A great deal of the distinctiveness of the Scots lexicon derives from the influence of other languages, especially Gaelic, Norwegian, and French. Gaelic loans, for example, include cairn, capercailzie, ceilidh, claymore, gillie, glen, ingle, loch, pibroch sporran, and whisky, and several of these are now part of Standard English. The following are among the lexical items which remain restricted to Scots. It is the tiniest of samples, considering that The Scots Thesaurus (1990), for example, lists over 20,000 items.
| airt
| direction
|
| ay
| always
|
| dominie
| teacher
|
| dreich
| dreary
|
| fash
| bother
|
| high-heid yin
| boss
|
| janitor
| caretaker
|
| kirk
| church
|
| outwith
| outside of
|
| pinkie
| little finger
|
| swither
| hesitate
|
There are also many words which have the same form as in SE, but are different in meaning. Examples include scheme (local government housing estate), mind (memory, recollection), travel (go on foot), and gate (road), as well as several idioms, such as to miss oneself (to miss a treat) or be up to high doh (be over-excited).
In Scotland a complex dialect picture is to be observed, with a continuum linking SE and Scots in informal speech and to some extent in writing.
Case study 6: Welsh English
T he distinctiveness of Welsh English varies greatly within Wales, being most noticeable in areas where Welsh is strong (the north-west). There is no universally used standard variety, despite the fact that some features are thought by outsiders to be ‘typically Welsh’, and used in a stereotyped way in literature and humour. A good example is the tag look you, a direct translation from a Welsh tag, which is rarely if ever used by real Welsh English.
