From: martin.baines@uk.sun.com (Martin Baines - Sun UK - SE Manager Cambridge)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.british
Subject: Re: Accent and Dialect, the politics there
Date: 6 Nov 1992 13:08:20 GMT
Organization: Sun Microsystems Ltd
Distribution: world
Reply-To: martin.baines@uk.sun.com
NNTP-Posting-Host: bottomdog.uk.sun.com

In article 29965@gssec.bt.co.uk, cwilson@gssec.bt.co.uk (Colin Wilson) writes:
>In article <1d6amaINNbi2@grapevine.EBay.Sun.COM>, martin.baines@uk.sun.com (Martin Baines - Sun UK - SE Manager Cambridge) writes:
>|> 
>|> As linguistic assertion is one of the most common things to
>|> happen in newly independent countries, I expect that if
>|> Scotland ever did become independent the "Scottish Language"
>|> would be promoted vigorously, until then I'll join Matthew
>|> in his view that it's a pointless arguement.
>|> 
>
>If you believe that the debate over the status of Scots is pointless,
>then that is probably - I would respectfully suggest - because you have
>no personal stake in the issue. For some of us, however, things are
>different.

I didn't say the debate about the status of the Scots language/dialect
(delete according to taste) was pointless: merely the arcane
debate about constituted a language verses a dialect. There really
is no common concensus about what is a language and what is not:
the Chinese consider Cantonese and Manderin to be two dialects
of the same language (Chung Wa in Cantonese), but they are
completely mutually unintelligable and at least as different
as (say) Dutch and German. This does not stop Cantonese having
the status that there are radio/TV stations broadcasting in
it in Guangdong.

>I would like to be able to use my own language freely in public and
>professional life. I would like to be able to read daily newspapers
>printed in it. I would like to be able to see and hear a full variety
>of radio and TV programming in it, as opposed to the present situation
>in which the use of Scots is almost totally confined to comedy. If I
>ever have children, I would like them to be educated to be articulate
>and literate in their own language, and to know its literature - some
>of which is internationally respected - instead of the process of
>self-education that I am having to undergo in the limited time
>available as an adult.
>
>I don't want to, and don't see why I should have to, wait for a
>political separation between Scotland and England for all this,
>especially as there is no certainty that such a separation will ever
>happen. That is why, for me and others, this is a debate that is far
>from pointless.

I actually agree with you on this: if there is an audiance I see
no problem with there being Scots language/dialect radio and
TV stations, books newspapers etc. I would also support any
move for schools to offer courses in the same: providing there
was freedom of choice, but that's another debate.

But as a fervent non-nationalist, I don't think emotional debates
about the semantics of what is/is not a language/dialect add
any real contribution to the practical problems.

Martin

---

"You might say that, but I couldn't possibly comment"

Martin Baines, Sales Support Manager,
Sun Microsystems Ltd, 306 Science Park, Cambridge, CB4 4WG, UK
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Newsgroups: soc.culture.british