Scots language

Native speakers sometimes refer to their vernacular as {{lang|sco|braid Scots}} (or "broad Scots" in English){{cite web|url=http://www.dsl.ac.uk/entry/snd/scots|title=Scottish National Dictionary (1700–): Scots, adj|publisher=Dsl.ac.uk|access-date=13 December 2016}} or use a dialect name such as the "Doric"{{cite web|url=http://www.dsl.ac.uk/entry/snd/sndns1238 |title=Scottish National Dictionary (1700–): Doric |publisher=Dsl.ac.uk |access-date=13 December 2016}} or the "{{lang|sco|Buchan Claik}}".{{cite book|last1=Buchan|first1=Peter|last2=Toulmin|first2=David|title=Buchan Claik: The Saut and the Glaur O't: a Compendium of Words and Phrases from the North-east of Scotland|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=BdWyAAAACAAJ|year=1998|publisher=Gordon Wright|isbn=978-0-903065-94-8}} The old-fashioned Scotch, an English loan,Aitken, A. J. The Oxford Companion to the English Language. Oxford University Press, 1992 p. 892. occurs occasionally, especially in Ulster.{{cite book|last=Traynor|first=Michael|year=1953|title=The English dialect of Donegal|publisher=Royal Irish Academy|location=Dublin|page=244}}{{cite book|last=Nic Craith|first=M.|year=2002|title=Plural Identities—singular Narratives|publisher=Berghahn Books|page=107}} The term Lallans, a variant of the Modern Scots word {{lang|sco|lawlands}} {{IPA|sco|ˈlo̜ːlən(d)z, ˈlɑːlənz|}},{{cite web|url=http://www.dsl.ac.uk/entry/snd/lawland|title=Scottish National Dictionary (1700–): Lawland, adj|publisher=Dsl.ac.uk|access-date=13 December 2016}} is also used, though this is more often taken to mean the Lallans literary form.{{cite web |title=Ethnologue – Scots |url=http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=sco |publisher=Ethnologue |access-date=9 September 2012}} Scots in Ireland is known in official circles as Ulster-Scots ({{lang|sco|Ulstèr-Scotch}} in revivalist Ulster-Scots) or "Ullans", a recent neologism merging Ulster and Lallans.{{cite book |author-link=Maria Tymoczko |last1=Tymoczko |first1=M. |last2=Ireland |first2=C.A. |year=2003 |title=Language and Tradition in Ireland: Continuities and Displacements |publisher=University of Massachusetts Press |page=159 |isbn=1-55849-427-8}}

Scots is a contraction of {{lang|sco|Scottis}}, the Older Scots and northern version of late {{langx|ang|Scottisc}} (modern English "Scottish"), which replaced the earlier i-mutated version {{lang|sco|Scyttisc}}.{{Cite web|url=https://dsl.ac.uk/entry/dost30888|title=Dictionaries of the Scots Language:: DOST ::}}{{cite web|url=https://www.oed.com/|website=OED online|title=Scots, a. (n.)|access-date=28 July 2020|archive-date=26 December 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191226130007/https://www.oed.com/|url-status=live}} Before the end of the fifteenth century, English speech in Scotland was known as "English" (written {{lang|sco|Ynglis}} or {{lang|sco|Inglis}} at the time), whereas "Scottish" ({{lang|sco|Scottis}}) referred to Gaelic.{{cite web|url=http://www.scotslanguage.com/books/view/2/539/What%20is%20Scots|website=Scotslanguage|title=A Brief History of Scots}} By the beginning of the fifteenth century, the English language used in Scotland had arguably become a distinct language, albeit one lacking a name which clearly distinguished it from all the other English variants and dialects spoken in Britain. From 1495, the term {{lang|sco|Scottis}} was increasingly used to refer to the Lowland vernacular{{r|OxfordCompanion|page=894}} and {{lang|sco|Erse}}, meaning "Irish", was used as a name for Gaelic. For example, towards the end of the fifteenth century, William Dunbar was using {{lang|sco|Erse}} to refer to Gaelic and, in the early sixteenth century, Gavin Douglas was using {{lang|sco|Scottis}} as a name for the Lowland vernacular.{{cite book|title=The Stewart Kingdom of Scotland, 1371–1603|first=Caroline|last=Bingham|year=1974|publisher=Weidenfeld and Nicolson}}{{cite book|title=Companion to the Oxford English Dictionary|first=Tom|last=McArthur|publisher=Oxford University Press|year=1994}} The Gaelic of Scotland is now usually called Scottish Gaelic.

{{main|History of the Scots language}}

[[File:History of Scots in Scotland and Ulster.png|thumb|left|The growth and distribution of Scots in Scotland and Ulster:{{cite map|url=http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/historical/shepherd/british_isles_802.jpg|title=The British Isles about 802|scale=1:7 500 000}}{{cite encyclopedia|url=https://www.scots-online.org/dictionary/read_dictionary.php?letter=C&CurPage=5|dictionary=The Online Scots Dictionary|title=cairt n. v.}}

{{legend|Red|Old English by the beginning of the 9th century in the northern portion of the Anglo-Saxon{{Cite web|url=https://www.scotslanguage.com/articles/node/id/660/type/referance|title=550-1100 Anglo-Saxon (Pre-Scots)|website=Scotslanguage.com }} kingdom of Northumbria, now part of Scotland}}

{{legend|Orange|Early Scots by the beginning of the 15th century}}

{{legend|Yellow|Modern Scots by the mid-20th century}}]]

