Why is Scots a language?
The status of Scots as a language is founded on a number of criteria. Historically, its vocabulary and grammar diverged sufficiently from southern English and performed a wide enough range of social functions for Scots to be considered a fully-fledged language. Literature still thrives in different social and regional dialects of Scots. In recent years, however, the linguistic differences between Scots and southern English have been diluted; even so, they remain obvious enough for many people in Scotland to use them to identify themselves as Scots. Since the Scots tongue is recognised as a valid signifier of national identity, it is recognised as a distinct language, for example by the European Bureau of Lesser Used Languages. Spoken Scots The Scots tongue is recognisable by its:pronunciation, e.g. the r sounds produced before consonants and at the ends of wordsvocabulary, e.g. words like scunner, ‘disgust’, oxter, ‘armpit’ and stour ‘dust’grammar, e.g. the old n plural found in words
