[Ads-l] From Britain to Texas

Tue Sep 20 16:52:18 UTC 2016

Hm ... have I been caught with my identity politics showing, or was my initial
howl of outrage justified?

While I take Larry's point, I would draw attention to the level of specificity
which Wilson was adducing -- thus not, "From Britain to America [or 'the
USA'?]", which I might have been prepared to admit, but from ... what he said.

To be fair all round, and perhaps reflecting a level of prejudice which was more
common in the eighteenth century than now, I mibee should have said, "From the
Lowlands of Scotland [couched in braid Scots -- I utterly abhor the synthetic
term, "Lallans"] to Texas [outwith the Nation], rather than either the Southron
Lands or the Gaeltacht [where the teuchters eat their living young]."

Remember Flodden ... Glencoe ... Bloody-handed Claverhouse ... The Clearances
... the Hag of Grantham and the Poll Tax!

Enough, already.

Outraged from Kelvinside.

(Incidentally, from Larry's list below, the only fraction* of, to give it its
full name, "Great Britain and Northern Ireland", who self-identify as "British"
are Northern Ireland Protestants.  Go figure.  R.)

* I use the term "fraction" in that instance in its technical Trotskyist** sense
-- I hope everyone was paying close enough attention to give me proper credit
for this.

Himself.

** Wilson, as a fellow SF aficionado, you might be interested in the work of the
Glasgow [specifically, in this instance ***] writer Ken MacLeod, whose first
novel was called _The Star Fraction_.  A seriously gallus cheil, thon yin.

a.k.a. The Wee MacGreegor

*** One last ultra-pedantic point -- parts of _The Star Faction_ aren't simply
located in Glasgow, but in a howlingly local time frame, since in my day, the
Queen Margaret Union didn't allow critters of the male persuasion entrance other
than to a very narrow range of social events.  I'd place it mid to late
seventies.

The Gonzo Scholar

(Oh, I know I shouldn't, but I just remembered this, and it's too good not to
pass on -- somewhere embedded in _The Star Fraction_ is a Trotskyist version of
the Dilly song, known in America as "Children, come as I call thee".  Is that
the correct title?  Whatever, a traditional counting song, best rendered by the
Seekers IMHO.

The Lilywhite Boy)

> 
>     On 20 September 2016 at 16:11 Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
> wrote:
> 
> 
>     But wouldn't Scots folk tales, songs, and singers also be British? Does
> "Britain" not include Scotland, Wales, and at least Northern Ireland--i.e.
> those who make up the Br in Brexit? (And yes, I know how the Scots voted.) Or
> is that just Great Britain?
> 
>     LH
> 
>     > On Sep 20, 2016, at 12:24 AM, Robin Hamilton
>     > <robin.hamilton3 at VIRGINMEDIA.COM> wrote:
>     >
>     > Wilson, how *could* you do this -- "From Britain [sic] to Texas". The
>     > earliest
>     > (and best early) versions are SCOTS!!! (Sorry to shout, but.)
>     >
>     > Bet you it jumps straight from Scotland to the blues singers, without
>     > touching
>     > on England on the way. (I exaggerate, I spose.)
>     >
>     > It's Child 274:
>     >
>     > Hame came our goodman,
>     >
>     > And hame came he,
>     >
>     > And then he saw a saddle-horse,
>     >
>     > Where nae horse should be. [1776]
>     >
>     > Aw, I'll forgive you just this one time, since you pointed me to Coley
>     > Jones,
>     > who I hadn't encountered before.
>     >
>     > Robin
>     >
>     >>
>     >> On 20 September 2016 at 04:41 Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
>     >>
>     >>
>     >> Chief British Poets of the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries
>     >> Pages 328b-330a
>     >> https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__books.google.com_books-3Fid-3D9DtAAAAAIAAJ&d=CwIFaQ&c=-dg2m7zWuuDZ0MUcV7Sdqw&r=wFp3X4Mu39hB2bf13gtz0ZpW1TsSxPIWYiZRsMFFaLQ&m=_FsS1xjTUxS_tU0W1vVpKxx7EMscM4wa7oVDiDpU9j8&s=gn6kypuATnI8itY13JCzbrav7Uk9LyrC0qtggpNf8cE&e=
>     >> William Allan Neilson, ‎Kenneth Grant Tremayne Webster - 1916 -
>     >> ‎English
>     >> poetry
>     >>
>     >> GBooks has the poem back to 1795 in snippet.
>     >>
>     >> https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.youtube.com_watch-3Fv-3D5wc6CPxzxP8&d=CwIFaQ&c=-dg2m7zWuuDZ0MUcV7Sdqw&r=wFp3X4Mu39hB2bf13gtz0ZpW1TsSxPIWYiZRsMFFaLQ&m=_FsS1xjTUxS_tU0W1vVpKxx7EMscM4wa7oVDiDpU9j8&s=yDA8pk_E9t3bqrQfV-c_XEnYrn-txwAS3GQiavSVAzg&e=
>     >> Coley Jones - Drunkard's Special from the album, TexasBlues
>     >>
>     >>
>     >> --
>     >> -Wilson
>     >> -----
>     >> All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint to
>     >> come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
>     >> -Mark Twain
>     >>
>     >> ------------------------------------------------------------
>     >> The American Dialect Society -
>     >> https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__www.americandialect.org&d=CwIFaQ&c=-dg2m7zWuuDZ0MUcV7Sdqw&r=wFp3X4Mu39hB2bf13gtz0ZpW1TsSxPIWYiZRsMFFaLQ&m=_FsS1xjTUxS_tU0W1vVpKxx7EMscM4wa7oVDiDpU9j8&s=1rWL8dRNA1WNX6Yktbv6DS4K-tx6_Hu2UtEZAP8T39k&e=
>     >>
>     >
>     > ------------------------------------------------------------
>     > The American Dialect Society -
>     > https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__www.americandialect.org&d=CwIFaQ&c=-dg2m7zWuuDZ0MUcV7Sdqw&r=wFp3X4Mu39hB2bf13gtz0ZpW1TsSxPIWYiZRsMFFaLQ&m=_FsS1xjTUxS_tU0W1vVpKxx7EMscM4wa7oVDiDpU9j8&s=1rWL8dRNA1WNX6Yktbv6DS4K-tx6_Hu2UtEZAP8T39k&e=
> 
>     ------------------------------------------------------------
>     The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org