Northumbrian Old English had been established in what is now southeastern Scotland as far as the River Forth by the seventh century, as the region was part of the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Northumbria.{{cite encyclopedia |year=2002 |title=A Dictionary of the Older Scottish Tongue |publisher=Dictionary of the Scots Language |access-date=18 October 2015 |volume=12 |page=xxxvi |last2=Aitken |first2=A.J. |last1=Macafee |first1=Caroline |chapter=A History of Scots to 1700 - 2. The origins and spread of Scots (CM) |chapter-url=https://dsl.ac.uk/about-scots/history-of-scots/origins/}} Some historians have traditionally argued that the regions later known as Lothian and the Scottish Borders became attached to the Kingdom of Scotland in the tenth and early eleventh centuries,{{cite book |last=Rollason |first=David W. |author-link=David Rollason |title=Northumbria, 500 – 1100: Creation and Destruction of a Kingdom |year=2003 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=0-521-81335-2 |p=275}}{{cite book |last=Barrow |first=G. S. W. |title=The Kingdom of the Scots: Government, Church and Society from the Eleventh to the Fourteenth Century |publisher=Edinburgh University Press |year=2003 |isbn=978-0-7486-1803-3 |location=Edinburgh |page=121}} but this is no longer accepted and the takeover that does take place is not fully evident until the twelfth century and probably incomplete until at least the thirteenth century.{{citation |last=Stringer |first=Keith | author-link = | contribution="Middle Britain in Context, c. 900-c1300 |title=Northern England and Southern Scotland in the Central Middle Ages |editor-last=Stringer |editor-first=Keith J. |editor2-last=Winchester |editor2-first=Angus |editor2-link= |year=2019 |publisher=Boydell & Brewer |location=Woodridge |isbn=9781787441521 | url= |pages=1–30}}, at pp. 4-5{{citation |last=McGuigan |first=Neil | contribution=Donation and Conquest: The Formation of Lothian and the Origins of the Anglo-Scottish Border |title= Offa's Dyke Journal 4: Borders in Early Medieval Britain | editor-last=Guy |editor-first=Ben |editor2-last= Williams |editor2-first= Howard |editor3-last= Delaney |editor3-first= Liam |publisher= JAS Arqueología |location=Chester |year=2022|volume=4 | issn=2695-625X |pages= 36–65 |doi=10.23914/odj.v4i0.352 |s2cid=257501905 |url=http://revistas.jasarqueologia.es/index.php/odjournal/article/view/352|doi-access=free }}, pp. 36–65. The common use of English remained largely confined to Lothian and the Borders until the thirteenth century, where the local varieties were reshaped in response to migration from the Scandinavian-influenced North and Midlands of England that came with the foundation of the first burghs in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries.{{Cite web |last=Smith |first=Jeremy |title=Scots: an outline history - Influence of Old Norse |url=https://dsl.ac.uk/about-scots/an-outline-history-of-scots/origins/ |archive-date= |access-date=31 March 2025 |website=Dictionaries of the Scots Language}} The Scots language scholar Robert McColl Millar framed Early Scots as a koine of the varieties of English spoken in Bernicia and the Danelaw that had been brought to the new burghs.{{Cite book |last=McColl Millar |first=Robert |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ecLSEAAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover&hl=source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false |title=A History of the Scots Language |date=29 March 2025 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=9780198863991 |location=Oxford |publication-date=2023 |pages=36–38 |language=English |chapter=3.4 The Creation and spread of Inglis / 3.5 Formation of Inglis}}

Later influences on the development of Scots came from the Romance languages via ecclesiastical and legal Latin, Norman French,{{r|DictionaryScots|page=lxiii–lxv}} and later Parisian French, due to the Auld Alliance. Additionally, there were Dutch and Middle Low German influences due to trade with and immigration from the Low Countries.{{r|DictionaryScots|page=lxiii}} Scots also includes loan words in the legal and administrative fields resulting from contact with Middle Irish, and reflected in early medieval legal documents.{{r|DictionaryScots|page=lxi}} Contemporary Scottish Gaelic loans are mainly for geographical and cultural features, such as cèilidh, loch, whisky, glen and clan. Cumbric and Pictish, the medieval Brittonic languages of Northern England and Scotland, are the suspected source of a small number of Scots words, such as lum (derived from Cumbric) meaning "chimney".{{cite web |title=Dictionaries of the Scots Language – vocabulary |url=https://dsl.ac.uk/about-scots/history-of-scots/vocabulary/ |access-date=30 April 2021}} From the thirteenth century, the Early Scots language spread further into Scotland via the burghs, which were proto-urban institutions first established by King David I. In fourteenth-century Scotland, the growth in prestige of Early Scots and the complementary decline of French made Scots the prestige dialect of most of eastern Scotland. By the sixteenth century, Middle Scots had established orthographic and literary norms largely independent of those developing in England.{{cite book|chapter=A Brief History of Scots|editor-last1=Corbett|editor-first1=John|editor-last2=McClure|editor-first2=Derrick|editor-last3=Stuart-Smith|editor-first3=Jane|year=2003|title=The Edinburgh Companion to Scots|location=Edinburgh|publisher=Edinburgh University Press|isbn=0-7486-1596-2|page=9}}

From 1610 to the 1690s during the Plantation of Ulster, some 200,000 Scots-speaking Lowlanders settled as colonists in Ulster in Ireland.Montgomery & Gregg 1997: 572{{Full citation needed|date=July 2020}} In the core areas of Scots settlement, Scots outnumbered English settlers by five or six to one.Adams 1977: 57{{Full citation needed|date=July 2020}}

The name Modern Scots is used to describe the Scots language after 1700.{{citation needed|date=September 2020}}

A seminal study of Scots was undertaken by JAH Murray and published as Dialect of the Southern Counties of Scotland.{{cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/cu31924026538938|title=The dialect of the southern counties of Scotland : its pronunciation, grammar, and historical relations; with an appendix on the present limits of the Gaelic and lowland Scotch, and the dialectical divisions of the lowland tongue; and a linguistical map of Scotland|last=Murray|first=James Augustus Henry|year=1873|publisher=Asher & Co}} Murray's results were given further publicity by being included in Alexander John Ellis's book On Early English Pronunciation, Part V alongside results from Orkney and Shetland, as well as the whole of England. Murray and Ellis differed slightly on the border between English and Scots dialects.{{cite book|last=Ellis|first=Alexander John|title=On early English pronunciation: with especial reference to Shakspere and Chaucer, containing an investigation of the correspondence of writing with speech in England from the Anglosaxon period to the present day means of the ordinary printing types|publisher=Trübner & Co|pages=20–21|url=https://archive.org/details/onearlyenglishpr00elliuoft/page/20/mode/2up?q=murray}}

Scots was studied alongside English and Scots Gaelic in the Linguistic Survey of Scotland at the University of Edinburgh, which began in 1949 and began to publish results in the 1970s.{{cite book |last=Petyt |first=Keith Malcolm |title=The Study of Dialect: An introduction to dialectology |publisher=Andre Deutsch |year=1980 |pages=94–98 |isbn=0-233-97212-9}} Also beginning in the 1970s, the Atlas Linguarum Europae studied the Scots language used at 15 sites in Scotland, each with its own dialect.{{cite book |last=Eder |first=Birgit |title=Ausgewählte Verwandtschaftsbezeichnungen in den Sprachen Europas: untersucht anhand der Datensammlungen des Atlas Linguarum Europae |publisher=Peter Lang |year=2004 |page=301 |isbn=978-3-631-52873-0}}

