# Lallans > Mediated Wiki article. Canonical URL: https://mediated.wiki/source/Lallans > Markdown URL: https://mediated.wiki/source/Lallans.md > Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lallans > Source revision: 1331846769 > License: Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/) {{Short description|Term used to refer to the Scottish language}} {{Distinguish|Lallans (magazine)}} {{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}} thumb|Commemorative plaque in Lallans, Edinburgh '''Lallans''' ({{IPAc-en|ˈ|l|æ|l|ə|n|z}} {{respell|LAL|ənz}},{{cite encyclopedia |editor-last=Stevenson |editor-first=Angus |title=Lallans |encyclopedia=Oxford Dictionary of English |year=2015 |orig-year=2010 |edition=3rd |url=https://www.oxfordreference.com/display/10.1093/acref/9780199571123.001.0001/m_en_gb0454690 |url-access=subscription |publisher=Oxford University Press |publication-place=New York, NY |isbn=978-0-19-172766-5 |oclc=700212397}} {{IPA|sco|ˈlɑːlən(d)z, ˈlo̜ːl-|lang}};[http://www.dsl.ac.uk/dsl/getent4.php?query=lawland&sset=1&fset=20&printset=20&searchtype=full&dregion=form&dtext=both SND: Lawland] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120121193351/http://www.dsl.ac.uk/dsl/getent4.php?query=lawland&sset=1&fset=20&printset=20&searchtype=full&dregion=form&dtext=both |date=2012-01-21 }} a [Modern Scots](/source/Modern_Scots) variant of the word ''lawlands'', referring to the [lowlands of Scotland](/source/Scottish_Lowlands)), means the [Scots language](/source/Scots_language), or certain varieties of it. The term was traditionally used to refer to the Scots as a whole.{{Cite web |url=http://www.dsl.ac.uk/dsl/getent4.php?plen=7096&startset=22153396&query=LALLAN&fhit=lallans&dregion=entry&dtext=snd#fhit |title=SND: Lallan |access-date=2009-01-07 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070926234636/http://www.dsl.ac.uk/dsl/getent4.php?plen=7096&startset=22153396&query=LALLAN&fhit=lallans&dregion=entry&dtext=snd#fhit |archive-date=2007-09-26 |url-status=dead }} However, more recent interpretations assume it refers to the dialects of south and central Scotland,{{Citation needed|date=January 2009}} while ''[Doric](/source/Doric_dialect_(Scotland))'', a term once used to refer to Scots dialects in general, is now generally seen to refer to the [Mid Northern Scots](/source/Mid_Northern_Scots) dialects spoken in the north-east of Scotland.[http://www.dsl.ac.uk/dsl/getent4.php?query=doric&sset=1&fset=20&printset=20&searchtype=full&dregion=form&dtext=all SND:Doric] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110526195414/http://www.dsl.ac.uk/dsl/getent4.php?query=doric&sset=1&fset=20&printset=20&searchtype=full&dregion=form&dtext=all |date=2011-05-26 }}{{cite book |last=Millar |first=Robert McColl |author-link=Robert McColl Millar|title=Northern and Insular Scots | publisher=Edinburgh University Press |publication-place=Edinburgh |year=2007 |isbn=978-0-7486-2996-1 |oclc=100562381 |page=116}} ==Burns and Stevenson== Both [Robert Burns](/source/Robert_Burns) and [Robert Louis Stevenson](/source/Robert_Louis_Stevenson) used it to refer to the Scots language as a whole. They took nae pains their speech to balance,
Or rules to gie;
But spak their thoughts in plain, braid lallans,
Like you or me.
:—Robert Burns in ''Epistle To William Simson''{{cite book |last=Burns |first=Robert |editor-last=Douglas |editor-first=W. S. |chapter=Epistle To William Simson |chapter-url=https://hdl.handle.net/2027/uc2.ark:/13960/t52f7s464?urlappend=%3Bseq=233 |title=The works of Robert Burns |publisher=James Thin, publisher to the University |publication-place=Edinburgh |year=1895 |oclc=679697994 |pages=121–128 |hdl=2027/uc2.ark:/13960/t52f7s464?urlappend=%3Bseq=233 |via=HathiTrust}} "What tongue does your auld bookie speak?"
He'll spier; an' I, his mou to steik:
"No bein' fit to write in Greek,
I wrote in Lallan,
Dear to my heart as the peat reek,
Auld as Tantallon.
