ULSTER SCOTS
The Guid Guide to finding that elusive `Ulster Scots'
CULTURE COMMENT BY Brian MacLoughlainn
Irish News 26 September 1996
I WAS astonished to hear that the European investigators could not locate any communities speaking the "Ulster Scots language" in Ulster during their visit. Maybe they were looking in the wrong place.
Did they progress, for example, beyond south Belfast where the propaganda comes from? Again, they seem to have had some preconceived notions about the nature of the beast which may have led them astray.
For example, they thought it was a unionist language and this may have led them on a wild goose chase up the Shankill or along the Newtownards Road. Or, they may have asked for the wrong thing; native speakers call it "Plain Inglish" as opposed to "Polite Inglish" and if you ask them where they speak "Ulster Scots" they will you need your head examined. `Scots' are people. `Scotch' is the adjective which describes anything to do with Scotland, as in, `a guid Scotch night'.
But I can understand their difficulty - it's a bit like looking for Irish in the Gaeltacht so, for the benefit of future investigators, I will now list in alphabetical order, the places known to me in Co Antrim where the elusive tongue may be heard: Ballycastle, Ballyclare, The Braid Valley (excluding Ballymena), Carnal banagh, Carnlough, Dunloy, Glenarm, Larne, Loughguile. Another useful tip is that any place in north Antrim which produces a hurling team is Scotch Inglish speaking, except Cushendall. I don't know much about Co Down but I have met tourists from Kilkeel in this area and we were able to converse in the vernacular with no difficulty. I have a lot of relations in the Limavady area and it is their native tongue as well. I also hear it is widely spoken in east Donegal.
There are two main dialects of Scotch Inglish in Ulster: The Antrim/Down version arrived with migrants and is close to Ayrshire speech. The Derry/Donegal version was brought back by seasonal workers in Scotland and is close to the speech of the Stirling area. Neither Ulster nor Scottish versions are any closer to Norse than dialects of the north of England. I joined the Ulster Scots Language Society a few years ago, despite their posh English title, at the inaugural meeting in Ballyclare town hall. The proceedings were in standard English with a few people doing comic `turns' in `Ulster Scots'. I sought out the Heich Heid Yin and addressed him in the medium. He countered in the Queen's English: "And do you always speak the old language?"
I later wrote to them suggesting that we should meet in a neutral venue as the décor in Ballyclare town hall is not exactly cross-community friendly. There was no reply.
The notice of the next meeting stated that it would take place in the Somme Hospital in east Belfast. I thought they were trying to tell me something, as `Ulster Scots' speech does not fill the air in that area as far as I know. So I had to let my membership lapse.
So, is it a language, a dialect, or what? I think the most accurate description
is that it is a dialect which, in the mouth of a good speaker, diverges
enough at times from modern standard English to present difficulties of
comprehension to the uninitiated. It is a survival of some elements of mediaeval
English and would have presented no difficulty to Chaucer. But no grammar
of it has even been written, there is no widely agreed spelling and virtually
no literature originating in Ulster apart from the weaver poets, mainly
James Orr of Ballycarry and he was a Burns imitator. It has not developed
to deal with the modern world but merged with standard English. |
