Scots Wahae!



Crikey, just reaslised the Scottish Parliament has now added Scots to the 'other languages' options on their website. However, they are still not about to have signage in the new building in Scots. They will be in English and Gaelic, but not BroadScots. Now I am perfectly happy for my tax money to be used to promote Gaelic language and culture and for all parliamentary documentation and signage to be bilingual English and Gaelic. But why do they refuse to have Scots? Galeic, much as I support it, now only has a little over 60,000 native speakers in Scotland. For about a millenium now it has been the language of the western Isles and Highland region, whereas Scots is the primary language for the bulk of the nation. Why therefore is it not given equal prominence? Seems odd to give (much needed and deserved) support to one native language spoke by a minority while largely ignoring the majority language. Reminds me too much of my school days when - with the exception of studying Burns or Dunbar - our English classes were designed to make us all write and talk BBC English and destroy regional diversity in language. Thanks goodness for ItchyCoo publishing Scots language books for kids to help keep our language alive. Try their site on the Black & White Publishing web page. As well as details of some of their braw books there is a pop-up with a Scots word of the day. Cool.