". But this is just too heavy for the lede section, I guess. –Austronesier (talk) 19:02, 22 March 2022 (UTC)

Scots is also from Scotland so therefore it's safe to say it's an indigenous language 2600:8801:FB13:6B00:CE9F:FED6:F584:5708 (talk) 04:57, 29 January 2024 (UTC)

Danelaw influence

This article is missing any mention of Dano-English influence (from the Danelaw) on Scots, but I routinely encounter mention of this is source material (especially etymological).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  00:00, 8 July 2023 (UTC)

Distinct from the influence of Northumbria? Mutt Lunker (talk) 16:08, 8 July 2023 (UTC)

The article mention it "It began to further diverge from the Middle English of Northumbria due to twelfth and thirteenth-century immigration of Scandinavian-influenced Middle English-speakers from the North and Midlands of England." Nogger (talk) 18:54, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

Note about comparison with Danish and Norwegian

Should probably specifically refer to Bokmål. Nynorsk and Norwegian dialects in general aren’t closely related to Danish. 94.191.136.226 (talk) 17:19, 15 June 2024 (UTC)

(new section)

I suck at Wiki editing but can some mod or whatever add that it's a recognised minority language in the EU too?

Source: https://www.coe.int/en/web/european-charter-regional-or-minority-languages — Preceding unsigned comment added by 220.156.12.92 (talk • contribs)

Scots_language#Decline_in_status appears to deal with that. Mutt Lunker (talk) 10:43, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

"Easter eggs & questionable terms"

@Mutt Lunker: I can understand why you would consider linking "Anglian" to Old English#Dialects, though I'd say it's the closest thing we have to a dedicated section discussing the Northumbrian and Mercian dialects collectively as the Anglian dialects, a classification which is supported by A History of the English Language by Albert Baugh and Thomas Cable (page 47). I do not see how the term Anglian, and in particular referring to Scots and modern Northumbrian as having common descent from Old Northumbrian is particularly controversial. Arctic Circle System (talk) 15:38, 19 August 2024 (UTC)

Piping to "Old Northumbrian" from Northumbrian Old English seems odd. Mutt Lunker (talk) 16:33, 19 August 2024 (UTC)

@Matt Lunker: If that was your only objection, I would have appreciated if you made that clearer by only changing that part of the edit instead of reverting the whole thing. Regardless, my intention was for it to be a shorthand so as not to clutter the infobox as much. I believe I'd seen that used on other pages before, one of them being Northumbrian dialect. However, if that is a major point of contention, I will put the full name of Northumbrian Old English in the infobox rather than piping it to anything. Arctic Circle System (talk) 22:12, 19 August 2024 (UTC)

It was not my only objection. Mutt Lunker (talk) 09:40, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

@Arctic Circle System Where did you get the term "Anglian" from, and how is it distinct from the Anglic languages? Theknightwho (talk) 23:37, 19 August 2024 (UTC)

@Theknightwho: If you actually read my post, you would know where I got it from. Arctic Circle System (talk) 02:36, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

@Arctic Circle System The problem is that that source doesn't support the argument that it's a distinct clade within Anglic; it just supports the idea that "Anglian" is a synonym for "Anglic". You ignored the second half of my question, which was the important part. Theknightwho (talk) 02:44, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

@Theknightwho: No it does not. The section I'm talking about specifically refers to Northumbrian and Mercian. Emphasis mine.

We can distinguish four dialects in Old English times: Northumbrian, Mercian, West Saxon, and Kentish. Of these Northumbrian and Mercian are found in the region north of the Thames settled by the Angles. They possess certain features in common and are sometimes known collectively as Anglian. But Northumbrian, spoken north of the Humber, and Mercian, between the Humber and the Thames, each possess certain distinctive features as well.

— Albert Baugh, The Dialects of Old English, A History of the English Language, page 47, line 2

Arctic Circle System (talk) 02:58, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

@Arctic Circle System Alright, but it still makes no sense to list Northumbrian Old English as a family. Theknightwho (talk) 03:06, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

@Theknightwho: It's well-established that Scots, Cumbrian, and modern Northumbrian are all related by common descent from Northumbrian Old English, meaning they are a language family (or language or dialect group if you want to be pedantic), though I haven't found any common name for this group as of yet. Since calling it just Northumbrian would lead to confusion with the modern Northumbrian dialect group, and since calling it Old Northumbrian is also an issue according to Matt Lunker, I struggle to come up with a term that covers that group for the purpose of actually putting it in the infobox where it should be while also not getting reverted it within a day for said terminology. Arctic Circle System (talk) 03:16, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

@Arctic Circle System Yes, it's an ancestor, but it's still not a family, in the same way that Proto-Indo-European isn't a family either. Scots is not a form of Northumbrian Old English, just as Latin and Sanskrit aren't forms of Proto-Indo-European, even though they're Indo-European languages. That's the difference. Anything else is original research. Theknightwho (talk) 03:29, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

@Theknightwho: I am aware that Northumbrian Old English itself isn't a language family, but the suggestion that a group of dialects descending from a common ancestor isn't a language family despite that being the literal definition of a language family is absurd. And the idea that Scots, modern Northumbrian, and Cumbrian descend from NOE is not at all controversial. Arctic Circle System (talk) 03:38, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

@Arctic Circle System Again, that's why it's already listed as an ancestor. However, if you want to list a family then you're going to have to find a source that actually describes one; otherwise it's WP:SYNTHESIS. Theknightwho (talk) 03:44, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

I'm going to step away from this conversation for a bit and come back later. Arctic Circle System (talk) 04:35, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

I agree with @Mutt Linker and @Theknightwho and see two problems here. First, you have to keep subgroups as cladistic entities separate from their respective ancestors, whether they are reconstructed or actually documented (e.g. Danish is a descendant from Old Norse, but not a member of the "Old Norse" subgroup of the Germanic languages). Also, the classification of modern varieties has to be based on sources that actually classify modern varieties. You cannot graft statements about decent from a documented ancestor onto a classification of that ancestor among its sister varieties at that time in the past. Of course, this generally works among more distantly related languages, but then we need a source that exactly says so. In a dialect continuum, things are less unequivocal. Wave-like innovations can completely submerge earlier dialect boundaries and produce new ones. The Anglo-Scottish border remained permeable, otherwise we wouldn't have diphthongization of *ī or fronting of (primary or secondary) long *ā. So it's not just a matter of SYNTHESIS, but for the position of modern Scots within the Anglic dialect continuum we really need sources that talk about the linguistic classification of present varieties. –Austronesier (talk) 08:20, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

@Austronesier: @Mutt Lunker: @Theknightwho: I am aware that subgroups as cladistic entities are separate from their respective ancestors, I listed it in the way I did because while the literature I'd found did say that Scots and modern Northumbrian are descended from Northumbrian Old English, they frequently didn't go as far as to name the group. Regardless, I think these sources would be useful for this discussion and support my claims: The Pronunciation of Traditional Dialects (Figure 2.1 in particular) in Peter Trudgill's The Dialects of England; the Middle English entry in Concise Oxford Companion to the English Language; Is (Older) Scots an Anglic variety? by Charles-Henri Discry (along with its subsequent addendum). I am currently looking for more as we speak, but hopefully this should help. Arctic Circle System (talk) 01:07, 21 August 2024 (UTC)