LL-L: "Standardization" LOWLANDS-L, 02.SEP.2000 (01) [S]
Lowlands-L
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L O W L A N D S - L * 02.SEP.2000 (01) * ISSN 189-5582 * LCSN 96-4226
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From: John M. Tait [jmtait at altavista.net]
Subject: LL-L: "Standardization" LOWLANDS-L, 31.AUG.2000 (02) [S]
Ian wrate:
>A canna gae wae ye thar, Sandy. A niver seen 'dae' spelt 'dui' in onie
>leeteratur, no fae the last 250 yeir in Airlann oniehou. Unner ma
>seistem, A wud uise -ae at the enn o a wurd fur tae show the ae soond
>as -ui- in the mids o a wurd. Bot 'dae' is the 'base form', an fae
>thar, fur a reglar paradigm, ye maun chynge 'duin' tae 'daen'. Else
>hit aa gits owre complicate.
The'r a problem here wi the defineition o the word 'soond', Ian. Gin UI wis
juist anither medial spellin o the AE soond, ye shoud can write 'a puir o
horse', 'doon the stuir', etc.
The pynt at Sandy an Andy is makkin is at the Scots cognate o English 'do'
- like aamaist aa Scots cognates o words at haes the /u/ phoneme in
(Scottish Standard) English - haes the underlyin /2/ diaphoneme, at is
sayed [2] in places like Shetland at haes conservative dialects (whaur the
pronunciation is [d2:]), but haes merged wi the /i/ phoneme in North East
Scots, an wi the /e/ an /I/ phonemes (whit ane determined bi the SVLR) in
Central an Ulster Scots. The raeson at ye dinna get spellins like <dui> is
at this spellin - final UI - niver developed in Scots for this soond in
word-final poseition. In middle Scots, as faur as I can mynd, it wis aften
spelled <do>, like in English, tho I think I'v seen the spellin <du> tae.
In modren Scots it tends ti be spelled wi the dialect soond - sae 'dae' in
Central Scots, 'dee' in the North East, an uisually wi the O-Umlaut or
U-Umlaut spellin in Shetlandic, shawin the oreiginal vowel disteinction at
aye hings on in conservative dialects.
The boddom line here is at the word disna hae an 'ae soond' except in
dialects whaur the oreiginal phoneme happens ti hae merged wi that soond.
In the NE it haes an 'ee' soond, an in conservative dialects a [2] or [y]
soond. Sae <dae> isna the base form ava - it is, like Andy sayed, a
fossilised Central/Ulster pronunciation. The base form, whether it's
spelled that wey or no, is /d2/, no /de/. Juist spellin it <dae> disna
alter the fact at the underlyin diaphoneme is /2/, onie mair nor sayin 'the
muin is made o green cheese' maks that a fact! Sae while a dae-daed-daen
paradigm micht be regular, it's juist regularly wrang! Wrang for twa
reasons: firstlins, cause <duin>, like <dae> dis hae the /2/ phoneme
(Shetland [d2n], NE [din]), an twa wrangs disna mak a richt; an saicont,
cause the preterite <did> haes the /I/ phoneme, at's uisually spelled <i>.
This is shawn bi the fact that, in conservative dialects like Shetlandic at
aye haes the [2] soond in <dae> an <duin>, <did> is sayed [dId]. Sae the
verb _dis_ hae a irregular preterite - it no seemin til is anither
coincidence o the Central-type pronunciation, whaur it juist happens at /2/
merges wi /I/ in short environments. But naebodie in Shetland says [d2d],
nor dis oniebodie i the NE say [did] as faur's I ken. The preterite haes a
/I/ vowel, an is richtly spelled [dId].
Coorse, thare micht be a case for uisin a morphological spellin like <daed>
in spite o this, gin the vowel o the base form wis /e/ - juist like I wad
threip for <haes> an <haed> frae <hae>, raither nor <his> an <hid>. But the
underlyin vowel in <hae> IS /e/, whaurbyes the ane in <dae> isna. Gin ye
wis spellin Ullans as a sindrie leid, thare wad be a case for
dae-daed-daen; but bi the same threip thare wad be a case for daein awa wi
the UI spellin aathegither, gin it heas merged wi /e/ aawey in Ulster (I
hinna time evenou ti check the LSS).
(Pech...I think I need a drink...)
John M. Tait.
----------
From: John M. Tait [jmtait at altavista.net]
Subject: LL-L: "Standardization" LOWLANDS-L, 30.AUG.2000 (07) [E/S]
Andy quotit an Ron commentit on:
>"The Comatee recommends at final -ie be uised for the unstressed final
"ee"
>soond in aa words or forms o words unique til or characteristic o Scots,
>includin verbs (cairie), nouns (mannie) [Is thon no a diminutive noun? Ma
>comment!], adjectives (bonnie) an adverbs (aefauldlie)...
