Friday, 30 December 2011 01:20

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Edinburgh’s Hogmanay 2011/12 is a key part of Scotland’s tourism calendar, and was worth more than £32 million to the Scottish economy in 2010/2011, with 132,000 people coming to Edinburgh over the course of the festival.

Pete Irvine, Creative Director of Edinburgh’s Hogmanay, said “With four of the six ticketed events already sold out, we are looking forward to a fantastic Hogmanay.

Thursday, 29 December 2011 21:35

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By Paul Kavanagh – [click here for parts 7 and 8]

1800 AD : It was during this period that both Scotland’s major languages became minoritised, but Scots and Gaelic were affected by the advance of English in different ways.  A minoritised language is something different from a minority language although the two categories often overlap.  A minoritised language is one that has been driven from public use and whose use is not recognised or supported by the state, which works exclusively through the medium of another language.  The state sees its goal as the spread of this language to the exclusion of other languages.

Thursday, 29 December 2011 21:19

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By Paul Kavanagh – [click here for parts 5 and 6]

1400 AD : A massive shift to Scots is in progress in the Lowlands. By this time Scots is regarded as a different language from English, and was in the process of undergoing a complex set of linguistic changes which would eventually turn it into a language quite different in character from its closest relative.  Most of the distinctive features of Scots pronunciation arose during this period and the language was being lexically enriched as writers strove to adapt it for use as the language of the Scottish state and administration.  Literature in Scots starts to become abundant and covers a diverse range of topics, styles and themes.