From the mid-sixteenth century, written Scots was increasingly influenced by the developing Standard English of Southern England due to developments in royal and political interactions with England.{{r|EdinburghCompanion|p=10}} When William Flower, an English herald, spoke with Mary of Guise and her councillors in 1560, they first used the {{lang|enm|"Scottyshe toung"}}. As he found this hard to understand, they switched into her native French.Joseph Bain, [https://archive.org/details/calendarstatepa00baingoog/page/322/mode/2up Calendar State Papers Scotland, vol. 1 (Edinburgh, 1898), 322 no. 662] King James VI, who in 1603 became James I of England, observed in his work Some Reulis and Cautelis to Be Observit and Eschewit in Scottis Poesie that {{lang|enm|"For albeit sindrie hes written of it in English, quhilk is lykest to our language..."}} (For though several have written of (the subject) in English, which is the language most similar to ours...). However, with the increasing influence and availability of books printed in England, most writing in Scotland came to be done in the English fashion.{{r|EdinburghCompanion|p=11}} In his first speech to the English Parliament in March 1603, King James VI and I declared, {{lang|enm|"Hath not God first united these two Kingdomes both in Language, Religion, and similitude of maners?"}}."A Speach in Parliament. Anno 1603" in "The Workes of the Most High and Mightie Prince Iames, by the Grace of God" (1616), pg. 485 Following James VI's move to London, the Protestant Church of Scotland adopted the 1611 Authorized King James Version of the Bible; subsequently, the Acts of Union 1707 led to Scotland joining England to form the Kingdom of Great Britain, having a single Parliament of Great Britain based in London. After the Union and the shift of political power to England, the use of Scots was discouraged by many in authority and education, as was the notion of "Scottishness" itself.{{cite book|last=Jones|first=Charles|year=1995|title=A Language Suppressed: The Pronunciation of the Scots Language in the 18th Century|location=Edinburgh|publisher=J. Donald Publishers|page=vii|isbn=0-85976-427-3}} Many leading Scots of the period, such as David Hume, defined themselves as Northern British rather than Scottish.{{r|LangSuppressed|page=2}} They attempted to rid themselves of their Scots in a bid to establish standard English as the official language of the newly formed union. Nevertheless, Scots was still spoken across a wide range of domains until the end of the eighteenth century.{{r|EdinburghCompanion|page=11}} Frederick Pottle, the twentieth-century biographer of James Boswell (1740–1795), described James's view of the use of Scots by his father Alexander Boswell (1706–1782) {{when|date=September 2020}} in the eighteenth century while serving as a judge of the Supreme Courts of Scotland:

{{blockquote|He scorned modern literature, spoke broad Scots from the bench, and even in writing took no pains to avoid the Scotticisms which most of his colleagues were coming to regard as vulgar.}}

However, others did scorn Scots, such as Scottish Enlightenment intellectuals David Hume and Adam Smith, who went to great lengths to get rid of every Scotticism from their writings.{{Cite web|url=http://www.scuilwab.org.uk/assets/TheHistoryOScots-1.pdf|title=Scuilwab, p.3}} Following such examples, many well-off Scots took to learning English through the activities of those such as Thomas Sheridan, who in 1761 gave a series of lectures on English elocution. Charging a guinea at a time (about £{{formatnum:{{inflation|UK|1.05|1761|r=-2}}}} in today's money{{inflation-fn|UK}}), they were attended by over 300 men, and he was made a freeman of the City of Edinburgh. Following this, some of the city's intellectuals formed the Select Society for Promoting the Reading and Speaking of the English Language in Scotland. These eighteenth-century activities would lead to the creation of Scottish Standard English.{{r|EdinburghCompanion|p=13}} Scots remained the vernacular of many rural communities and the growing number of urban working-class Scots.{{r|EdinburghCompanion|p=14}}

File:AU Burns Canberra.jpg in Canberra, Australia]]

In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the use of Scots as a literary language was revived by several prominent Scotsmen{{citation needed|date=September 2020}} such as Robert Burns. Such writers established a new cross-dialect literary norm.

Scots terms were included in the English Dialect Dictionary, edited by Joseph Wright. Wright had great difficulty in recruiting volunteers from Scotland, as many refused to cooperate with a venture that regarded Scots as a dialect of English, and he obtained enough help only through the assistance from a Professor Shearer in Scotland.{{cite news|title=The Dialect Dictionary: meeting in Bradford|newspaper=Bradford Observer|date=7 October 1895}} Wright himself rejected the argument that Scots was a separate language, saying that this was a "quite modern mistake".

During the first half of the twentieth century, knowledge of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century literary norms waned, and {{as of|2006|lc=y}}, there is no institutionalised standard literary form.{{cite web|last=Eagle|first=Andy|year=2006|title=Aw Ae Wey – Written Scots in Scotland and Ulster|url=http://www.scots-online.org/articles/contents/AwAeWey.pdf|access-date=18 October 2015}} By the 1940s, the Scottish Education Department's language policy was that Scots had no value: "it is not the language of 'educated' people anywhere, and could not be described as a suitable medium of education or culture".Primary education: a report of the Advisory Council on Education in Scotland, Scottish Education Department 1946, p. 75 Students reverted to Scots outside the classroom, but the reversion was not complete. What occurred, and has been occurring ever since, is a process of language attrition, whereby successive generations have adopted more and more features from Standard English. This process has accelerated rapidly since widespread access to mass media in English and increased population mobility became available after the Second World War.{{r|EdinburghCompanion|p=15}} It has recently taken on the nature of wholesale language shift, sometimes also termed language change, convergence or merger. By the end of the twentieth century, Scots was at an advanced stage of language death over much of Lowland Scotland.{{cite book|last=Macafee|first=C.|chapter=Studying Scots Vocabulary|editor-last1=Corbett|editor-first1=John|editor-last2=McClure|editor-first2=Derrick|editor-last3=Stuart-Smith|editor-first3=Jane|year=2003|title=The Edinburgh Companion to Scots|location=Edinburgh|publisher=Edinburgh University Press|isbn=0-7486-1596-2|page=51}} Residual features of Scots are often regarded as slang.{{cite book|title=The Edinburgh History of the Scots Language|last=Jones|first=Charles|year=1997|publisher=Edinburgh University Press|location=Edinburgh|isbn=978-0-7486-0754-9|page=518|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0ldowI6VgeMC&q=%22scots+language%22+slang&pg=PA518|access-date=9 August 2010|quote=Menzies (1991:42) also found that in her sample of forty secondary-school children from Easterhouse in Glasgow, there was a tendency to describe Scots words as 'slang' alongside the use of the term 'Scots'}} A 2010 Scottish Government study of "public attitudes towards the Scots language" found that 64% of respondents (around 1,000 individuals in a representative sample of Scotland's adult population) "don't really think of Scots as a language", also finding "the most frequent speakers are least likely to agree that it is not a language (58%) and those never speaking Scots most likely to do so (72%)".{{cite web|last=The Scottish Government|title=Public Attitudes Towards the Scots Language|url=http://www.gov.scot/Publications/2010/01/06105123/0|access-date=18 October 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160102091527/http://www.gov.scot/Publications/2010/01/06105123/0|archive-date=2016-01-02|url-status=dead}}

File:John Knox House - Edinburgh Fringe.jpg, on John Knox House, Edinburgh]]

Before the Treaty of Union 1707, when Scotland and England joined to form the Kingdom of Great Britain, there is ample evidence that Scots was widely held to be an independent sister language{{cite web |url=https://www.scots-online.org/articles/Nostra_Vulgari_Lingua.php |title=Nostra Vulgari Lingua: Scots as a European Language 1500–1700 |first=Dauvit |last=Horsbroch |publisher=www.scots-online.org |access-date=18 October 2015 }} forming a pluricentric diasystem with English.

