LL-L "Language perceptions" 2004.02.01 (02) [E]

[Lowlands-L]

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L O W L A N D S - L * 01.FEB.2004 (02) * ISSN 189-5582 * LCSN 96-4226
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A=Afrikaans Ap=Appalachian B=Brabantish D=Dutch E=English F=Frisian
L=Limburgish LS=Lowlands Saxon (Low German) N=Northumbrian
S=Scots Sh=Shetlandic V=(West)Flemish Z=Zeelandic (Zeêuws)
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From: R. F. Hahn <sassisch at yahoo.com>
Subject: Language perceptions

Dear Lowlanders,

I expect some of you will get a kick out of the article below.

Enjoy!

Reinhard/Ron

***

Seattle Times, Sunday, February 01, 2004

FRIENDLY NATURE, SCOTS' BURR PAYING COUNTRY DIVIDENDS

By Todd Richissin
[The Baltimore Sun]

GLASGOW, Scotland — The Scottish may have lost any number of battles over
the years, particularly to their English cousins, and may have lost any
number of hapless and eventually headless monarchs in battles for love or
power or love of power.
     But Scots have never lost their voice or their Bob-Dylan-on-speedlike
accent, and that is paying dividends for a country of people more accustomed
to working with their hands than with their tongues.
     Increasingly across Scotland, and especially among people in Glasgow,
their money is where their mouth is.
     Call centers — where operators answer phones and answer questions for
all types of companies, wherever they may be — have become nearly as common
over the past few years here as the sheep that roam the hills.
     And one reason for that is the Scottish accent, its soothing qualities
outweighing any pesky concerns such as comprehension for consumers from
England to Asia.
     "I may be biased, but the accent certainly does seem to be one people
like to listen to," says Louise Reilly, the Scottish research manager at the
Call Center Association, an umbrella organization based in Scotland but
which works for the whole of Britain.
     "There may be a very generalized stereotype that certain parts of the
U.K., like London, with their posh accent, aren't so friendly, they're from
a big bustling city, and maybe that here in Scotland we're nice, common
folks."
     Call centers come in a couple of varieties. One is simply the place
where calls to a business are answered by employees of that business. The
other are centers that hire themselves out to other companies and then take
their calls for them.
     American Express, Coors, Morgan Stanley, Hilton Hotels, Hewlett Packard
and IBM all have call centers in Scotland, and the list has been growing.
The call-center industry employs about 56,000 people here, or about 2
percent of the working population. It has grown despite companies from
Britain moving many of their centers to New Delhi and other cities in India,
where labor is far less expensive.
     "To be perfectly honest, I'm not sure I buy the accent story but I do
know that success in call centers is mostly about attitude and service, and
I'd have to say the Scottish have a great attitude," says the director of
the Call Center Association, Anne Marie Forsyth, who is Scottish and indeed
is difficult to imagine in an unfriendly mood. "It's embarrassing to say,
but I think we do tend to be very friendly people."
     And talkative. Hop in a cab in Glasgow and the driver is likely to take
the long way to the destination, but there's no feeling that it's an effort
to boost the fare.
     The Scots, of course, speak in more than one dialect depending largely
on geography.
     The lilt from the Scottish Highlands is so clear and so prized that its
speakers are often sought for radio and television work in Britain.
     But to the ear unaccustomed to the accent, some Scots simply cannot be
understood — especially those from parts of Glasgow, where the Glaswegian
accent turns English into a foreign language.
     "We haven't had any complaints about the accent, that people couldn't
understand," says Nasreen Noor, marketing manager for Response Handling, a
call-center company that handles about 8 million calls for other companies
each year.
     "However strong the accent is, what the Scottish are good at is
developing a rapport with customers and reading them so they know how to
handle the different types of calls they get."

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