LL-L "Language varieties" 2004.09.20 (04) [E]

[Lowlands-L]

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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: Thomas <t.mcrae at uq.net.au>
Subject: Language Varieties

About a mnoth ago I mentioned how pleased I was at the way Lowland Scots was
being widely spoken in Edinburgh at least with even clothing being
emblazoned with Scots words.
 Our Spring has arrived here and at last I can wear the great 't' shirt I
purchased at the Museum of Scotland which proudly displays the word
"Crabbit" with dictionary definitions below on a blue background. "ill
tempered, grumpy, curt , disagreeable, in a bad mood (especially in the
morning). Example given 'Ken this yer a crabbit get so ye are'." The Museum
has several other Scots words similarly presented including another good yin
"Steamin" which pertains to being more than a little under the affluence of
incohol.
Mine has received great attention from all who have seen it.
Origin of Crabbit ? Have you ever seen a large crab freshly pulled from the
water ?
Regards
Tom
Tom Mc Rae PSOC
Brisbane Australia
"The masonnis suld mak housis stark and rude,
To keep the pepill frome the stormes strang,
And he that fals, the craft it gois all wrang."
>>From 15th century Scots Poem 'The Buke of the Chess'

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From: john feather <johnfeather at sceptic1.freeserve.co.uk>
Subject: Language varieties

Criostoir wrote:

"In Cornish there is a word _evet_ but that refers, I think, to newts or
more generally any sort of slimy four-legged creepy crawlie. Perhaps it was
borrowed from Old English _emet_ (with the standard Cornish sound shift from
[m] > [v]) and shifted semantically."

But remember "newt" and "eft" when we were discussing the shifting "n"?
_Evet_ might be a variant of that.

"I wonder if there are any Danes, Norwegian and Swedes who have learnt the
other two languages and can pass for Danish, Norwegian, Swedish. Swedes seem
very able to pass themselves off as English, Scots or Irish if they choose,
perhaps due to the extraordinarily wide range of vowels in Swedish"

I would guess that it might be relatively easy for a Dane to "pass himself
off" as a native of Skaane to someone from Stockholm or further north. I'm
not sure about the wide range of vowels in Swedish - does that mean within
the standard language or within the whole range of dialects? I've never
heard the former suggested. The only Icelanders I've met who spoke UK
English gave no clue that they were not native speakers.

BTW there's a true story about Mariella Frostrup, an assimilated Dane, who
used to present a film guide on UK TV. Talking about an old film which had
been re-released on video for the Christmas market and wanting to convey
that it was still as fresh as ever she said: "_The Wooden Horse_ never
stales." You need to know that the last word when applied to horses means
"urinates". If you're tempted to say: "Well, she was right, wasn't she"
please don't.

I once had a Dutch teacher who spoke almost perfect RP except for dark "l"s
[that's "ell" - curse this horrible font]. But she'd attended Edinburgh
University so I guess that she was getting interference from a Scottish "l".
A couple of days ago I heard the same (to my cloth ears) pronunciation from
a checkout person in the supermarket so I asked her if she was Dutch: turned
out she was from Uzbekistan.

Regarding Ron's point I would have said that South Walians pronounce the
vowel in "pint" much as in RP. Such difference as exists is largely due to
different lengths of the two parts of the diphthong and the ever-present
possibility that the SW speaker will change the pitch half-way through. But
someone will correct me.

John Feather johnfeather at sceptic1.freeserve.co.uk

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From: Brooks, Mark <mark.brooks at twc.state.tx.us>
Subject: LL-L "Language varieties" 2004.09.19 (03) [E]

Grietje's remark that her "accent's all over the place" reminded me of one
of my linguistics professors.  He's the one that taught phonology.  He said
that linguists study so many different sound systems and languages that they
speak all of them with a bad accent ;-)

Mark Brooks

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