German linguist {{lang|de|Heinz Kloss|italic=no}} considered Modern Scots a {{lang|de|Halbsprache}} ('half language') in terms of an abstand and ausbau languages framework,Kloss, Heinz, ²1968, Die Entwicklung neuer germanischer Kultursprachen seit 1800, Düsseldorf: Bagel. pp.70, 79 although today in Scotland most people's speech is somewhere on a continuum ranging from traditional broad Scots to Scottish Standard English. Many speakers are diglossic and may be able to code-switch along the continuum depending on the situation. Where on this continuum English-influenced Scots becomes Scots-influenced English is difficult to determine. Because standard English now generally has the role of a {{lang|de|Dachsprache}} ('roofing language'), disputes often arise as to whether the varieties of Scots are dialects of Scottish English or constitute a separate language in their own right.{{cite web |last=Scott |first=Maggie |title=The Scots Continuum and Descriptive Linguistics |url=http://www.arts.gla.ac.uk/ScotLit/ASLS/SWE/TBI/TBIIssue2/ScotsContinuum.html |work=The Bottle Imp |publisher=Association for Scottish Literary Studies |access-date=21 July 2011|date=November 2007}}

The UK government now accepts Scots as a regional language and has recognised it as such under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages.{{cite web |title=Second Report submitted by the United Kingdom pursuant to article 25, paragraph 2 of the framework convention for the protection of national minorities |url=http://www.coe.int/t/dghl/monitoring/minorities/3_fcnmdocs/PDF_2nd_SR_UK_en.pdf |publisher=Council of Europe |access-date=16 August 2013 }}

{{blockquote|Notwithstanding the UK government's and the Scottish Executive's obligations under part II of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages, the Scottish Executive recognises and respects Scots (in all its forms) as a distinct language, and does not consider the use of Scots to be an indication of poor competence in English.}}

Evidence for its existence as a separate language lies in the extensive body of Scots literature, its independent – if somewhat fluid – orthographic conventions, and in its former use as the language of the original Parliament of Scotland.See for example {{cite web |url=https://www.legislation.gov.uk/aosp/1560/1/contents |title=Confession of Faith Ratification Act 1560 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200826030235/https://www.legislation.gov.uk/aosp/1560/1/contents |archive-date=26 August 2020 }}, written in Scots and still part of British Law Because Scotland retained distinct political, legal, and religious systems after the Union, many Scots terms passed into Scottish English.

File:William Wye Smith-The New Testament in Braid Scots.pdf in Braid Scots]]

During the 2010s, increased interest was expressed in the language.

The status of the language was raised in Scottish schools,{{cite news|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-31453253|title=Scots language being revived in schools|work=BBC News|date=13 February 2015}} with Scots being included in the new national school curriculum.{{cite web|url=http://www.educationscotland.gov.uk/knowledgeoflanguage/scots/scotsandliteracy/curriculum/index.asp|title=Knowledge of Language: Scots: Scots and Curriculum for Excellence|publisher=Education Scotland|access-date=18 October 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161014173218/http://www.educationscotland.gov.uk/knowledgeoflanguage/scots/scotsandliteracy/curriculum/index.asp|archive-date=2016-10-14}} Previously in Scotland's schools there had been little education taking place through the medium of Scots, although it may have been covered superficially in English lessons, which could entail reading some Scots literature and observing the local dialect. Much of the material used was often Standard English disguised as Scots, which caused upset among proponents of Standard English and proponents of Scots alike.{{Cite news|url=http://www.scotsman.com/news/exposed-to-ridicule-1-512738|title=Exposed to ridicule|work=The Scotsman|date=7 February 2004|access-date=18 October 2015}} One example of the educational establishment's approach to Scots is, "Write a poem in Scots. (It is important not to be worried about spelling in this – write as you hear the sounds in your head.)",{{cite web|url=http://www.ltscotland.org.uk/5to14/specialfocus/scots/ideas/index.asp|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20041030060009/http://www.ltscotland.org.uk/5to14/specialfocus/scots/ideas/index.asp|url-status=dead|archive-date=30 October 2004|title=Scots – Teaching approaches – Learning and Teaching Scotland Online Service|publisher=Ltscotland.org.uk|date=3 November 2005|access-date=21 May 2009|df=dmy-all}} whereas guidelines for English require teaching pupils to be "writing fluently and legibly with accurate spelling and punctuation".{{cite web|url=http://www.ltscotland.org.uk/5to14/htmlunrevisedguidelines/Pages/englang/main/elng1003.htm|title=National Guidelines 5–14: ENGLISH LANGUAGE Learning and Teaching Scotland Online Service|publisher=Ltscotland.org.uk|access-date=21 May 2009|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081006192200/http://www.ltscotland.org.uk/5to14/htmlunrevisedguidelines/Pages/englang/main/elng1003.htm|archive-date=6 October 2008}}

A course in Scots language and culture delivered through the medium of Standard English and produced by the Open University (OU) in Scotland, the Open University's School of Languages and Applied Linguistics as well as Education Scotland became available online for the first time in December 2019.{{Cite web |url=https://www.open.edu/openlearncreate/course/index.php?categoryid=382 |title=OLCreate: Scots language and culture |access-date=22 December 2019 |archive-date=26 August 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200826030240/https://www.open.edu/openlearncreate/course/index.php?categoryid=382 |url-status=live }}

In the 2011 Scottish census, a question on Scots language ability was featured. In the 2022 census conducted by the Scottish Government, a question in relation to the Scots language was also featured.{{Cite web |title=Scottish government website |url=https://www.scotlandscensus.gov.uk/media/ulcfhmoq/scotlands-census-2022-individual-questionnaire.pdf |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230707161600/https://www.scotlandscensus.gov.uk/media/ulcfhmoq/scotlands-census-2022-individual-questionnaire.pdf |archive-date=Jul 7, 2023 }}{{Cite web|title=Planning the 2022 census {{pipe}} Scotland's Census|url=https://www.scotlandscensus.gov.uk/plans-scotland%E2%80%99s-census-2021|url-status=deviated |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200826030242/https://www.scotlandscensus.gov.uk/plans-scotland%E2%80%99s-census-2021|archive-date=26 August 2020|access-date=7 January 2022|website=Scotland's Census}} It was found that 1,508,540 people reported that they could speak Scots, with 2,444,659 reporting that they could speak, read, write or understand Scots,{{cite web|website=Scottish Government|url=https://www.gov.scot/policies/languages/scots|title=Scots - Languages }} approximately 45% of Scotland's 2022 population. The Scottish Government set its first Scots Language Policy in 2015, in which it pledged to support its preservation and encourage respect, recognition and use of Scots. The Scottish Parliament website also offers some information on the language in Scots.{{cite web|url=http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/help/79056.aspx|title=Scots - Help |publisher=Scottish Parliament|access-date=18 October 2015 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151109171441/http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/help/79056.aspx |archive-date= Nov 9, 2015 }}