:—Robert Louis Stevenson in "The Maker to Posterity"{{cite book |last=Stevenson |first=Robert Louis |chapter=The Maker to Posterity |chapter-url=https://hdl.handle.net/2027/loc.ark:/13960/t39z9p19j?urlappend=%3Bseq=103 |title=Underwoods |publisher=C. Scribner's Sons |publication-place=New York |year=1887 |oclc=894242668 |pages=77–79 |hdl=2027/loc.ark:/13960/t39z9p19j?urlappend=%3Bseq=103 |via=HathiTrust}} ==Synthetic Scots== The term ''Lallans'' was also used during the [Scottish Renaissance](/source/Scottish_Renaissance) of the early 20th century to refer to what [Hugh MacDiarmid](/source/Hugh_MacDiarmid) called ''synthetic Scots'', i.e., a synthesis integrating, blending, and combining various forms of the [Scots language](/source/Scots_language), both [vernacular](/source/vernacular) and [archaic](/source/archaism). This was intended as a classical, standard Scots for a world-class literature. [Sydney Goodsir Smith](/source/Sydney_Goodsir_Smith) in his 1951 essay "A Short Introduction to Scottish Literature" commented: :''“When MacDiarmid spoke of 'Synthetic Scots', he merely referred to another aspect of this necessary revolution; that we should forget the whole poverty-stricken 'dialect' tradition that Burns and his predecessors had unconsciously been responsible for, and use again all the rich resources of the language as [Dunbar](/source/William_Dunbar) and the [Makars](/source/Makars) had used it, as had Burns and [Fergusson](/source/Robert_Fergusson), [Scott](/source/Sir_Walter_Scott), [Galt](/source/John_Galt_(novelist)), Stevenson, and [George Douglas Brown](/source/George_Douglas_Brown). In fact to make a synthesis where for too long there had been "disintegration".'' However, the result was more often than not Scots words grafted on to a [standard English](/source/standard_English) grammatical structure somewhat removed from traditional spoken Scots, its main practitioners not being habitual Lowland Scots speakers themselves. "In addition, the present century has seen the conscious creation of a 'mainstream' variety of Scots — a standard literary variety,... referred to as 'synthetic Scots', now generally goes under the name Lallans (=Lowlands).... In its grammar and spelling, it shows the marked influence of Standard English, more so than other Scots dialects."{{cite book |last=Crystal |first=David |author-link=David Crystal |title=The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English language |publisher=Cambridge University Press |publication-place=Cambridge [England] |year=1995 |isbn=978-0-521-40179-1 |oclc=31518847 |page=333}} MacDiarmid's detractors often referred to it as ''plastic Scots'' — a word play on ''synthetic'' as in synthetic plastics — to emphasize its artificiality. [Roy Campbell](/source/Roy_Campbell_(poet)), a [South African poet](/source/South_African_poetry) of proudly [Scottish descent](/source/Scottish_diaspora) and political opponent and critic of MacDiarmid since the [Spanish Civil War](/source/Spanish_Civil_War), in later life poked fun at MacDiarmid's use of Synthetic Scots in the poem ''Ska-hawtch Wha Hae! A Likkle wee poom i'th' Aulde Teashoppe Pidgin Brogue, Lallands or Butter-Scotch (Wi' apooligees to MockDiarmid)''.{{sfn |Campbell |2001 |pp=106–108}} In a footnote explaining the poem, Campbell scholar [Joseph Pearce](/source/Joseph_Pearce) wrote, "MacDiarmid championed the use of Scots... in poetry, often employing traditional or regional parochialisms in artificial or dubious contexts."{{sfn |Campbell |2001 |p=106}} [Sydney Goodsir Smith](/source/Sydney_Goodsir_Smith), however, defended the literary use of the idiom in his ''Epistle to John Guthrie'': :''We've come intil a gey queer time'' :''Whan scrievin Scots is near a crime,'' :'''There's no one speaks like that', they fleer,'' :''-But wha the deil spoke like King Lear?'' ==Magazines== ''[Lallans](/source/Lallans_(magazine))'' is the name of the magazine of the [Scots Language Society](/source/Scots_Language_Society). In [Ulster](/source/Ulster) the neologism ''Ullans'' merging ''Ulster'' and ''Lallans'' is often used to refer to a revived literary variety of [Ulster Scots](/source/Ulster_Scots_dialects). The magazine of the [Ulster Scots Language Society](/source/Ulster_Scots_Language_Society) is also named ''Ullans''. ==See also== *[History of the Scots language](/source/History_of_the_Scots_language) ==References== {{reflist|50em}} ===Sources=== *{{cite book |last=Campbell |first=Roy |author-link=Roy Campbell (poet)|editor-last=Pearce |editor-first=Joseph |editor-link=Joseph Pearce |title=Roy Campbell: Selected Poems |publisher=Ad Donker |publication-place=Johannesburg |year=2001 |isbn=978-0-86852-223-4 |oclc=51168085}} ==Further reading== *{{cite book |last=Hart |first=Matthew |title=Nations of Nothing But Poetry |chapter=The Impossibility of Synthetic Scots; Or, Hugh MacDiarmid's Nationalist Internationalism |publisher=Oxford University Press |date=2010-03-19 |pages=51–78 |doi=10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195390339.003.0003 |isbn=978-0-19-539033-9 |ref=none}} *{{cite journal |last=Kinghorn |first=Alexander Manson |title=WHA'LL PENT TRULIE SCOTLAnd's HEID? "An Essay on the Lallans Tradition" |journal=The University of Texas Studies in English |url=http://www.jstor.org/stable/20776067 |url-access=registration |publisher=University of Texas Press |volume=32 |year=1953 |issn=2158-7973 |pages=133–147 |jstor=20776067 |access-date=2023-07-09 |ref=none}} *{{cite web |title=Scottish literature Poetry, Novels & Plays |website=Encyclopedia Britannica |date=1998-07-20 |url=https://www.britannica.com/art/Scottish-literature |ref=none |access-date=2023-07-09}} *{{cite journal |last=Wagner |first=Geoffrey |title=Contemporary "Synthetic" Scots |journal=University of Toronto Quarterly |publisher=University of Toronto Press |volume=23 |issue=4 |date=2015-07-01 |issn=1712-5278 |pages=410–420 |doi=10.3138/utq.23.4.410 |url=https://muse.jhu.edu/article/560670/summary |access-date=2023-07-09 |ref=none}} ==External links== *[https://www.lallans.co.uk ''Lallans'' magazine] *[https://www.evertype.com/books/alice-sco-synth.html ''Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland'' translated into Synthetic Scots] by Andrew McCallum {{Scottish literature}} * Category:Scots language Category:Scottish literature Category:Scottish Renaissance --- Adapted from the Wikipedia article [Lallans](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lallans) by Wikipedia contributors ([contributor history](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lallans?action=history)). 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