>
>Final -ie is no recommendit in word endins siclike as -ity, -ology,
-ography,
>etc. nor in identical English cognates siclike as funny, silly."
This, ti my mynd daft, recommend cam aboot, as faur's I can mynd, cause
baith the SNDA an RWS recommends uisin -ie for 'speceefically Scots' words,
an this wis taen as ane o the few consensuses (?!) atween the twa.
Houaniver, (a) baith the SNDA an RWS supporters haes since disassociatit
thairsels wi the conclusion o the spellin report, sae tryin ti placate
thaim baith didna get naewey, an (b) naither o thir twa actually uises
written Scots except in leiterary bitties at can be gaen ower wi a
smaa-teetht kame - like I'v sayed in a recent e-mail, maist aabodie I ken
at uises aither RWS or SNDA type spellins uises English whan thay actually
want ti say oniething. The pynt wis certainly made at the time - bi mair
fowk nor mysel - at this distinction atween 'Scots' an 'English' vocabular
wis unscientific an unwirkable, but the idea o placatin baith camps, alang
wi the norie at the -ie endin wis somewey or ither mair Scots cause o its
uiss in Middle Scots, swung the vote on the hurcheon sexin principle ('Is
this hurcheon a lounie or a quinie?' 'Dinna ken.' 'We'll hae a vote on
it.') David Purves, at's maist in favour o this kynd o schizographic
spellin (mukkil buckle, etc) haes actually sayed recent-like at Scots only
exists inasfaur as it's different frae English (a non-statement: ye micht
as weel say at sharnie* flees only exists inasfaur as thay'r different
frae Jupiter), an this philosophy explains a lot aboot the RWS type o
spellin.
John M. Tait.
Here I haud wi the recommend, tho I wad naiturally want ti write <sharny>.
----------
From: Sandy Fleming [sandy at scotstext.org]
Subject: "Standardization"
> From: Andy Eagle [Andy.Eagle at t-online.de]
> Subject: LL-L: "Standardization" LOWLANDS-L, 31.AUG.2000 (04) [S]
>
> A wad certies be interestit in onie new insichts that micht come fae
sic
> obervins.
Weel, here ane that's been batherin me!
It's generally acceptit amangst Scots enthusiasts that the
best wey o representin the soond [u] is wi /ou/. In theory
this is supposed ti reglarise modern Scots spellin bi daein
awa wi the appearinly random uise o "ou" an "ow" ti represent
thae soonds in aulder, espeecially the mair sel-consciously
"literary", texts. In practice, this disna happen - few modern
Scots writers can bring theirsels ti write "about", "out" for
[V'bu?], [u?] an aa that. This means that the kin o spellin
maist o us is uisin the nou is baith inconsistent an lippens
(erseroads) til English spellins.
A think that the chyce o /ou/ abuin /oo/ is liker snobbery
than ony sickar orthographic principle. Late 20th Century
Scots readers maistly sees /ou/ in Burns (an if they read
mair in Scots, ither literary writers an aa) an sees /oo/
maistly in comics the likes o "Oor Wullie" an "The Broons".
Altho /ou/ (an aftwhiles /ow/) dis seem ti be uised aa the
road up until Stevenson, the late Victorian & Edwardian
revivalists haed nae sic qualms. In typin in Gibb's Sermons,
for example, A'm haein ti chainge "oo" til "ou" (an whiles "ui")
aa the time (the'r ae notable exception in Gibb - he aye writes
"throwe" for "throu", that A doot means he soondit it [TrVu]).
Likwice, maist (or as faur's A'v seen, mibbie even aa) o the
great prose writers o this era uises the /oo/ spellin vernear
aawey (eg, fae Gibb: hoose, coo, hoo, clood... - an mind that
this is frae sermons written in a sel-conciously oratorial
style, it's no attemptin the comical effeck o "Betty's Trip
tae Edinbury" at aa!).
A wonder if it isna time we lat lowss o oor post-OorWullian
nories an startit uisin a mair consistent (an for maist Scots,
mair coothie (there! A did it!)) spellin that disna lippen ti
English (or at laest disna _hiv_ ti ti leuk Scots!).
A ken there some adjustments can be made ti this idea - for ae
thing in some dialecks "cou" is soondit [kVu] an aa that. Andy's
site suggests that this happens at the end o wirds. Say we micht
uise /ou/ for this. Folk in ither dialecks could still write it
bi uisin the rule that this spellin is uised at the end o a word,
an that wad even cover Gibb's "throwe"!
A'm no sayin A wad masel write this aathegither reglar - or
even can jook lippenin ti English whiles. A example o this
is the English "thou". A wad gae uisin the irreglar spellin
"thoo" in Scots, wi hou maist Scots nouadays, unfamiliar wi
the word, wad gae readin it wrang itherwice. But this is a
exception necessitated bi the fack that it's a maistly obsolete
wird, an say guidance on the maist uisual soondin is nott.