In September 2024, experts of the Council of Europe called on the UK Government to "boost support for regional and minority languages", including the Scots Language.{{cite news|website=Scottish Legal News|url=https://www.scottishlegal.com/articles/council-of-europe-experts-call-on-uk-to-boost-support-for-regional-and-minority-languages |date= 20 Sep 2024 |title=Council of Europe experts call on UK to boost support for regional and minority languages}}{{cite news|website=The Guardian|url=https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/sep/19/uk-urged-to-promote-speaking-of-irish-and-ulster-scots-in-northern-ireland |first1=Lisa |last1=O'Carroll |date=Sep 18, 2024 |title=UK urged to promote speaking of Irish and Ulster Scots in Northern Ireland}}{{cite news|website=The Herald|url=https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/24594585.scots-gaelic-teaching-must-strengthened-says-report |first1=Gabriel |last1=McKay |date=18 September 2024 |title=Scots and Gaelic teaching must be strengthened says report}}{{cite news|website=The Scotsman|url=https://www.scotsman.com/news/politics/scots-speakers-gaelic-hate-speech-threats-european-report-4788448 |date=19 Sep 2024 |first1=Jane |last1=Bradley |title=Scots speakers experience 'threats and hate speech' amid calls to 'depoliticise' Gaelic}}

The serious use of the Scots language for news, encyclopaediae, documentaries, etc., remains rare. It is reportedly reserved for niches{{Clarify|date=September 2024}} where it is deemed acceptable, e.g. comedy, Burns Night or traditions' representations.

Since 2016, the newspaper The National has regularly published articles in the language.{{Cite web|url=https://www.thenational.scot/news/17519026.the-national-at-the-fore-of-dictionary-updates-of-scots-language/ |first1=Katharina |last1=Moos Bille |title=The National at the fore of dictionary updates of Scots language|website=The National|date=22 March 2019 }} The 2010s also saw an increasing number of English books translated in Scots and becoming widely available, particularly those in popular children's fiction series such as The Gruffalo, Harry Potter, Diary of a Wimpy Kid, and several by Roald Dahl{{Cite web|url=https://www.scotslanguage.com/articles/node/id/108|title= Children's books in Scots|website=Scotslanguage.com }} and David Walliams.{{cite web |title=Book List: Scots books for 9–14 year olds |url=https://www.scottishbooktrust.com/book-lists/scots-books-for-9-14-year-olds |access-date=2021-10-21 |website=Scottish Book Trust |language=en-GB}} In 2021, the music streaming service Spotify created a Scots language listing.{{cite web |url=https://www.scotsman.com/whats-on/arts-and-entertainment/singer-wins-campaign-to-persuade-spotify-to-recognise-scots-language-for-first-time-3155256 |title=Singer wins campaign to persuade Spotify to recognise Scots language for first time |work=The Scotsman |date=4 March 2021}}

The Ferret, a UK-based fact-checking service, wrote an exploratory article in December 2022 to address misconceptions about the Scots language to improve public awareness of its endangered status.{{cite web|website=The Ferret|url=https://theferret.scot/fact-check-claims-about-scots-language|title=Fact check: Claims about the Scots language}}{{cite news|website=The Herald|url=https://www.heraldscotland.com/opinion/23166037.lennie-pennie-debunking-myths-scots-language|title=Lennie Pennie: Debunking the myths about the Scots language}}

In Scotland, Scots is spoken in the Scottish Lowlands, the Northern Isles, Caithness, Arran and Campbeltown. In Ulster, the northern province in Ireland, its area is usually defined through the works of Robert John Gregg to include the counties of Down, Antrim, Londonderry and Donegal (especially in East Donegal and Inishowen).Caroline I. Macafee (ed.), A Concise Ulster Dictionary. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996; pp. xi–xii. More recently, the Fintona-born linguist Warren Maguire has argued that some of the criteria that Gregg used as distinctive of Ulster-Scots are common in south-west Tyrone and were found in other sites across Northern Ireland investigated by the Linguistic Survey of Scotland.{{cite book |last=Maguire |first=Warren |publisher=Edinburgh University Press |isbn=978-1-4744-5290-8 |title=Language and Dialect Contact in Ireland: The Phonological Origins of Mid-Ulster English |year=2020 |page=4}} Dialects of Scots include Insular Scots, Northern Scots, Central Scots, Southern Scots and Ulster Scots.

It has been difficult to determine the number of speakers of Scots via census, because many respondents might interpret the question "Do you speak Scots?" in different ways. Campaigners for Scots pressed for this question to be included in the 2001 UK National Census. The results from a 1996 trial before the Census, by the General Register Office for Scotland (GRO),[Iain Máté] (1996) Scots Language. A Report on the Scots Language Research carried out by the General Register Office for Scotland in 1996, Edinburgh: General Register Office (Scotland). suggested that there were around 1.5 million speakers of Scots, with 30% of Scots responding "Yes" to the question "Can you speak the Scots language?", but only 17% responding "Aye" to the question "Can you speak Scots?".{{Citation needed|date=February 2012}} It was also found that older, working-class people were more likely to answer in the affirmative. The University of Aberdeen Scots Leid Quorum performed its own research in 1995, cautiously suggesting that there were 2.7 million speakers, though with clarification as to why these figures required context.Steve Murdoch, Language Politics in Scotland (AUSLQ, 1995), p. 18

The GRO questions, as freely acknowledged by those who set them, were not as detailed and systematic as those of the University of Aberdeen, and only included reared speakers (people raised speaking Scots), not those who had learned the language. Part of the difference resulted from the central question posed by surveys: "Do you speak Scots?". In the Aberdeen University study, the question was augmented with the further clause "... or a dialect of Scots such as Border etc.", which resulted in greater recognition from respondents. The GRO concluded that there simply was not enough linguistic self-awareness amongst the Scottish populace, with people still thinking of themselves as speaking badly pronounced, grammatically inferior English rather than Scots, for an accurate census to be taken. The GRO research concluded that "[a] more precise estimate of genuine Scots language ability would require a more in-depth interview survey and may involve asking various questions about the language used in different situations. Such an approach would be inappropriate for a Census." Thus, although it was acknowledged that the "inclusion of such a Census question would undoubtedly raise the profile of Scots", no question about Scots was, in the end, included in the 2001 Census.{{cite book|title=A Handbook of Varieties of English|editor=Bernd Kortmann and Edgar W. Schneider|pages=48–49|publisher=Walter de Gruyter|year=2004|isbn=978-3-11-017532-5|chapter=Scottish English: phonology|author=Jane Stuart-Smith|given13=9783110175325}}{{cite journal|title=The Scots Language in education in Scotland|journal=Regional Dossiers Series|publisher=Mercator-Education|issn=1570-1239|format=PDF|year=2002|url=http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2010/01/06105123/4}}{{cite book|title=Scottish Education|author=T.G.K. Bryce and Walter M. Humes|pages=263–264|publisher=Edinburgh University Press|year=2003|isbn=978-0-7486-1625-1}} The Scottish Government's Pupils in Scotland Census 2008{{cite web|url=http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2009/04/01090908/20|title=Pupils in Scotland, 2008|publisher=Scotland.gov.uk|date=1 April 2009|access-date=9 September 2012|archive-date=26 August 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200826030241/https://www.webarchive.org.uk/wayback/archive/20170701074158/www.gov.scot/Publications/2009/04/01090908|url-status=live}} found that 306 pupils{{clarify|date=April 2022}} spoke Scots as their main home language. A Scottish Government study in 2010 found that 85% of around 1000 respondents (being a representative sample of Scotland's adult population) claim to speak Scots to varying degrees.

