Irish English and the Ulster Scots Controversy by Jeffrey Kallen
From: Ulster Folk Life Vol.45, 1999. (Published by Ulster Folk & Transport Museum, Cultra)
Turning to syntax, I examine the use of do and inflected be (e.g. she bees) as habitual markers in Ulster Scots. Again, we start with Robinson:
Ulster Scots......avoids the strong is, am and ir forms when there is any sense of continuity, permanence or habit intended. So rather than 'I am sick in the mornings' or even 'I get sick in the mornings' we would say A wud be (or dae be) seek o a moarnin or A wud (or dae) tak bad o a moarnin' 78,
This 'auxiliary dae' according to Robinson, 'is often used to introduce an 'ongoing' sense or 'habitual' mood (and then is also often in the -s form)' as in The dae ait gye an earlie sae the dae 'They (do) eat very early' Baith of thaim daes get coul 'Both of them tend to get cold' and He daes be earlie an aa 'He is (always) early too.' 79. Noting examples such as A bees bad ilka morn sae A am and He aye bees bad quhan (when) he rises, Robinson also argues that inflected bees can be used with subjects of any person or number, as 'the s form of verbs in Ulster Scots, can be used to indicate a 'habitual' or ongoing condition.' 80.
At first glance, the uses of do and be described for Ulster Scots look very much like those which have been noted for general Irish English. The co-occurrence of do and be as a habitual marker in Irish English has been noted since the 19th century, 81, and both the do be collocation and inflected be have been described in broadly similar terms as habitual markers by many commentators. 82
Looking at the Ulster Scots and other evidence in the light of the variation controversy introduces a number of elements which are not generally considered together. First consider the Scots context. Grant and Dixon, like Robinson, note that 'in ordinary speech the termination s is sometimes added to the 1st person sing., especially of habitual action' (e.g. I rises ilka day at sax) 83. Yet, significantly, Grant and Dixon do not note the use of inflected be to denote habitual aspect in Scots, nor do they note any such usage for do. 84. Neither is such a pattern ascribed to Scots in the Dictionary of the Older Scottish Tongue (DOST), the Scottish National Dictionary (SND) or Montgomery and Kirk's treatment of inflected be in Ulster. 85. Grant and Dixon further point out that Scots uses a habitual type adverb aye 'always' 86 cf. Their paired examples, He's fond o' gutterin aboot and He's aye gutteran aboot 87. Robinson glosses aye as 'ever, always' 88 and Ulster Scots examples are found throughout his work, e.g. A'm aye awa aa that simmertim 'I'm always away all summer' and The Boyds wuz aye kintra fowk, sae the wur 'The Boyds have always been country folk'.89 Robinson also notes some uses of inflected be which should not be confused with the habitual marker, although the resulting surface forms look quite similar. He bees tae cum themorra and He bees tae cut tha grass, in which, according to Robinson, the sense of be plus infinitive denotes obligation, comparable to ''must'' or ''ought''90. Attention to habitual marking in the Scottish context thus shows that Ulster Scots shares the use of word final s and adverbial aye with Scots in Scotland, but it is divergent from Scots in using the do be and inflected be constructions as fully grammatical habitual markers. 91.
Since the do be and inflected be constructions in Ulster Scots are very much evident elsewhere in Ireland, the demands of the variation controversy push us to try to characterise these forms more fully. Some controversy arises over semantic issues. Henry, for example, distinguishes between do be and inflected be on semantic grounds, so that an 'iterative durative' sense (as in There bees a fret o' people at the fairs o'Boyle) contracts with the 'punctual present with iterative aspect' using do followed by the main verb, as in He does come when he hears the noise. 92. Harris and Todd likewise separate the two forms on semantic grounds, though each uses different terminology and characterisations. 93.
While it may be agreed that both forms tend to focus on notions of habit,
repetition, or generic status, 94, what is not well understood is the geographical
distribution of these forms. Inflected do plus a main verb, as the data
from Ulster Scots, Henry and Harris show 95, is found panlectally in Ireland.
As the sources cited here show, the do be collocation also appears throughout
Ireland. Yet not all examples of do be are alike. Henry's survey of rural
dialects showed the use of do combined with auxiliary be plus a main verb,
as in.....birds that does be a shooting (Bragan, Co. Monaghan) and there
do be a yellow flower come on that (Glencar, Co. Kerry) 96. In Dublin, however
the 61 examples of generic/habitual marking which I reported on in 1989,
included only three uses of do plus be as an auxiliary verb (e.g. He does
be weighing things out for me for when I'm on me own). Instead, stative
uses where be is the main verb (e.g. I do be half asleep in the morning)
accounted for 28 examples there were 10 occurrences of do plus other verbs
(e.g. Me ma does tell me I'm livin on my nerves) and a further 15 uses combined
habitual do with negatives or questions, as in Now don't be eatin any more
of them dictionaries and I don't be hungry at all really. 97. Such data
suggests that aspectual do preceding a main verb, do preceding be where
be is the main verb and do together will be as an auxiliary preceding a
main verb are actually separate devices for generic/habitual marking, each
of which is subject to its own linguistic, geographic and social conditioning.
The Ulster Scots patterns suggested by Robinson'' fragmentary data must
be understood in relation to these forms as used in Ireland as a whole. |