Anither thing is, dis "coothie" suggest *['ku:DI] raither nor
['kuTI]? - aiblins some thocht anent the SVLR wad be a idea.
> > > From: Andy Eagle [Andy.Eagle at t-online.de]
> > > monie a publisher drappit letters for thon verra raison. Less
wirk...
>
> A'v mebbies juist spent ower lang analysin phonology an wirdleets an
no
> eneuch time analysin wrutten texts o the kin that you're nou pittin
up on
> Scots text.
> Tho o course saftweir that coud collect a the wirds fae texts
> that hae's -y
A hiv ca'd thegither a database application that'll make a list
o wirds fae plain text files. It can be fair enlichtenin ti filter
on various soonds an study the collection o wirds that haes them.
A hinna haed muckle time ti actually dae this, but for example,
in filterin on "ch" & "gh" thegither an separatin aa thae wirds
inti different orthographic uisages, A noticed that oot o a list
o mibbie a hunder words wi the [nS] soond in them, aa wis spelled
wi /nch/ forby "glunsh" an "dunsh". This lat me see that rare
"Scots-only" spellins like "glunsh", "dunsh" an (jist in
post-OorWullian writin, A doot) "Frensh" is irreglar spellins
an should be written "glunch", "dunch" an "French" - the'r nae
need for this irregularity for that the'r nae [ntC] consonant
clister in Scots ava. Ye see the advantage o text ower dictionars
here - the dictionars haes juist wirds peculiar ti Scots an sae
disna lat ye see the hale pictur.
A dinna ken what this says aboot hou "glumsh/glumch" should be
spelled, tho! A think "glumchin" micht be in danger o gittin
soondit "glum chin" bi some!
A dinna ken aboot sortin oot the -ie/-y prablems bi leukin ower
auld texts, tho. Alexander Montgomerie's late Middle Scots seems
ti uise aither (fae "The Cherrie and the Slae", but tak tent that
the spellin varies amang aerly manuscrips):
With deidlie visage paill, and wan,
Mair like ane Atomie nor man,
I widderit clean away:
As wax befoir the fyre, I felt
My hart within my bosome melt,
And pece and pece decay:
My vaines with brangling like to brek,
My punsis lap with pith:
Sa fervently did me infek,
That I was vext thairwith:
My hart ay, did start ay,
The fyrie flames to flie:
Ay houping, throw louping,
To win to liberty.
It micht be that he prefers -y wi Latinate wirds, like you,
Andy! But he dis uise "ugly" an siclike an aa.
But bi the time o David Herd's song collection, -y is definitely
gettin the upper haun. Herd's spellin varies noticeably frae
sang ti sang - aiblins he's copyin semi-faithfu oot ither
manuscrips - but in Herd even diminutives is for uisual spelt
wi a -y, even the likes o Jenny, Wilsy, Katy, daddy, minny,
titty &c (while ither names, ither mainers - Jamie, Maggie &c).
But a richt indication o the consistency (or want o'd) in Herd
comes in the sang "Lucky Nan(c/s)(ie/y)" whaur the eponymous
heroine gets her eponym spelled baith "Nancy" an "Nansie",
an haes a lot ti adae wi ma decision ti _no_ pit ScotsteXt up
in the original spellins! It dis leuk like Herd haed twa
vairsions o the sang an didna chainge the original spellins
whan he merged them (the chorus o the sang chainges haufroads
throu, an the spellin wi'd). If this is richt tho, it micht
mean that Herd is representative o the spellins o the time -
bein that he aiblins didna chainge them hissel.
Syne it's Burns that swings awa in the direction o -ie for
diminutives (daddie, minnie, tittie &c) an a wheen ither
words, an Burns beuks bein aawhaur, this seems ti A stuck
in the Scottish psyche ever fae syne, aa ootthrou the Victorian
revival, till the post-OorWullians startit steerin aathing up
again, but maistly in ignorance.
Sandy
http://scotstext.org
A dinna doot him, for he says that he
On nae accoont wad ever tell a lee.
- C.W.Wade,
'The Adventures o McNab'
----------
From: R. F. Hahn [sassisch at yahoo.com]
Subject: Standardization
John, ye wrate:
> this kynd o schizographic spellin (mukkil buckle, etc)
Hah-hah! "Schizographic"! Braw! Did ye mak it up yersel, an may
oniebodie (~ onybody) eese it?
An Sandy wrate:
> write "about", "out" for [V'bu?], [u?]
A masel vote fer writin "ou" only gin the English cognate has "ou". Bit ma
vote disna coont ... oops! ... count. ;)
Regairds,
Reinhard/Ron
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