The 2011 UK census was the first to ask residents of Scotland about Scots. A campaign called Aye Can was set up to help individuals answer the question.{{cite web|title=Scottish Census Day 2011 survey begins|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-12871752|work=BBC News|access-date=21 July 2011|date=26 March 2011}}{{cite web|title=Scots language – Scottish Census 2011|url=http://www.ayecan.com/|work=Aye Can|access-date=21 July 2011}} The specific wording used was "Which of these can you do? Tick all that apply" with options for "Understand", "Speak", "Read" and "Write" in three columns: English, Scottish Gaelic and Scots.{{cite web|title=How to fill in your questionnaire: Individual question 16|url=http://www.scotlandscensus.gov.uk/en/howto/questionshelp/q/i16.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110301034753/http://www.scotlandscensus.gov.uk/en/howto/questionshelp/q/i16.html|url-status=dead|archive-date=1 March 2011|work=Scotland's Census|publisher=General Register Office for Scotland|access-date=21 July 2011|df=dmy-all}} Of approximately 5.1 million respondents, about 1.2 million (24%) could speak, read and write Scots, 3.2 million (62%) had no skills in Scots and the remainder had some degree of skill, such as understanding Scots (0.27 million, 5.2%) or being able to speak it but not read or write it (0.18 million, 3.5%).{{cite web|title=Scotland's Census 2011: Standard Outputs|url=http://www.scotlandscensus.gov.uk/ods-web/standard-outputs.html|publisher=National Records of Scotland|access-date=12 December 2014|archive-date=5 October 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161005011314/http://www.scotlandscensus.gov.uk/ods-web/standard-outputs.html|url-status=live}} There were also small numbers of Scots speakers recorded in England and Wales on the 2011 Census, with the largest numbers being either in bordering areas (e.g. Carlisle) or in areas that had recruited large numbers of Scottish workers in the past (e.g. Corby or the former mining areas of Kent).{{Cite web|url=https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/ukgwa/20160105160709/http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/census/2011-census/key-statistics-for-local-authorities-in-england-and-wales/rft-table-ks206ew.xls|title=UK Government Web Archive|website=webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk}} In the 2022 census conducted by the Scottish Government, it was found that 1,508,540 people reported that they could speak Scots, with 2,444,659 reporting that they could speak, read, write or understand Scots, approximately 45% of Scotland's 2022 population.

{{Main|Scots-language literature}}

Among the earliest Scots literature is John Barbour's Brus (fourteenth century), Wyntoun's Cronykil and Blind Harry's The Wallace (fifteenth century). From the fifteenth century, much literature based on the Royal Court in Edinburgh and the University of St Andrews was produced by writers such as Robert Henryson, William Dunbar, Gavin Douglas and David Lyndsay. The Complaynt of Scotland was an early printed work in Scots. The Eneados is a Middle Scots translation of Virgil's Aeneid, completed by Gavin Douglas in 1513.

After the seventeenth century, anglicisation increased. At the time, many of the oral ballads from the borders and the North East were written down. Writers of the period were Robert Sempill, Robert Sempill the younger, Francis Sempill, Lady Wardlaw and Lady Grizel Baillie.

In the eighteenth century, writers such as Allan Ramsay, Robert Burns, James Orr, Robert Fergusson and Walter Scott continued to use Scots – Burns's "Auld Lang Syne" is in Scots, for example. Scott introduced vernacular dialogue to his novels. Other well-known authors like Robert Louis Stevenson, William Alexander, George MacDonald, J. M. Barrie and other members of the Kailyard school like Ian Maclaren also wrote in Scots or used it in dialogue.

In the Victorian era popular Scottish newspapers regularly included articles and commentary in the vernacular, often of unprecedented proportions.William Donaldson, The Language of the People: Scots Prose from the Victorian Revival, Aberdeen University Press 1989.

In the early twentieth century, a renaissance in the use of Scots occurred, its most vocal figure being Hugh MacDiarmid whose benchmark poem "A Drunk Man Looks at the Thistle" (1926) did much to demonstrate the power of Scots as a modern idiom. Other contemporaries were Douglas Young, John Buchan, Sydney Goodsir Smith, Robert Garioch, Edith Anne Robertson and Robert McLellan. The revival extended to verse and other literature.

In 1955, three Ayrshire men – Sandy MacMillan, an English teacher at Ayr Academy; Thomas Limond, noted town chamberlain of Ayr; and A. L. "Ross" Taylor, rector of Cumnock Academy – collaborated to write {{lang|sco|Bairnsangs}} ("Child Songs"),Bairnsangs {{ISBN|978-0-907526-11-7}} a collection of children's nursery rhymes and poems in Scots. The book contains a five-page glossary of contemporary Scots words and their pronunciations.

Alexander Gray's translations into Scots constitute the greater part of his work, and are the main basis for his reputation.

In 1983, William Laughton Lorimer's translation of the New Testament from the original Greek was published.

Scots is sometimes used in contemporary fiction, such as the Edinburgh dialect of Scots in Trainspotting by Irvine Welsh (later made into a motion picture of the same name).

But'n'Ben A-Go-Go by Matthew Fitt is a cyberpunk novel written entirely in what {{Lang|sco|Wir Ain Leed|italic=no}}{{cite web|author=Andy Eagle|url=http://www.scots-online.org/grammar|title=Wir Ain Leed – An introduction to Modern Scots|publisher=Scots-online.org|date=26 July 2005|access-date=15 September 2012}} ("Our Own Language") calls "General Scots". Like all cyberpunk work, it contains imaginative neologisms.

The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam was translated into Scots by Rab Wilson and published in 2004. Alexander Hutchison has translated the poetry of Catullus into Scots, and in the 1980s, Liz Lochhead produced a Scots translation of Tartuffe by Molière. J. K. Annand translated poetry and fiction from German and Medieval Latin into Scots.

The strip cartoons Oor Wullie and The Broons in the Sunday Post use some Scots. In 2018, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stane, a Scots translation of the first Harry Potter book, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, was published by Matthew Fitt.

