Join Len Pennie, the renowned Scots poet celebrated for her Scots word of the day on Twitter and TikTok, and Dr. Michael Dempster, director at the Scots Language Centre, as they discuss the historical divergence of Scots from English and uncover the rich tapestry of creative works that have flourished in the Scots language. Engage in the debate surrounding the thorny issue of a standardised orthography for Scots, as well as the pressing threats that endanger the future of the language.

“The time has now come for conversations about Scots to be in complete isolation from English.”

Scots and English are sister languages with many similarities, but they are not the same. These days, Scots is minoritised and often seen as ‘bad English’. But how did it get this reputation, and is its future under threat?

Len Pennie and Dr Michael Dempster join Richard to explore the divergence of Scots from English, Scots’ rich history as a language of creative works, and they share the vibrancy of the language through some of their favourite words, phrases and dialects.

Follow Len’s ‘Scots Word of the Day’ on TikTok and check out Michael’s website mindyerlanguage.scot. 

Take a look at the special section on Scotticisms in The Chambers Dictionary here.

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Your host is polyglot Richard Simcott. The Language Podcast is an OG Podcasts production.

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