{{Further|Modern Scots#Phonology|Phonological history of Scots}}

File:WIKITONGUES- Christine speaking Shetlandic.webm speaking the Shetland dialect of Scots]]

The vowel system of Modern Scots:Aitken A. J. "How to Pronounce Older Scots" in Bards and Makars. Glasgow

University Press 1977

{{notelist}}

Vowel length is usually conditioned by the Scottish vowel length rule.

{{notelist}}

{{Further|Northumbrian Old English|Middle English|Early Scots|Middle Scots|Modern Scots}}

The orthography of Early Scots had become more or less standardisedAgutter, Alex (1987) "A taxonomy of Older Scots orthography" in Caroline Macafee and Iseabail Macleod eds. The Nuttis Schell: Essays on the Scots Language Presented to A. J. Aitken, Aberdeen University Press, p. 75. by the middle to late sixteenth century.Millar, Robert McColl (2005) Language, Nation and Power An Introduction, Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke. pp. 90–91 After the Union of the Crowns in 1603, the Standard English of England came to have an increasing influence on the spelling of ScotsWilson, James (1926) The Dialects of Central Scotland, Oxford University Press. p.194 through the increasing influence and availability of books printed in England. After the Acts of Union in 1707 the emerging Scottish form of Standard English replaced Scots for most formal writing in Scotland.{{r|EdinburghCompanion|page=11}}

The eighteenth-century Scots revival saw the introduction of a new literary language descended from the old court Scots, but with an orthography that had abandoned some of the more distinctive old Scots spellingsTulloch, Graham (1980) The Language of Walter Scott. A Study of his Scottish and Period Language, London: Deutsch. p. 249 and adopted many standard English spellings. Despite the updated spelling, however, the rhymes make it clear that a Scots pronunciation was intended.{{cite encyclopedia|editor-first1=William|editor-last1=Grant|editor-first2=David D.|editor-last2=Murison|title=The Scottish National Dictionary (SND) (1929–1976)|publisher=The Scottish National Dictionary Association|volume=I|location=Edinburgh|page=xv}} These writings also introduced what came to be known as the apologetic apostrophe,{{r|ScottishDictionary|page=xiv}} generally occurring where a consonant exists in the Standard English cognate. This Written Scots drew not only on the vernacular, but also on the King James Bible, and was heavily influenced by the norms and conventions of Augustan English poetry.{{r|OxfordCompanion|page=168}} Consequently, this written Scots looked very similar to contemporary Standard English, suggesting a somewhat modified version of that, rather than a distinct speech form with a phonological system which had been developing independently for many centuries.McClure, J. Derrick (1985) "The debate on Scots orthography" in Manfred Görlach (ed.), Focus on: Scotland, Amsterdam: Benjamins, p. 204 This modern literary dialect, "Scots of the book" or Standard Scots,Mackie, Albert D. (1952) "Fergusson's Language: Braid Scots Then and Now" in Smith, Sydney Goodsir ed. Robert Fergusson 1750–1774, Edinburgh: Nelson, p. 123–124, 129Mairi Robinson (editor-in-chief), The Concise Scots Dictionary, Aberdeen University Press, 1985 p. xiii once again gave Scots an orthography of its own, lacking neither "authority nor author".Stevenson, R.L. (1905). The Works of R. L. Stevenson Vol. 8, "Underwoods", London: Heinemann, p. 152 This literary language used throughout Lowland Scotland and Ulster,Todd, Loreto (1989). The Language of Irish Literature, London: Macmillan, p. 134 embodied by writers such as Allan Ramsay, Robert Fergusson, Robert Burns, Sir Walter Scott, Charles Murray, David Herbison, James Orr, James Hogg and William Laidlaw among others, is well described in the 1921 Manual of Modern Scots.{{cite book|last1=Grant|first1=William|last2=Dixon|first2=James Main|year=1921|title=Manual of Modern Scots|location=Cambridge|publisher=Cambridge University Press}}

Other authors developed dialect writing, preferring to represent their own speech in a more phonological manner rather than following the pan-dialect conventions of modern literary Scots, especially for the northernMcClure, J. Derrick (2002). Doric: The Dialect of North–East Scotland. Amsterdam: Benjamins, p. 79 and insular dialects of Scots.

During the twentieth century, a number of proposals for spelling reform were presented. Commenting on this, John Corbett (2003: 260) writes that "devising a normative orthography for Scots has been one of the greatest linguistic hobbies of the past century". Most proposals entailed regularising the use of established eighteenth- and nineteenth-century conventions, in particular, the avoidance of the apologetic apostrophe, which represented letters that were perceived to be missing when compared to the corresponding English cognates but were never actually present in the Scots word.{{cite web|last=Eagle|first=Andy|date=2014|title=Aw Ae Wey—Written Scots in Scotland and Ulster|url=http://www.scots-online.org/articles/contents/AwAeWey.pdf|version=v1.5}}Rennie, S. (2001) "The Electronic Scottish National Dictionary (eSND): Work in Progress", Literary and Linguistic Computing, 2001 16(2), Oxford University Press, pp. 159 For example, in the fourteenth century, Barbour spelt the Scots cognate of "taken" as {{lang|sco|tane}}. It is argued that, because there has been no k in the word for over 700 years, representing its omission with an apostrophe is of little value. The current spelling is usually {{lang|sco|taen}}.

Through the twentieth century, with the decline of spoken Scots and knowledge of the literary tradition, phonetic (often humorous) representations became more common.{{Citation needed|date=October 2020}}

{{see also|Modern Scots#Grammar|label 1=Modern Scots grammar}}

Modern Scots follows the subject–verb–object sentence structure like Standard English. However, the word order {{Lang|sco|Gie's it}} (Give us it) vs. "Give it to me" may be preferred.{{r|OxfordCompanion|page=897}}

The indefinite article a may be used before both consonants and vowels. The definite article the is used before the names of seasons, days of the week, many nouns, diseases, trades and occupations, sciences and academic subjects.{{r|"Manual of Scots"|page=78}} It is also often used in place of the indefinite article and instead of a possessive pronoun.{{r|"Manual of Scots"|page=77}}

Scots includes some irregular plurals such as {{lang|sco|ee/een}} ("eye/eyes"), {{lang|sco|cauf/caur}} ("calf/calves"), {{lang|sco|horse/horse}} ("horse/horses"), {{lang|sco|cou/kye}} ("cow/cows") and {{lang|sco|shae/shuin}} ("shoe/shoes") that survived from Old English into Modern Scots, but have become regularised plurals in Standard Modern English – ox/oxen and child/children being exceptions.{{r|"Manual of Scots"|page=79}}{{r|OxfordCompanion|page=896}} Nouns of measure and quantity remain unchanged in the plural.{{r|OxfordCompanion|page=896}}{{r|"Manual of Scots"|page=80}}

The relative pronoun is that for all persons and numbers, but may be elided.{{r|OxfordCompanion|page=896}}{{r|"Manual of Scots"|page=102}} Modern Scots also has a third adjective/adverb this-that-yon/yonder ({{lang|sco|thon/thonder}}) indicating something at some distance.{{r|OxfordCompanion|page=896}} {{lang|sco|Thir}} and {{lang|sco|thae}} are the plurals of this and that respectively.

The present tense of verbs adheres to the Northern subject rule whereby verbs end in -s in all persons and numbers except when a single personal pronoun is next to the verb.{{r|OxfordCompanion|page=896}}{{r|"Manual of Scots"|page=112}} Certain verbs are often used progressively{{r|OxfordCompanion|page=896}} and verbs of motion may be dropped before an adverb or adverbial phrase of motion.{{r|OxfordCompanion|page=897}}

Many verbs have strong or irregular forms which are distinctive from Standard English.{{r|OxfordCompanion|page=896}}{{r|"Manual of Scots"|page=126}}

The regular past form of the weak or regular verbs is -it, -t or -ed, according to the preceding consonant or vowel.{{r|OxfordCompanion|page=896}}{{r|"Manual of Scots"|page=113}}

The present participle and gerund in are now usually {{IPA|/ən/}}{{cite book|last=Beal|first=J.|chapter=Syntax and Morphology|editor-last=Jones|editor-first=C.|title=The Edinburgh History of the Scots Language|location=Edinburgh|publisher=University of Edinburgh Press|page=356}} but may still be differentiated {{IPA|/ən/}} and {{IPA|/in/}} in Southern Scots,{{cite web|url=http://www.dsl.ac.uk/INTRO/intro2.php?num=22|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120121171949/http://www.dsl.ac.uk/INTRO/intro2.php?num=22|url-status=dead|archive-date=21 January 2012|title=SND Introduction - Dialect Districts. p.xxxi|publisher=Dsl.ac.uk|access-date=21 May 2009}} and {{IPA|/ən/}} and {{IPA|/ɪn/}} in Northern Scots.

The negative particle is {{lang|sco|na}}, sometimes spelled {{lang|sco|nae}}, e.g. {{lang|sco|canna}} ("can't"), {{lang|sco|daurna}} ("daren't"), {{lang|sco|michtna}} ("mightn't").{{r|"Manual of Scots"|page=115}}

Adverbs usually take the same form as the verb root or adjective, especially after verbs. Examples include {{lang|sco|Haein a real guid day}} ("Having a really good day") and {{Lang|sco|She's awfu fauchelt}} ("She's awfully tired").

From The Four Gospels in Braid Scots (William Wye Smith):

{{Poemquote

|text={{lang|sco|Noo the nativitie o' Jesus Christ was this gate: whan his mither Mary was mairry't till Joseph, 'or they cam thegither, she was fund wi' bairn o' the Holie Spirit.

Than her guidman, Joseph, bein an upricht man, and no desirin her name sud be i' the mooth o' the public, was ettlin to pit her awa' hidlins.

But as he had thir things in his mind, see! an Angel o' the Lord appear't to him by a dream, sayin, "Joseph, son o' Dauvid, binna feared to tak till ye yere wife, Mary; for that whilk is begotten in her is by the Holie Spirit.

"And she sall bring forth a son, and ye sal ca' his name {{smallcaps|Jesus}}; for he sal save his folk frae their sins."

Noo, a' this was dune, that it micht come to pass what was said by the Lord throwe the prophet,

"Tak tent! a maiden sal be wi' bairn, and sal bring forth a son; and they wull ca' his name Emmanuel," whilk is translatit, "God wi' us."

Sae Joseph, comin oot o' his sleep, did as the Angel had bidden him, and took till him his wife.

And leev'd in continence wi' her till she had brocht forth her firstborn son; and ca'd his name {{smallcaps|Jesus}}.|italic=no}}

|source=Matthew 1:18–21

}}

From The New Testament in Scots (William Laughton Lorimer, 1885–1967)

{{Poemquote

|text={{lang|sco|This is the storie o the birth o Jesus Christ. His mither Mary wis trystit til Joseph, but afore they war mairriet she wis fund tae be wi bairn bi the Halie Spírit. Her husband Joseph, honest man, hed nae mind tae affront her afore the warld an wis for brakkin aff their tryst hidlinweys; an sae he wis een ettlin tae dae, whan an angel o the Lord kythed til him in a draim an said til him, "Joseph, son o Dauvit, be nane feared tae tak Mary your trystit wife intil your hame; the bairn she is cairrein is o the Halie Spírit. She will beir a son, an the name ye ar tae gíe him is Jesus, for he will sauf his fowk frae their sins."

Aa this happent at the wurd spokken bi the Lord throu the Prophet micht be fulfilled: Behaud, the virgin wil bouk an beir a son, an they will caa his name Immanuel – that is, "God wi us".

Whan he hed waukit frae his sleep, Joseph did as the angel hed bidden him, an tuik his trystit wife hame wi him. But he bedditna wi her or she buir a son; an he caa'd the bairn Jesus.|italic=no}}

|source=Matthew 1:18–21

}}

Given that there are no universally accepted criteria for distinguishing a language from a dialect, scholars and other interested parties often disagree about the linguistic, historical and social status of Scots, particularly its relationship to English.{{cite book|author-link=A. J. Aitken|last=Aitken|first=A. J.|title=The Oxford Companion to the English Language|publisher=Oxford University Press|year=1992|page=894}} Although a number of paradigms for distinguishing between languages and dialects exist, they often render contradictory results. Broad Scots is at one end of a bipolar linguistic continuum, with Scottish Standard English at the other.{{cite book|last=Stuart-Smith|first=J.|chapter=Scottish English: Phonology|title=Varieties of English: The British Isles|editor-last1=Kortman|editor-last2=Upton|location=Mouton de Gruyter, New York|year=2008|page=47}} Scots is sometimes regarded as a variety of English, though it has its own distinct dialects;{{r|OxfordCompanion|page=894}} other scholars treat Scots as a distinct Germanic language, in the way that Norwegian is closely linked to but distinct from Danish.{{r|OxfordCompanion|page=894}}

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• Bungi Creole of the Canadian Metis people of Scottish/British descent
• Doric dialect (Scotland)
• Glasgow patter
• Billy Kay
• Languages of the United Kingdom
• Phonological history of Scots
• Scotticism
• Scottish Corpus of Texts and Speech
• Scottish literature
• Scots Wikipedia

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{{Wikibooks|Lowland Scots}}

{{InterWiki|code=sco}}

• [http://www.scots-online.org/ Scots-online]
• [http://www.lallans.co.uk/ The Scots Language Society]
• [http://www.scotslanguage.com/ Scots Language Centre]
• [https://archive.org/details/dialects-english-scots Internet Archive Collection on Dialects of English and Scots]

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